Jackson makes Dinner

Our favorite Daddy wasn't home for dinner the other night, so I decided to get creative (ha - that's a lie, I saw a commercial for Pillsbury biscuits that suggested this and just happened to have the stuff on hand) and asked Jackson for help making dinner.

Of course, since we were making one of his favorites - cheese pizza - Jackson was more than happy to lend a hand!

First, we gathered our ingredients: Pillsbury Biscuits (honey butter, next time we'll use original, but this is what I had in the refrigerator), cheese (Mozzarella, Parmesean, and Cheddar - there's never a shortage of cheese in our house!), and pizza sauce. Oh, and Woody and Jesse stickers close-by to supervise. I laid everything out on freezer paper to minimize mess.

First, we washed our hands. This is always an important step when you're cooking, but even more important when you're cooking with a two-almost-three-year-old boy. You never know where those chubby little hands have been. After washing our hands, we flattened the biscuit... umm... pizza dough. Next, we added the pizza sauce. I cringed during this part, but as you can see in the picture above, the few spills we had all ended up on the freezer paper. Jackson is very into the "do it myself" phase and I have to tell myself to just let him do it - building confidence and motor skills is much more important than keeping stains out of my table runner. I have to be honest though - I hover and ask "Do you need help?" a little more than I probably should. Jackson is very patient with me though - haha!

Next, we added the cheese. I put the cheese on the freezer paper and Jackson decided how much and what kind to put on each pizza. He really liked a lot of the "orange cheese" on his pizzas.

And here are our completed pizzas, ready for the oven!!! Woody and Jesse can be seen supervising here as well. I preheated the oven to 350F, transferred the pizzas to my baking stone, and set the timer for 12 minutes. They weren't done after 12 minutes, so I think I added a total of 6 minutes to the time. I'm not sure if the baking stone affected the time at all, but in the future I'll probably start at 15 min and go from there.

While your pizzas are cooking, you'll probably want a toy hammer to play with. Jackson suggests banging it on the table, using it to "fix" your baby sister (I didn't know she was broken), and demanding your mommy takes pictures of you using the hammer.

There's a Hammer Time joke in here somewhere...


That's the pizza that Jackson made all by himself. (can also be seen in Hammer Time Picture #2). Aside from the order (dough, cheese, sauce), Jackson did a pretty good job! I ate half of that pizza, and it was delicious. Mmm. Speaking of eating pizza, our pizzas are ready!

So. good. and so. easy.

Toddler, robot, and firefighter-hat-approved!

The best part was when Jackson talked to his Daddy about the pizza he made. When Steven asked "Who made the pizza?" Jackson got a sweet, shy-but-proud grin on his face and said "Jackson made the pizza." Awww! Next lesson: breakfast. This will come in handy in the future.

Oh, and to Jackson's future wife: you're welcome. ;)