Kid-Made Rainbow Cupcakes

I'm certain that we eat too much white flour, and too many sweets.

But baking them is so much fun!

Syd wanted to make rainbow cupcakes last week, and it was a project that she did almost completely independently. Hence the mess:

Which she cleaned up, incidentally--I'm still really struggling with getting the girls into the habit of cleaning up after themselves on a regular basis, but they do clean up after their projects very well (with prompting).

Sydney made the batter, following the instructions that I read out loud to her from our vanilla cupcake recipe (I usually use the vanilla cupcake recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, which is yummier, but this one seemed easier for a kid to make by herself), then divided it while I dragged out the dregs of our food coloring stash:

I've used the Wilton gel coloring for years, but as the colors have been running out I've been considering upgrading to healthier food coloring. I'm waffling, however, which means that right now we have neither healthier food coloring NOR a good selection of Wilton gels anymore. So Syd had to get a little creative!

Paper plates are NOT what I would have steered her to if I'd been making these cupcakes. We buy paper for road trips and birthday parties, and then I always try to hide the extras away until the next road trip or birthday party, and yet somehow the kids and Matt always find them! Mark my words, I'm probably going to have to buy more paper plates for next week's road trip, now, so that the vicious cycle will continue.

These poor cupcakes took almost 24 hours to make. Syd started the process early one afternoon, then had to put it aside because we had our volunteer gig that afternoon, then worked on it some more after dinner that night, then had to put it aside for bedtime, then got it back out after breakfast the next day, and then FINALLY had the rainbow cupcakes of her dreams!

And then, apparently, she got my camera out, because I did not take the following glamour shots of these rainbow cupcakes:

See? White flour and sugar!

But also math, independent work, practical life skills, creative thinking, problem solving...

And yummy dessert.