First Grade Over: Izzy's End Of Year Picnic and Mini-Strawberry Cheesecakes

Izzy officially completed First Grade. Granted this is old news as we are already close to mid-July but when I began this post it was a milestone, not to be forgotten.

I had been eagerly awaiting his annual end-of-school-year Potluck picnic and was terribly disappointed to discover that it had morphed into a byop (bring your own picnic) event. No sharing of all manner of ethnically diverse foods and bringing desserts.

I couldn't imagine going to a picnic and not sharing so instead of making my usual large Strawberry-Cheesecake, I made mini-cheesecakes, about 30 of them and we were able to share quite a bit.



Making them was much easier than I had anticipated. I used this recipe, an old stand-by. Instead of making the large crust, I pressed an ample amount of the crumbs into muffin tins. I pre-baked the crusts for about 7 minutes and then poured in the batter as the directed. I adjusted the cooking time to about 30 minutes (check for doneness but it has been over a month and my memory is fuzzy).

The minis worked out just fine, perfect for serving to a large crowd as no messy cutting is involved. Another benefit is that I was able to have more servings which is a huge plus when feeding a crowd. Izzy was able to share the cheesecakes with all of his teachers and the highlight of the picnic was when a butterfly landed on Miss B's head! I guess that was her send off, as sadly she will not be returning to teach at his school next year. She will be missed!




Izzy's teachers will also be pleased to know that we began Izzy's summer vacation with a visit to the library, as per his request. We came back with some of my childhood favorites by
Beverly Cleary; The Mouse and the Motorcycle and Runaway Ralph.

Ah summer...a fine beginning.