This year my daughter was turning 10.  She mentioned to me that this was her most important birthday because this was her first double digit birthday.  She and I both decided that we should be celebrate this with four of her closest friends. The party was three hours long and started right after school.  The girls walked home together and the fun began right away.  As soon as the girls arrived, my daughter told them the theme. They were totally exicted since they had not known what to expect.  We had invited them a few days earlier explaining that my daughter was having a small get together with her closest friends. After mentioning the cooking theme, each girl was presented with a package.  Each package contained the following: a cooking apron (bought a local dept store for $8), chef hat($1 each found at a party store), wooden spoon (bought at a dollar store), lollipop (my daughter insisted that the package contain something sweet) and a small bag containing 2 different icing tips, 2 couplers for the icing tips and 2 plastic disposable icing bags(bought at Michaels).  When the girls opened their packages they were so excited. The following is the agenda/plan that I followed 1.  Kids will arrive after school at 3:00pm 2. Eat the fruit platter prepared upon arrival 3. Told the theme 4.  Decorate their aprons with fabric markers.  They personalized their aprons and their         hats. They used plastic font templates I found at the dollar store. 5. Put on their decorated aprons and hats. They were told that they had to be on the entire time they were in the kitchen.  6.  I had some flour nearby.  They dipped their hands in the flour and spread it across their face.  This made a great photo opportunity.     5.  Each child was then told that we were making pizza. Since the girls were old enough to use a knife, they were each assigned a task. The night before I had prepared the pizza dough.  The girls were essentially preparing the ingredients for the pizza.  One girl was assigned to chop the red peppers, one girls was assigned to cut the pepperoni and the other meat for the pizza, another girl was responsible for opening the cans of pizza sauce and pineapple, two girls were responsible for greasing and flouring the pizza pans.  Everything seemed to flow very well. When one girl was finished with their task, they were willing to help out others.  I used my kitchen table as the pizza assembly station. Each girl rolled out their dough, assembled their pizza and placed them in the oven. ( I have a regular size oven with 3 shelves. I could fit two pizza trays on each shelf. Every 8 minutes (approx.) I rotated the pizzas by placing them on different shelves to avoid burning and under cooking of each pizza. 6.  Cook the pizza and play a game. I was trying to teach them some skills found on a game called Cooking Mama.  The girls were each given a plate. I put a tsp of oil on each plate. When I said start, the girls had to rotate the plate until the whole plate was covered in oil.  They found this quite challenging.  I did not give out any prizes and the girls didn't even complain.  I mentioned often that there are skills that we will be learning that are going to help us in the kitchen. 7. After the game and while the pizza was cooking, the girls then prepared the birthday cupcakes from scratch.  I asked for a volunteer to help read a recipe and make sure that the rest us will follow. Two girls volunteered to mix the ingredients by hand (they used the wooden spoons they were given).  Two girls were responsible for measuring and getting the ingredients from the pantry. If someone was free, they helped to prepare the muffin tray by putting different coloured baking cups in the tray and turned on the oven to the appropriate temp. Once the mixture was done, the girls then took turns filling each cupcake cup with the mixture. They thought this was absolutely fun. The pizza was now done and the cupcakes were ready to be baked. 8.  Each girl then ate their own pizza. They all made comments on how they would improve on them the next time.  ie use more sauce, spread the pizza dough better... 9.  The girls occassionaly inspected the cupcakes as they were cooking. 10. While the muffins are cooling, we played another game/skill thing. Each girl was given an egg.  I demo'd how to separate the yolk from the egg white using the shells of the egg. They thought this would be easy until they tried it. (I don't like to waste food, so I used the eggs for my breakfast the next morning)  11. Decorate the cupcakes when they are cool enough.  I introduced each girl to some basic piping  skills. Each girl cut the tips off their icing bags and put the couplers and tips on. I showed each girl how to change the colour of the icing (bought the ready  Wiltons icing and colour from Michaels). They each picked their own icing colour and mixed it well. They even filled their own icing bag.  I showed them how to make stars, mini flowers, dots, and lines.  Off they went as they personalized two muffins each. 12. They arranged the decorated cupcakes on a platter and put candles in them. They sang and blew out all of the candles.  My daughter and her friends were having such a blast. 13.  Opened birthday gifts I wanted to doing another cooking skill challenge but the time flew by.  If I had time, the challenge would be a cutting onion challenge. I wanted to share some of the tips I had learned about cutting onions and how to avoid crying while cutting them. Maybe next time. Throughout the party, I usually supervised, provided simple suggestions and offerd lots of verbal support for these young ladies.  I was also in the kitchen cleaning their mess after them and running the dishwasher.  No loot bags were required because of the packages each girl received. Each left my house with their aprons and their chef hats on their heads. They were proud chefs in training.