Thank you to everyone who voted on the best recipe for the Rice Krispies Treat After School Conversation Starter Challenge. The landslide winner is….

The Lots of Love Lollipop Treat!

I had a feeling this would be popular, but the voting wasn’t even close. The idea behind this Rice Krispies Lollipop Treat that you can make a regular batch of Rice Krispies Treats and quickly and easily make a special afternoon snack. You can make any shape you want using a cookie cutter, but the heart looks as sweet as it tastes. And, the shape – no matter what you decide to use – can be a great conversation starter with schoolkids of any age. For my little guy I said, “I love you very much. What did you love about school today?”

While you can make one treat from a regular batch of Rice Krispies, this recipe is to make an entire batch of Lollipops.

Rice Krispies Treat Lollipop Recipe

What You Need

• 3 Tablespoons Margarine or Butter (I strongly prefer butter!)
• 1 Package (10 ounce, about 40) regular marshmallows or 4 cups miniature marshmallows (Get your kid involved tip: My son helped me count out 40 marshmallows)
• 6 Cups Kellogg’s Rice Krispies cereal
• 2 Cups Chocolate Chips (I used milk chocolate but semi-sweet is perfect, too.)
• 1 Tablespoon Shortening
• 1 Cup crushed Nuts
• Cookie Cutter
• Lollipop Sticks

Directions

1. Melt butter in large saucepan over low heat. Add marshmallows and stir until completely melted. Remove from heat.
2. Mix in Kellogg’s Rice Krispies cereal. Stir until well coated.
3. Spread the mixture using  a buttered spatula or waxed paper evenly into a 13 x 9 x 2 inch pan coated with cooking spray. (To make them more even and compact, I place waxed paper on top and another pan on top of that to flatten them out.)
4. Let Rice Krispies Treats cool completely. Using your favorite cookie cutters, cut out shapes.
5. Melt the chocolate chips and shortening together in a double boiler. (If you don’t have a double boiler, place a few inches of water in a saucepan, place a metal bowl into the pot leaving room between the bottom of the bowl and the water. Melt the chocolate and shortening in the bowl.)
6. Dip shapes in melted chocolate. Lay on waxed paper and sprinkle with crushed peanuts. Insert lollipop stick in the bottom of the shape to create a lollipop!
7. Let lollipops cool and then enjoy!

Rice Krispies Treat Lollipop keep well in the refrigerator for a few days. Makes approximately 12 lollipop, depending on the size of your cookie cutter.

This post is part of a compensated program for Rice Krispies facilitated by TheMotherhood.com. (Read the complete rules.)

I almost always pack sandwiches for my kids’ lunches because it’s quick, easy and practical. And, it’s one food they will always eat. But, they I’m excited to buy some sandwich cutters to make their lunches a little more exciting – while keeping it simple for me.

Now, The purpose of Ten Dollar Tuesday is to highlight affordable ways to get your shop up for $10 and under. I wanted to share some fun sandwich cutters and most are sold in packs that total over $10 – but I figure you are really getting a set so this post can still qualify, right? Good. Here’s an assortment of some of the sandwich cutters to make lunch fun.

Love the sweet and simple heart shapes from the SweetBytes Sandwich Crust Cutter ($3.79 on Amazon).

The same company offers roar-ful sandwich dinosaur shapes in the DynoBytes Sandwich Crust Cutter ($4.50 on Amazon).

The set of four Animal Lunch Punch ($14.00 on The Land of Nod) offers a variety of fun for little ones. I love the shapes within the shapes – like the mini elephant and mama elephant.

And new from Lunch Punch, the vrrrRMM!! Lunch Punch ($13.95 on fawn&forest) set has car, airplane, truck and train and is designed for larger sized bread. Love this set!

This post contains affiliate links.

This is the second post in a series of back to school advice for moms. Check out the first post about making the first day of school easier for moms and teachers.

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School is fast approaching, and some of you probably are already in the throws of the first days! There are so many things that you can do as a mom to help your child’s teacher have a successful start to the new year.  Here are a few more tips to be a super mom in the eyes of the teacher.

Problem: Schools can never be clean enough. Janitorial staffs are always spread so thin and teachers barely have time to clean their own desk, let alone 30. After last year’s H1N1 scare, we all want our child’s classroom to be clean.

How to help: Even if it isn’t on the supply list, send your kid to school with a little bag with these three things for the teacher: 1 box tissues, 1 pump hand sanitizer, 1 tube of sanitizing wipes.

Yes, I know you spend a ton on school supplies, but these are things you probably buy anyway, so pick up an extra and send them to school. Tissues especially are impossible to keep in a classroom. I had a team of 120 kids, each one was required to bring a box of tissue at the beginning of the year. We ran out of them by December break without fail every year! Guess who bought them for the rest of the year? Me.  I was always in LOVE with the mom who would just randomly send a 3 pack of tissues to school with her son or daughter for me in the middle of January. Seriously, things like this make a teacher cry with joy. It’s the equivalent of your husband doing the dishes and laundry for a month without being asked. ‘nuf said!

Problem: Your child’s legal name is William Jeffery Smith, and he has gone by Jeff since he was born.

How to help:  Prepare your child to be called by his legal name at first and politely correct the teacher.

Ok, this is one that I thought about forever when naming my children. I didn’t want to have my kid be the one always having to correct the teacher. On the first day of school I always said to my class before I called roll the following statement. “The names I am calling are the legal names that your parents gave you. Please after I call your name, tell me what you are called on a daily basis, and don’t be upset if I call you your legal name for a while until I get it memorized” .  The list we are given has to by most state laws have the child’s legal name. Even if it’s always been known the kid goes by something else, that legal name is what will show up on everything, so get used to it. So until the teacher has scratched out the name and written “Jeff” on every list, tell little Jeff to expect to be called William for a while, and to be polite about it.  The teacher will get it eventually! Oh, and when there is a substitute teacher, Jeff will almost always be called William, so again, prep little Jeff ahead of time that this will happen!

Problem: Forms, forms, forms!

How to help: You need to GO INTO YOUR CHILD’S BACKPACK!

Your child will have so many things for you to read, sign, initial all through the school year, but especially that first two weeks. Don’t simply ask if there is anything Mommy is supposed to sign, chances are your little student has forgotten that paper that was handed to him at 9 in the morning. Every evening, sit down with your little student and go through his backpack together. Ask questions about all the papers, and make sure you read everything and see if there is anything you are supposed to sign. Have a designated folder pocket where little Johnny knows those papers are supposed to (in theory!) make their way back to Mrs. Smith in the morning with Mommy or Daddy’s signature.

Next week’s topic: Time savers in the morning and evenings on school nights. What do you do to get out the door in a timely fashion?