Treasure Jar

This April and May, let your children explore the joys of cooking and baking as The Maya Kitchen offers classes for kids 6-12 years old and teens 13 years old and up.

Junior Master Chef Grand Champion Kyle Imao teaches Kids Kitchen Adventure with its first batch on April 8, 10, 11, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, 9am-2pm.

Recipes correspond to school subjects. For math and science: rainbow layer cake, apple pie and strawberries dipped in popping chocolate.  For history: Filipino fried chicken, Filipino style barbecue and Ginataang Halo-halo. Other recipes include Burritos, Kani sandwiches and Chocolate Eclairs.

The class fee of Php6,000 includes apron and toque, handouts, ingredients, and snacks. Each student will receive a certificate. The second batch is on May 6-9, Tuesday-Friday 9am-12noon.

Young and talented instructor Sabrina Daez is in charge of Teens Culinary Series on April 22-25(Tues-Fri) 9:00 AM to 2:00 PM.

Recipes include: ‘Italian Feast’-Beef and Spinach Cannelloni, Chicken and Mushroom Risotto, Cream Puffs, Chocolate Truffles; ‘Along The Coast Of Britain’-Mustard-Grain Pretzel, Fish and Chips, Cream of Pumpkin Soup, Berry-Mango Trifle; ‘The American Superbowl’-Cheese-Stuffed Burgers, Cajun Mojos, Hot Fudge Sauce, Caramel Sauce, Brownie S’mores.

The class fee of Php7,000 includes apron and toque, handouts, ingredients, snacks and lunch. Each student will receive a certificate. The second batch is on May 20-23, 9am-2pm.

Single session classes are also available: Food Arts & Crafts, May 2, Friday, 9am-2pm; Dough-Re-Mi,May 16, Friday, 9am-2pm; and Cake Factory, May 30, Friday, 9am-2pm.  Class fee is P1,000 per student.

For more information on other courses offerings, log on to www.themayakitchen.com  or e-mailcontactus@themayakitchen.com  or visit The Maya Kitchen Culinary Center every Tuesday toSaturday at 8F  Liberty Building, 835 A. Arnaiz Avenue (Pasay Road), Makati City or call 8921185 / 892-5011 local 108 / Mobile No. +63947 835 2290.

Tags: Summer Kitchen Adventure for Teens and Kids at The Maya Kitchen, The Maya Kitchen, The Maya Kitchen summer classes

Doing crafts is one interesting way to spend time with children. As a homeschooling mother, the kids and I look forward to these activities where they get to experiment and work with paints, glue, scissors and different art materials.

Why, we even made our own Christmas decor last Christmas. We made paper stockings, personalized gift tags, and photos on the tree.

Below is one craft we made last year:

Disney Princesses Wind Chimes

When using paints, it is important to have the children wear something to protect their clothes, like a big old shirt or an apron.

Cover the work area with paper so that the paint will not flow on the table and make a mess.

Go get those art materials now and spend quality time with your children 🙂

Tags: Arts and Crafts, family, wind chimes, wooden projects

Did you give practical gifts last Christmas?

You know, things that can be used by the recipient? Or would these just gather dust and be discarded after a year?

I think we did. One of the gifts we gave away to the teachers were handmade notepads which they can use just in case they needed to write down notes and thoughts. The notepads were not big and could easily fit in a small bag.

These were the papers we used for the notepads. For more info on how these notepads were made, click here.

For the person who loves arts and crafts, arts and crafts materials are the best to give. For the one who loves to cook, a cookbook or a kitchen gadget.

These were just some ideas and I’m sure there are so much more practical gift ideas out there.

Got summer plans already?

There is so much to do during summer and for sure, school children will not get bored with the many choices as to what they can do when school’s out:

• travel and see how much fun it is in the Philippines (needs time to plan and budget for expenses)
• cooking classes which also includes learning new skills like sanitation, cutting, sieving, food styling and nutrition facts
• photography
• styling classes
• swimming, soccer, basketball, baseball, badminton classes for the sporty ones
• piano, guitar, violin and voice lessons for the musically inclined
• summer classes, whether advanced or for failed academic subjects
• arts and crafts lessons for the crafty ones (this can be done at home because there are lots of tutorials to be found in the web)

There is so much to do during summer and there is no need for children to get bored. If budget is a problem, be creative and you can still have a lot of fun too!

Tags: arts and crafts for children, cooking classes, music lessons, photography classes for chlidren, sports activities for children, summer activities, summer activities for children, summer plans, vacation plans

Arts and crafts are a big thing for me, as a mother and as a teacher. I have written articles about why it is important to teach these to children here and here.

One of the ways to show how creative the children are is by giving away handmade greeting cards during special occasions. Be these manually made or done using the computer, I am sure these will be appreciated well.

One of the ways to send greetings to loved ones during special occasions is by sending online greeting cards. Yes, these are economical and has a fast delivery.

The other day, I saw my six year old daughter Tania make a Valentine greeting card on the desktop and here is what she made:

Simple but it sure brings the message across 🙂

Tags: greeting cards, personal greetings

Last year, on March 21, 2018, on the International Day of the Forest, the Best Friends of the Forest (BFF) Movement was born. Founded by the Forest Foundation of the Philippines, the BFF Movement is a community of young and action-oriented environmentalists, artists, travelers, and social entrepreneurs. The group aims to inspire and enable more millennials to be advocates of forest conservation and protection. 

The need for millennials to take up the mantle of conservation for their generation is more urgent than ever before. 

“The threat of deforestation has become so severe that we are losing forest cover at an alarming rate. If we do not take action, our forests may not be around for the next generation to see,” said Forest Foundation Philippines’ Executive Director, Atty. Jose Canivel a year ago, during the launch of the BFF Movement.

Anybody with a heart for forest conservation can join the BFF Movement. A year since it was launched, it has gathered the support of many outspoken environmental advocates. BFF Movement has also gotten the attention of young people looking for ways to make the world a better place.

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Tags: Best Friend of the Forest Movement, BFF Movement, Forest Foundation of the Philippines