Our Christmas Activity Advent Calender

So this year for the Christmas season we have decided to do a 24 day advent activity calender. We have an activity planned for every day, something that is Christmas-y, and that will be our count down to Christmas. I also thought this would be a good preschool activity, since some of the activities will be educational. So here is our list:

1st Attend the church program "Women Who Knew Christ."
2nd Make an ice wreath
3rd Make snow flake Frames (From Oriental Trading Company)
4th Build a Snowman
5th Send Christmas Cards
6th Make Gingerbread Houses
7th Make Glue-Snowmen Ornaments
8th Our Christmas Service Project
9th Ward Party
10th Watch a Christmas Movie and eat popcorn
11th Make Pine Cone Bird Feeders
12th Play Christmas Music (Piano) and sing
13th Do a Christmas Craft
14th Letters to Santa
15th Sit by the fire and read Christmas books
16th Go Sledding
17th Shop for Bingo Prizes
18th Family Bingo Party
19th Drive around and look at lights
20th Make Treats for Neighbors
21st Drink Hot Cocoa and look at pictures from past Christmases
22nd Watch a Christmas Movie
23rd Play in the Snow
24th Act out the Nativity
25th MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Thanksgiving Lesson

We started out by making "Hand Turkeys." You can do it with just one tracing of a hand, and then the thumb is the head of the turkey. (I am sure you all did that in grade school.) Or you can make several hands and a turkey body, shaped somewhat like a tear drop, and then glue the hands on the back like we did here.

Construction paper is a mommy home-schooler's best friend.

We did THIS worksheet.

We actually did this very first...with Circle Time. I drew the Mayflower and the stick people pilgrims and Indians, and I told the story as I drew it.

Then I found these SUPER CUTE printables online. Just darling! It was a lot of cutting for me to cut them out, but then the kids helped me assemble them. They were a big hit...not to mention I can use them as table decor for Thanksgiving. win win! Links are below.

Pilgrims and Indians

Mayflower

Turkey

Tepees

Then we watched "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving." We own it, and watch it every year, but I am sure you could find it at the library. Very Cute...and I love the second part on the DVD about the Mayflower. It tells the whole story of The first Thanksgiving, with real facts. They tell the date, and how many people were on the boat, and how many died, and how the Indians found them etc. It's a really good cartoon.

Planting plants!

Any excuse to find a teaching experience right!
And that is why I made my girls help me with this. :) I had a plant that was sitting in my mug of water in my kitchen all summer...waiting patiently for me to give it some dirt so that it could grow. I also had a plant that needed a bigger pot. I FINALLY made it to the store for potting soil, and so the girls helped me transfer the plants.

As you can see, they weren't too excited when I told them to pack the dirt down. I got a "Mom, are you kidding me, that's disgusting." Look from my girls. My younger daughter completely refused, and that is fine. I'm not going to force them.

And here are the finished plants! Way to go my little green thumbs!

Learning About Towns

My kids have been learning that the whole earth is not one big town. They finally are getting that one of our Grandma's and Grandpa's lives in town, and the other one lives out of town. We also have been talking about how each town is far away from each other, and how they all (generally speaking) have their own library, doctor's offices, churches, parks, etc.

I found this TOTALLY cute paper bag town in the Hightlights High Five Children's magazine that we subscribe to. I wish I had a link for you to download it, but I don't think it is accessible online. But don't let that stop you! There are tons of pictures from the internet, or if you are artistic you could even draw your own!

Then all you have to do is glue them onto paper bags, fill the bags with wadded up newspaper, and staple the top shut. Wa la! A little town!

My girls had SO much fun playing with this after we had been learning about towns.

I don't know if magazine racks sell them, but it was the Highlights High Five December 2010 Issue.
Highlights

C is for Cow

Today we worked on C some more, and learned about Cows in the process. I found THIS cute little cow paper bag puppet. They really enjoyed that.

"Cows say MOO!" We did THIS coloring page.
We read about Ferdinand the Bull. Very cute story, and an award winning book! (One of our favorites!) We talked a lot about cows and where they live. We talked about where we get milk from...cows. And we also talked about what cows like to eat.

Then we topped it off with some Cow Milk! Yum!

C is for Cookie!

Again I apologize for being absent in here. We have been super busy, and then we all got really sick with the flu. So things have just been at a stand still. We are ready to start up again, and get things moving!
We started the letter C. We began with me drawing the letter C on the board, and talking about what it looked like, and what sound it made. We have a song that we sing for each letter, that tells what sound the letter makes. Then we drew a few pictures of words that started with C, and we found the letter C in each word.

Then the girls got their turn to draw the letter C on the marker board. For some reason it's so much easier to begin to write letters on a marker board rather than a piece of paper. I think it's easier to write on, so they don't have to think as hard.

Another thing that we always do when we start a new letter is to put up a piece of our alphabet train puzzle. We already have the whole alphabet around the room, but having a progressive alphabet helps us to see where we are, and what we have learned.

Then we watched a video on youtube. (See it below.) The girls thought it was SO funny, and sung it for the whole rest of the day. It is Cookie Monster singing "C is for Cookie." So then we went to the kitchen and made cookies.

This recipe is SO GOOD, and so easy! They are pumpkin cookies, and all you need is:
One spice cake mix
One 15 oz can on Pumpkin
1 1/2 cups of Chocolate chips

Mix it all together. Drop it in spoonful onto a baking sheet. (It will be sticky and gooey.) Bake at 350 for 10-14 min. depending on how big you make them. They are gooey and just awesome! I love to make them fairly small because then you can eat more! :) And they don't take as long to cook...and I can't wait for them to make it out of the oven.

(Thank you Juli for the recipe!)

While the cookies baked we colored pictures of Cookie Monster.
I wanted to recreate the picture...with my own little cookie monsters eating cookies and milk with a straw. I had these fun chocolate milk straws, that magically make your milk chocolate as it comes through the straw. You can buy them at Walmart.

YUM!

Here is the Cookie Monster Video: