The Science activity for this day is to bake a "round cake" and decorate it to look like the earth. We did this yesterday (a Saturday), as baking a cake on a school day would be too stressful. Rabbit helped with measuring and mixing. We talked about if it said 2 2/3 cups, how that means 2 - 1 cup measures and 2 - 1/3 cup measures. We made 2 - 7 1/2" round cakes. We let them cool for several hours after it was done. (Rabbit has a dairy sensitivity, so this cake recipe is dairy free, and egg free too.)
Then, we just got Pillsbury frosting from the grocery store and put blue food coloring in it and covered the cakes. Someone on the My Father's World message board suggested using fondant to make the continents. I bought some at Michael's and kneaded in green food coloring. (Warning: the food coloring can squirt out of the fondant as you knead it, so make sure you are wearing an apron. I'm waiting to see if it is going to come out of my shirt in the wash next week.)
We measured the cakes, and then looked through the Intermediate World Atlas, measuring the maps until we found one that was close to the size of our cakes. We used tracing paper to trace the continents and then cut out the continents from the tracing paper. We rolled out the fondant (make sure you have lots of confectioner's sugar on the counter) and used the tracing paper continents as guides to cut out the continents from the fondant. Then we tried to place them appropriately on the cakes.
Here's our Western Hemisphere:
And here is the Eastern Hemisphere:
Today was the last day of summer Sunday School at church, so we took the cakes to share with the kids' Sunday School class. It was a big hit, even with the kids who were scared to try something new. I also took it because for next summer's Sunday School we're going to do a missions study.
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