Last Wednesday was National Chocolate Day. Even though it didn’t fall on cooking day, I really felt that National Chocolate Day needed to be celebrated in after care. Wednesday is Imagination Day, so I thought and thought about how we could do an imaginative activity with chocolate. I decided we should create something using only chocolate products, and finally decided that we should have a contest to see who create the best chocolate volcano.

We had eight chocolate projects that could be used–a brownie base, chocolate whipped cream, chocolate frosting, chocolate pudding, chocolate sauce, chocolate jimmies, crushed Oreo cookies, and mini-chocolate chips. Each kiddo got a chocolate base, then could choose five other toppings to complete their volcano. I had four to five kiddos working on their projects at a time.

During the course of their creative process, I had one kiddo hug me and tell me this was the best day of his life. Another kiddo told me that he was going to tell his mom that he had to be in after care on October 28th next year. Another kiddo drew me this picture:

Yet another kiddo asked if we could celebrate Chocolate day every week! I think they loved it.

We separated the kiddos into two groups–preschool through kindergarten and then the older kiddos. The older kiddos got to vote on the younger kiddos’ projects, and the younger kids got to vote on the older kids. We also had two guest judges–our headmaster and the upper school science teacher. The kids took the voting very seriously, and we had two great winners. It was tough to choose, and I was glad I wasn’t voting!

After the voting was complete, the kids ate their creations. Fortunately, everyone was smart enough to stop before they got sick. Overall, this one goes in the major win pile. I mean, really, what could be better than 8 different types of chocolate used to create something inherently messy? Then getting to eat it? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.