Snowmen Bookmarks

 Here is a fun popsicle stick craft that we are making for the avid readers in our family.

Gather popsicle sticks, small googley eyes, foam sheets, tiny pom-poms, strong glue, and a marker to drawl on the nose and mouse. I cut out the foam shapes and the girls glued everything onto the popsicle sticks.

Linked to: Made For You Mondays

Awesome Christmas Crafts

You will have a blast making these two adorable Christmas crafts this week.

 This cute caroler is made out of a toilet paper roll and
the reindeer is made out of a glove.

Glove Reindeer:
-Poke thumb inside glove
-Use stuffing material to fill 4 fingers and hand
-Use string to tie 2 fingers on each side together
-Tie bottom of glove with yarn and thread jingle bell
-Stick wiggly eyes on face
-Glue berry nose

 Christmas Carolers:
-Wrap and glue construction paper around tube
-Place hat on tube- hat is made out of old baby sock tied with yarn
-Trace a face on oval paper and glue
-Glue mittens to music paper and add it to tube

 Enjoy your weekend, we are counting down the days.
Many Blessings, Karen

Santa Advent Calendar

 We will be bearding Santa Claus again this year!  My girls adore this Santa beard advent calendar that we found here. 
  Our boxes are all unpacked, but now I am trying to get organized.  After school today we plan on getting out our Christmas decorations.

Hand Peace Dove's for MLK Day

We had a lovely conversation this evening about peace and ways that we can show peace to the world. We talked about Martin Luther King and how he wanted all colors to come together.

 Olive: Peace is....
Sharing and caring with others, being helpful, helping someone when they get hurt,  and praying about nature and loving animals.

Jem: Peace is...
Helping others and being kind to your dogs, helping friends get up when they get hurt, and being nice to your family and friends.

I must say that I am a true believer in Classical Conversations as Olive said, "you mean Martin Luther and the Protestant Reformation." I am impressed with the knowledge that she has picked up from her History timeline.  I explained the difference between the two Martin Luthers.

Baby news: I felt the baby kick for the first time this evening! I am right at 17 weeks and I have a big smile on my face as I type this.

Linking this post with:

Ginger Bread Houses- Hot Glued!

Tomorrow we are decorating these little houses with left over Halloween candy.  I think I hit the easy button this year when I got the idea to hot glue the houses ahead of time, it will make decorating a lot easier for the girls.

 The girls were so excited to see Santa and they are counting down the days with their Santa Beard Advent Calendar.

Creating An Advent Wreath

I have wanted to make an advent wreath with my girls for quite some time. We had some left over spruce from our Christmas tree and an extra foam ring from our coffee filter wreath project. The only thing left to buy were the purple and pink candles.

The candle lighting is progressive from week to week preparing for the birth of Baby Jesus. The Bible passages were recommended by a friend.

First Sunday of advent :  Hope
(just passed) Light one purple candle (Hope).
Read Isaiah 60:2-3

Second Sunday : Peace
Light two purple candles. (Hope and Peace).
Read Mark 1:4


Third Sunday : Joy
Light two purple candles (Hope and Peace),
and one pink (Joy).
Read Isaiah 35:10


Fourth Sunday: Love
Light all four candles  (Hope, Peace, Joy and Love).
Read Isaiah 9:6-7

Christmas Eve
After Sunset...
Light all four candles and add a fifth white candle
(the light of Christ).
Read Luke 1:68-79 and Luke 2:1-20


You can find a similar example here as well.

Santa Beard Advent Calendar

 My girls adore this Santa beard advent calendar that we found here.  They loved adding a cotton ball each day as we count down the days until Christmas.

 We have also been busy elves making wreaths to send to our family out of town. The girls added the decorations and I hot glued them on.

It's been a busy weekend around here. We just started cookie baking, the girls were in the local Christmas parade, we added the finishing touches to our decorations, and put up the tree. How are your preparations going?

Linked to:
My Delicious Ambiguity
Homeschool Creations Pre-5

Pipe Cleaner Tree

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with friends and family. I hope you did too! Three of us are sick so we've been taking school slow this past week, but we are starting off the Christmas season with music, decorations, and a cute pipe cleaner craft.

I first saw this craft at MOPS and brought an extra one home. Olive really loved twisting the pipe cleaners around the dowel rod. She glued a red pom-pom on top of her tree to finish it off. The dowel rod is glued into a wooden base, but you could also use a strong plastic plate covered in felt.