Little Snowmen

This afternoon snow began to fall. It was very exciting to everyone because we have been seeing snow pictures from all across the country and have been longing for it. But it did not snow for long and the tiny flakes melted as soon as they hit. But the melting snow did not stop us from making snowmen.
These would also be a great treat for those who have come in from the snow to warm up with hot cocoa.

To make these you will need:  large marshmallows, white Karo syrup, some black and orange confetti sprinkles (I have some left over from Halloween), and white sparkling sugar. You'll need some wood skewers and a clean paintbrush for each person making one.

The original instructions, found at It's always a party at the Parker's, said to take your large marshmallow and with a clean paintbrush, brush some Karo syrup all around the side of the marshmallow, and then, roll your marshmallow in the white sparkling sugar, three times, separately and  so we did this at first, but, as you can imagine things got pretty sticky really quickly. We found it a little less messy with kids to thread all three marshmallows on the skewer first, then paint them with the Kayro syrup and...

roll the whole skewer full of Kayro-laden marshmallows in the sparkling sugar.

Next we added the face. Using your paint brush, dot the back of your confetti sprinkles with a touch of Karo syrup and then apply to your sugared marshmallow...two black for coal eyes, one orange for the carrot nose and three purple ones for the buttons on the body. Some of us used black sprinkles for the mouth and some of us used a red Christmas sprinkle for the mouth. You can be as creative as you like. They take a few minutes to set or the face will slide off.

Amanda added a candy hat and little marshmallows for arms, but we like the simplicity of this little guy. These were easy enough for my 6-year old to make and simple enough that I had the ingredients on hand.
Pair these little guys with a snowman book and it is perfect.

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Make a Matching Game

I have found that when there are just a few more days before Christmas, it is always nice to have a game to occupy them.

This is a very simple game to make.
You need some Hershey's Kisses and either
white circle stickers and small stamps or
colored circle stickers or
small stickers, but make sure you have two of each.

Put your stickers on the bottom of the Kisses...

in pairs.

Now you have a matching game, which can be played with one player...

or two.
Just take turns picking up two of the Kisses and seeing if they match.
If they do, you get to keep them. How many matches can you make?
When you get tired of playing with them, you can eat them!

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Thanksgiving Week Activity: Make Placecards (and practice handwriting too!)

The idea for these cute turkey placecards came from Frugal Family Fun Blog. Valerie made them by cutting some flower-shaped sticky notes in half to form the tail feathers of the turkey. I didn't have any of those, but I did have some scrapbooking paper which I cut into a similar shape.

We used a half-circle of brown construction paper and some yellow sticky-backed circles. He drew on the snoods and glued on some googly eyes.



He had an interesting place to put his sticky circles to keep track of them.

We will go back and paint the snoods red once the glue has dried. In no time he had made a whole rafter of turkeys.

(He didn't even realize that he was practicing handwriting.)

Thanksgiving Week Activity: Pilgrim Hat Treats

I saw these cuties on Craftily Ever After and knew at once that they were easy enough for even my youngest to do and simple enough not to be too much for an already busy week.

For each hat, you will need:

1 chocolate coated cookie (Such as Entenman's Raspberry Cookies or Nabisco Famous Chocolate Wafer or Fudge Striped Cookies)

1 small Reese's peanut butter cup

tube of yellow or orange frosting with piping tips

Place cookies on work surface; squeeze a dime-size dot of frosting in center of each. Unwrap and invert peanut butter cups on frosting, pressing down gently. Using the round piping tip, pipe a hat-band with frosting around peanut butter cup and a square buckle. Let frosting set before storing. Can be made up to 3 days ahead. Store airtight at room temperature.

I had wanted to show you pictures of the steps, but for some reason they all were blurry. I do have a few photos of our "tea" time to show you, though.

I made a pot of hot chocolate with snowmen marshmallows...

and homemade whipped cream.

We talked about all that we are thankful for...

and all our plans for the week.
A joyous time.

Thanksgiving Week Activity: Turkey Glyph

Today when I announced to my boys that we were only going to do Thanksgiving related activities this week, I don't think they had a math activity in mind! This is another activity from Mathwire.

You have all seen the paper turkeys with multi-colored tail feathers.

Well, the spin on these is that each color represents something on our dinner menu and they had to pick the colors for their turkey's tail feathers that match up to the foods they like and plan to eat from our Thanksgiving menu.
Light Brown- Stuffing
Black- Gravy
Red- Cranberry/Orange Relish
White-Mashed Potatoes
Yellow-Corn on the Cob
Green-Pickles & Olives tray
Light Blue-Deviled Eggs
Orange-Sweet Potato Casserole
Orange Striped-Pumpkin/Cranberry Bread
Tan-Turkey (shaped) Bread
Pink-Tortellini Salad
Dark Blue-Jello
Dark Brown-Pumpkin Pie
Purple-Cake

For the turkey body, you could choose light brown for white meat and dark brown for dark meat.
James wanted both, so we made his turkey body with both light and dark brown.

Quentin's.



Sam's.
Even though this is an early elementry activity, I had everyone in the family do it, so we could have more to graph.



James'

Alex's

Mom's

Katie's

And our vegetarian Dad just made a clutch of feathers.

You can use these to graph preferences.

On a practical level, it can help you to plan how much of each item on the menu to make. And lastly, serve as cute decorations for Thanksgiving Day.
Just as James said, "Each of the turkeys tells a story."

Thanksgiving Week Activity: Miniature Bows and Arrows

When I saw these cute miniature bow and arrows sets at Almost Unschoolers, I knew I had to make them for my history-loving boys.

The Brooding Hen has a wonderful step-by-step tutorial, so if you want to make one, you might want to go there for the details, but basically you:
1. cut four small notches in a Popsicle stick
2. soak them in water for an hour or so.
3. Tie dental floss around one end of the Popsicles stick, wrap it around a few times
4.Gently bend the Popsicle stick and wrap and tie it on the other end, making sure the floss is taut and on the same side of the Popsicle stick on both ends.
5. The arrows are made from Q-tips that have one end removed.

You have to watch out for suprise attacks, however!

My boys discovered that they are also perfect for their GI Joes.

These are not only great for Thanksgiving, but all sorts of history time periods depended on the bow and arrow, and so it has many possiblities...William Tell...Robin Hood...

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Happy May Day

Making May Day "Baskets"

 Gathering Flowers

James added origami ladybugs this year.

 Delivering baskets around the neighborhood.

 Happy May Day.