Book-n-Craft Advent Activities December 15th

Our 15th book is The Baker's Dozen by Aaron Shepard. This was a book that I bought here at a used sale. It was missing it's cover but the pictures were worth the damage. This book is about a baker who learns to give more than expected. I had a santa craft planned but we decided to make a tree.

J colored the parts that were to make up the tree.

 

She then cut out the parts herself. She asked to do it herself. The pieces were glued together and J drew ornaments onto them.

We played a math game using pom poms as marshmallows. J would pick a number card and she would place the "marshmallows" onto the mug. Then I would choose a card and J would have to determine how many more or less she would need to make that number.

We also made some gifts today but I can't show that. We had a busy day even though it doesn't look like it. Only nine more to go....

Book-n-Craft Advent Activities December 14th

Our 14th book (and counting...) is Merry Christmas, Big Hungry Bear by Don and Audrey Wood. This is a sequel of sorts to The Little Mouse, The Red Ripe Strawberry, and the Big Hungry Bear. In this book, the mouse does a very sweet thing for the bear whom he finds out doesn't have any presents. It is a cute story that teaches the spirit of giving. We played a rhyming game with some presents that I colored. J had to guess what color my present was based on the rhyming words.

We also played Don't Eat Pete again. This time I convinced her to take turns being the guesser and the Pete holder. She likes this game.

Our craft for this book was to make a paper snowglobe. First, I painted her hand with white paint and placed it on the blue paper. She added snowflakes by using the eraser of a pencil dipped in white paint.

After it was dry, J added the snowman details using markers.

We then glued it to black paper to make it look like a snow globe. For the circle patterns, I just traced some plastic lids.

This turned out cute and I love that the snowmen are made from her handprint. I have seen a version of this craft using a Christmas ball. What a neat keepsake. I always love stuff made from my kids handprints. Moving on......

Book-n-Craft Advent Activities December 13th

Our 13th book is The Christmas Story by Ruth J. Morehead. I have always loved the little Holly Babes. The pictures in this book are just cute. We read the story and made a book with an angel puppet.

The angel puppet is attached to a piece of string and it can interact with the book.

 

Here the angel is next to the manger. Cute story and it can be found here.

We made a posicle stick star for the tree. This was alittle difficult since the sticks did not want to stay glued together. J then sprinkled every last bit of the silver glitter onto it.

 

The game of the day comes from the printable game pack by Walking by the Way. It is Clear the Board. Again, this game is supposed to be played with M&M's and then they are eaten when taken off. But we used all of our little candies decorating the cookies. So we used buttons- not as much fun but effective. This is helping her math skills, recognizing the dots on the dice as numbers and addition skills.

She is asking again for Don't Eat Pete, so we will play this today. We are enjoying our Christmas Advent activities. We are off to another adventure....

Book-n-Craft Advent Activities December 12th

No Christmas book collection would be complete without How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss. This has to be a Christmas classic. From the cartoon when I was younger to the full feature film, this story has delighted all. My daughter Keke has a facination with all things Seuss so this is her all time favorite author. We started with coloring some grinchy ornaments.

Her favorite is Cindy Lou Who. Then, J colored some reindeer antlers since the Grinch turns his dog, Max, into a reindeer. After she put on the antlers, we had to act out the story and I got to be the Grinch!

We worked on our teen number recognition. She would flip over the number cards and, if she said the number correctly, she could keep the card.

Of course, we ended with watching The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, the cartoon version. She explained all of my mistakes during our reinactment of the Grinch and has asked me to do better next time (which is apparently tomorrow morning). I just love being the Grinch!  I believe we are half way there!

Monday's Discovery

Monday's discovery - if you jump long enough, you just wear out!

He was a busy boy, can you tell? 



Book-n-Craft Advent Acitivities December 11th

I have soo many favorite authors and Jan Brett is definitely on my list. I love her stories and her art work. Her books definitely need to be shared! The Gingerbread Baby is no exception. We laughed at all of the trouble the gingerbread baby got into and how Matti caught him in the end. First, we made paper gingerbread houses. J took her time to color hers so carefully that I printed one and colored with her as well.

I took the easy way out this time. I found a gingerbread sticker kit awhile back (probably last year) and I gave it to her. She made several gingerbread boys and girls. This kit was nice since it did not require glue and the gingerbread people fit in the houses we made.

Here is the finished gingerbread house and baby.

We took the extra stickers and made a gingerbread paper chain for our living room door.

Don't mind the jammies. These activities were done on the same day. We had to go grocery shopping and we finished our "school" stuff when we got back.

Our game for the day was Penguin War. Each penguin card had a different set of dots and we played war with them. The person who laid the penguin with the largest number on it won the cards.

She was winning - see the smile?

Next, we practiced measuring different items around the house using gingerbread men. I would ask her how many gingerbread men would the item measure and she would answer 100! She thought that was funny.

We measured our markers, paints, Kaleb's high chair tray, our table...

Cute book and J was excited to do school at night. Isn't that funny? Still working through the books and having a great time. Smile:)

Book-n-Craft Advent Activities December 10th

Our 10th book is The Little Fir Tree by Margaret Wise Brown. You know the Margaret Wise Brown of Goodnight Moon fame? (love it!) My copy doesn't have this cute cover but it is still the same story. It is a story about a little boy who can't walk and tthe joy the little fir tree brings him.

Our game of the day was Don't Eat Pete. It was found at Walking by the Way in her Christmas game pack. This game is supposed to be played with M&M's and you eat the ones that make it to the board. But we used all of our candies on the cookies so we used buttons. This is a type of Guess Who game where one player has a card with one of the people on the board and the other asks yes/no questions to determine who Pete is. J didn't like asking the questions, she like to be the one holding the card. She liked these and we played until we did all of the people on the board.

J made a Christmas tree for the front door by painting two large paper plates green. I love paper plate crafts, the only bad thing is you can't get these type of paper plates here. So I have to bring them in.

We had to wait until the paper plates were dry so we ended up finishing our craft the next morning. (the reason for the jammies) J used her fingerprints for lights on the tree. I stapled them together and we now have a tree for our front door!

Not too shabby....rather cute. J was excited that it was going to be on the door for everyone to see. Only 14 more books to go......