Saturday, November 21, 2009

No Turkey Here, Really!

C had to do this project for school, and I think it would be a great activity for the kids' table on Thanksgiving. He brought home a very basic, easy to draw picture of a turkey that he had to disguise. The turkey is hoping that his disguise will prevent him from becoming the main course at Thanksgiving dinner.


C used markers to disguise his turkey as Wolverine.


If you draw a simple turkey like the one above, you could provide the kids with a variety of art supplies (markers, glitter glue, stickers, pom poms, etc.) to disguise their turkeys. I can picture turkeys disguised as princesses, cartoon characters, soldiers, cowboys, etc. The possibilities are endless!

If you decide to do this, I would love to see your turkeys in disguise!

Thursday, November 19, 2009

We are packing!

Slowly, but surely we are getting ready for our move. The big day is quickly approaching. R decided that our boring brown boxes needed some color and decoration.

All moving boxes should have happy faces on them!

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Hand Print Turkeys

We really love the book, Setting the Turkeys Free by W. Nikola-Lisa. In the story, a young boy makes hand print turkeys and decorates them with paper, sequins, toothpicks, feathers, and more. He loves the turkeys and they take on a life of their own. So, what will happen when Foxy the fox comes around? Don't worry, this boy has a plan to protect his turkeys.

How can you read this book and not make hand print turkeys? C and R made hand print turkeys using Crayola Air Dry Clay. I traced their hands on paper and then traced the hand prints onto the clay.

Once the clay hand prints were dry, they painted them to look like turkeys.


We added a little glitter, some jewels, a googly eye, and a foam beak.

Our turkeys are pretty fancy!

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Scarecrows

I got the idea for these scarecrow cookies from Family Fun. I changed a few of the ingredients based on what I had in the house. I put white frosting on the back of sugar cookies. The eyes are m&m's, the nose is a candy corn, and the mouth is chocolate jimmies (or maybe you call them sprinkles in your part of the world). The hair is Cinnamon Life cereal and the hat is half of a sugar wafer with a whole sugar wafer on top of it with a dot of frosting. I made the little pumpkin decoration with icing to show that our scarecrows guard the pumpkin patch. Aren't they cute?

C and R enjoyed these cookies after we read a few of our favorite scarecrow books:

The Little Scarecrow Boy by Margaret Wise Brown,

The Scarecrow's Hat by Ken Brown, and

Scarecrow Pete by Mark Kimball Moulton.
We really enjoyed these books. Look for them at your local library.

Monday, November 16, 2009

Birthday Treats

Last week we celebrated Kelly's first birthday with some homemade doggy treats. This recipe from The Ultimate Book of Kid Concoctions is so easy.

Ingredients: 2 cups whole wheat flour
1/4 cup corn meal (Thanks Papa and Grandma for the corn meal!)
1/2 cup parmesan cheese
1 egg
1 cup water

Directions: Mix together all ingredients except 1/4 cup parmesan cheese. You can use cookie cutters to make different shapes, but we just made sticks. Roll your shapes in the remaining parmesan cheese and place on an ungreased baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes. Store in an airtight container.

Offer one to your doggy!

If you get this response, you know the treats were thoroughly appreciated!
Kelly wants to thank all of you for the birthday wishes you left for her in the comments section last week. You helped to make her birthday extra special.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

A Drawing by C

I love this drawing by C. He told me he was drawing things from the Bible. In case you didn't know, that is God looking down on all that he created.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

Turkeys in the Mail!

My children love getting mail, especially when the mail is a surprise package that includes everything necessary to make some fun and easy turkeys! Thank you Susana, you hit a home run with this one!
Here is R's turkey:

This one was made by C:
If you want to make your own turkey, visit Susana for complete directions.