St. Lucia and Hanukkah

Last week we celebrated Saint Lucia Day, as well covering some information on Hanukkah for Grant.  Hanukkah does not start until December 21, but we covered it last week because we will be on Christmas break this week. 

We started everyday with our same "pre-lesson" work.  French, music, spelling, math and reading. 

On Monday I read a book about Saint Lucia. 

Afterward, Johanna (she actually drew two pictures) and I drew a picture of her.

 Johanna's Saint Lucia Picture 1

Johanna's Saint Lucia Picture 2

We also pulled out the Saint Lucia crown for Johanna, and the Star Boy hat for Grant that we made last year.

On Monday, I also read Grant a short story about Hanukkah.

After I was done with the story, Grant and I drew a picture of a menorah.

Mom's Drawing

Grant's Drawing

On Tuesday, we took the day off from school to spend the time celebrating Saint Lucia Day.  I read another book about Saint Lucia.

While I read the book, there was Gloog (basically apple cider with the addition of cardamom)warming up on the stove, and dough rising to make our saffron Lucia buns.  Once I was finished reading the book, we made the buns.

With all this talk of Saint Luica, it wouldn't be right not to mention our little "Lucia".

In the afternoon, Grant and Johanna worked on a few more Christmas crafts from our "crafty Christmas" box.

On Wednesday, I had Grant re-tell me the story off Hanukkah, we came up with a summary, and then he wrote it in his lesson book.

After he was finished, the kids painted dreidels from this kit I got at Target.  There just happened to be three dreidels inside.

For some unknown reason, Mom decided not to put the kid's painting smocks on, and Julia totally got orange paint all over her gingerbread shirt (which did not come out in the wash). Oops!

Once the dreidels were dry, I explained to Grant the history behind the dreidel game, and then we played using white chocolate chunks as ante.

On Thursday, Grant and I went through his lesson book and reviewed everything we had done during this measurement block.  The next two weeks we will be on Christmas break.  Grant and I will start back up in January with a language arts block using more stories from the Old Testament.

Happy Hanukkah and Merry Christmas!

A Visit from Saint Nicholas and Measurement Wrap-Up

We started out the week on the second Sunday of Advent by lighting the second candle in our Advent wreath, and telling a story.

On Monday, we began our school week with the usual stuff.  French lesson, penny whistle lesson, math review, spelling practice, and reading.  Everyday last week started with this same routine. 

In addition to that, we got into the spirit of Saint Nicholas Day by telling some Saint Nicholas stories.  Afterward, Johanna and I drew a picture of Saint Nicholas.

Mom's Drawing

Johanna's Drawing

Grant and I moved into the kitchen for his main lesson.  Today we reviewed liquid measurement by making butter from heavy cream.  We've done the shaking-in-the-jar-with-a-marble-technique before, so this time we put it in the food processor, and let it do all the work.  We found that a pint of cream made about 1/2 lb of butter and about 1/2 cup of buttermilk.  We just had to have something to put our yummy homemade butter on, so we made some yummy homemade bread.  Every one got to knead their part of the dough and shape it into "rolls".  The girls were happy to be a part of what was going on in the kitchen.

The kids also put their shoes out for Saint Nicholas on Monday night.

On Tuesday, the kids woke up to find the goodies Saint Nicholas had left in their shoes.

Saint Nicholas Day also brought our first snowfall of the year.  It was barely anything, and it didn't last long, but the kids were super excited, and thought that was the best gift Saint Nicholas brought.

This was the first snow for most of our chickies.

Odin enjoyed the snow, too.

Once I was finally able to get the kids into the school room from playing in the snow, Grant and I worked through our daily routine, and then I read the kids another Saint Nicholas story.  Afterward, Grant and I moved up into the kitchen again to make cheese.  Grant measure out the milk, and we worked on doing some conversions, and everything was going well until my "pot-stirrer" left his post just long enough for some milk to scorch on the bottom of the pot.  Unfortunately, the whole batch of cheese tasted like burnt milk. Oh, well!  Next time we'll have to be a little more diligent with our cheese making.

On Wednesday, I read one more Saint Nicholas story, and then Grant and I talked about Biblical liquid measurement, worked out a few conversions, and he wrote this page in his lesson book:

On Thursday, Grant and I finished up measurement by writing more on the chart we are going to hang up in the school room.  We will add to it down the road as Grant learns more about measurement.

I also pulled out this nifty little "Crafty Christmas" kit I ordered from Land of Nod.

The kids decided to make some ornaments.  They were all cut out and ready to go.  First, they put stickers on:

Next, Johanna and Grant sewed the edges and stuffed them:

They had fun making them, and it was fast and easy since all I had to do was help them thread the needle (and sew up Julia's ornament).

Next week Grant will learn about the Jewish festival of Chanukah, and I also look forward to celebrating the Swedish holiday - Saint Lucia day. Being the Swedes that we are, it is one of our favorites to celebrate.  It's nice to bring a little bit of Sweden into our home. 

 

Icicles on the Tree

When the kids were helping decorate the Christmas tree, they found some ornaments they really liked that looked like big icicles. A few days later, I was in the kitchen with Julia and our dog, Mia, scratched on the door:

Mom: "Mia must have to go outside."

Julia:  "She's going to turn into an icicle out there."

Mom: (little chuckle) "She might.  It is pretty cold."

Julia:  "Then we will have to hang her on the tree."

Iron Man

The other day Cory was wearing an Iron Man t-shirt and Johanna decided to draw her own version.

Liquid Measure and Gingerbread

We started Advent last Sunday by lighting the first candle on our advent wreath, and then I told the kids a story.

During the rest of week we continued to work on spelling, which consists of me picking out a word for Grant to spell out loud and then he writes it three times.  We also reviewed math using our math dice, and Grant skip counted using our "times tables songs".  Grant also started learning a Christmas song on the penny whistle, and the kids continued to learn new French words through verses and songs.

For Johanna, the theme of the week was GINGERBREAD!  All the kids joined in on the activities, so it was really a gingerbread week for everyone.

On Monday, Grant's main lesson was in the kitchen getting some hands-on experience with dry measurement.  We did this by making bread.  I had Grant measure everything out.  For the flour, we measured it out by cups, and also weighed it out in ounces.

While the dough was rising, we went back into the school room for French lesson, penny whistle practice and spelling practice.  Once the dough had risen, we measured it into 8 ounce balls.

We also split one of those into two 4 ounce balls.

We weighed them when they came out of the oven to see if they still weighed the same.  We found they had all lost .3 - .4 ounces.  As Grant simply stated, "They lost some weight while they baked."


I also read Johanna this book (but of course they all listened):

Once I was done reading the book, Johanna and I drew some gingerbread men.  I drew these and she colored them in:

These are some that she drew:

On Tuesday, Grant and I reviewed linear and dry measure by going back through Grant's lesson book and talking about the pages where we worked with those types of measurements. We also started writing out a chart for the school room which will have some of the measurements and conversions we have worked with so far.

I also read Johanna this book:

Later in the day, the kids made these gingerbread shirts which were like the monster shirts they made at Halloween.  Once again, they all had a ton of fun designing their shirts.

The finished products:

On Thursday, Grant and I began talking about liquid measure. I used a story about a farmer's wife milking a cow and getting one gallon of milk.  We figured out how many pints and cups were in a gallon, and if she gave the farmer a pint of milk to drink, and gave her two kids a cup of milk each to drink, how much was left of the gallon for her to make butter (Next week we will be in the kitchen making our own butter)? We worked on those conversions, and then Grant wrote about it in his lesson book:

On Friday, we had fun making gingerbread cookies and a gingerbread "mansion".

(We did this part before bath.)

(We finished them up after bath.)

It was a fun and yummy gingerbread week!