Puppy and Kitten Paw Advent Calendar Nativity

The kids and I have been doing an Advent Calendar for as many years as I can remember.  We have done many different fun and interesting designs.  This year I found at a consignment store this cute Nativity with a puppy and kitten.  I had a ton of shells, so I decided to paint them with the countdown numbers and paw prints.  They lead to the Nativity.  This is a big project so I needed the whole length of the table for it.  Caitlin really thought this was a cute idea.

Do you do an Advent, or countdown to Christmas?

Ignoring This Blog?

No, not really, lol.  I just have not had time to get on and share this week.  The kids have been using both computers for school, and I just have not had a chance.  Next week, and the week after, are crazy socializing weeks for us.  I will be sure to get on and share all the fun things we are doing.  Tomorrow is our Earth Kids meeting, and we are studying Dolphins.  I will share our art work, and I am hoping to get a wire craft piece done tonight. 

If you are interested, check out my daily flash sales, for my Etsy and Ecrater stores, by visiting my other blog Melissas Jewelry and Gems. 

Christmas Around the World for History Class

For the month of December, we will be studying Christmas Around the World, for History class. We have done some Christmas for other religions, in the past, this time we will focus on traditions and the holiday in other countries. I am sharing some links for you to pick and choose which ones you would like to use. Below is a video for your kiddos to watch, after you have completed the study. We will be doing one or two different countries each day. For our purposes their activity will be to read about Christmas in a specific country, write Merry Christmas in their language, say what the weather is like at Christmas, find the country on the map, songs, and symbols. Both my kids will be doing this. I probably won't do all the countries listed, as time is limited. After Christmas break we will be doing Virtual Tours of the United States. I am still working on getting that all together, but will share it when it is completed. In my archives you can find the popsicle stick game to help learn the states.

http://www.homeschoolshare.com/christmas_around_the_world.php

http://www.rochedalss.eq.edu.au/xmas/world1.htm

http://www.santas.net/aroundtheworld.htm

http://www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/lesson041.shtml

http://www.the-north-pole.com/around/

Breaking Traditions!

This was my weekend off, and we had no plans, believe it or not. It was so beautiful yesterday, in the eighties. I got a ton of yard work done, dogs washed and even sat in the sun for a bit. Today it is like 50 and windy, ugh! If the weather stays as predicted, this will be the coldest Thanksgiving week since we have been here in Florida. Usually it is hot, humid and baking the turkey is torture. This year might be much different.

Last year, my husband bought a new Christmas tree, a huge one. I mean huge. It is so tall the top can not accommodate a topper. But, I did get to display all my ornaments this year, none got left off. I have a second small tree, that was my angel tree, it now has the advent calendar on it, which I will share in another post, it isn't quite finished yet. For as long as I can remember, starting when I was a kid, the Christmas tree went up Thanksgiving night. My husband and I have continued the tradition, until this year. He asked me if we could put it up early, yesterday. I really didn't want to, but you know what it worked out nicely. No one was over stuffed, tired, grumpy or wanting to watch football. Everyone participated and you can see the beautiful results below. Maybe breaking traditions is OK after all.

We are on Thanksgiving break all this next week.  We will be doing Run Club Monday, cleaning and food shopping on Wednesday.

May the beauty of the Season be with you today, and always. From my family, to yours, I would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas. Be safe, and jolly and may all your Chrismtas wishes come true. I will be back on the 26th.





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5 Days Until Christmas

Well it is 5 days until Christmas. I was going through some old pictures, one of my favorite things to do at the holidays. This is the only picture of Caitlin with Santa Claus. He is a puff a lump Santa, and she is about 5 months old. We have tried several times to get her to sit on Santas lap, and she just will not do it. So we get to treasure this one forever, lol. She is a shy, and kind of stubborn child, she will not do anything she doesn't want to do.

Have you finished all your shopping? I am done, and it is all wrapped. I have some great gift items in my store, you should check them out. I offer great prices. My sister will be coming in on Monday, and we are excited. We have not spent Christmas with her, in 4 years. It should be great.

I hope everyone that is getting snow dumped on them, is safe and warm. I remember those days. Matter of fact the year my son was 2, it snowed enough snow to reach the top of my Tracker. All I did was shovel, and no one could get out. My mom was in Florida, and thank goodness we had a web cam. What a Christmas that was.

President Bush Attacked By A Pair Of Shoes LOL

Not that I think it is funny, for anyone to assault the President, this was pretty humorous. President made a surprise visit, to Iraq, and while having a press conference, with the Prime Minister, a Iraqi reporter threw his size 10 shoes at the President. Luckily he missed, but Dana Perino the White House press Secretary, received a bruised eye, from the deflected size 10 shoe. Watch the video, and see for yourself.



I have so many things to get done, before Christmas. I am actually glad Christmas break is coming, because I need to do report cards, and I want to add all my stored educational links to this blog. This will not be an easy task, as I have so many to share. I think one spot, where my readers can find them, rather than searching through my archives looking for sites, would be more effective. It will just take a while.

I started my wrapping, but am no where near done. Maybe tonight, I will finish. Caitlin and I are going to bake sugar cookies, this afternoon while DJ is at his after school program. Then after dinner, we will all decorate them. My sister will be arriving next Monday, and we are all excited to be able to spend Christmas with her. It has been 4 years since, we spent a Holiday with her.


Lesson Plans for 12/16/08:

Reading: Read chapter 10 of Sunset of the Sabertooth
Writing: Write a Christmas poem
PE: 30 minutes
Science: Nutrition
Spelling: Lesson 13- write each spelling word, and circle the vowels
Vocabulary: Lesson 13- use each vocabulary word in a sentence
Language Arts: Adjectives, capitalization
Math: Estimating, multiplication, division
Spanish: Food and utensils, part 2