fiance, student, homeschool retiree, preschool teacher wannabe, Senior Living Coordinator, writer of many things unsaid, blogger, lover of the creative, most cheerful depressed person, devourer of books, crafty wanna be, amateur tech support, internet junkie, facebook stalker, tweeter of tweets, Pagan, friend, sister, daughter, aunt, karaoke super-star

Cookies For Santa

On Christmas Eve we made some gingerbread cookies for Santa.

Just after I took this picture Kaleb (7) says, " I don't even look like I've been cooking!" Then he grabbed a handfull of flour and rubbed it into the front of his apron.


Here I am looking very cheesy.
Ha! And Levi after I made him look like he was cooking too!
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Nutty Elves Craft


We usually make one new ornament every year. We make it in bulk and then pass them out as gifts to friends, neighbors, and family.

This year we picked this little craft from Family Fun called Nutty Elves.

 photo from Family Fun.com

They were pretty easy to make with the bigger boys (10 and 13). The little boys (7 and 5) had trouble because of the small size of the peanuts, but they made about 5 each. Oliver (5) loved gluing on the noses. You could easily do these assembly line fashion as a family, giving each person a part based on their abilities.

Tips: 
  • Pre-make hats and shoes. 
  • Cut arms and legs ahead of time with wire cutters.
  • Pose them before you glue them in. 
  • Use tacky glue and have hot glue gun on hand.
  • Hot glue to wrapped candy canes




After we assembled the elves, I hot glued them in fun poses onto wrapped candy canes. We used fishing line for the hanger and I just hot glued it to the candy cane to make it secure. 



We think they turned out cute and hope they last a few years. They sure made people smile when they opened them.

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A little debate...

...is always healthy. We went to a homeschool activity where we played some games and had a little debate session. The debate on Xbox verses Wii was pretty heated.











Christmas Spectacular

A friend had us over to organize a Christmas performance all day with the kids and then we performed later at a dinner with family and friends. The kids had a blast!

 

Bookshelves

Single girls...add this to your man wish list!
Love Levi bunches, but I overlooked the importance of a man with this trait.

Exercise isn't always fun, but it sure is FUNNY!







PE in the Winter



Idaho has lovely cold weather winters, complete with snow, ice, and inversions. This type of weather equals cold, miserable, windy, wet and muddy outdoor play. Our family always sinks into a sort of hibernation mode and it is harder to get the kids out to play and be active. To keep us motivated and away from the TV, I try to look for opportunities for us to get out and be active.

The community offers a few solutions for a fee. The pools at the local Recreation Center and YMCA are always a big hit. In our area we are also fortunate to have a few Bounce house places like Monkey Buisness in Boise and Jumpin Jungle in Nampa. A new place opened this year in our town, an indoor trampoline park, called JumpTime. It makes for a great indoor workout and tired kids after.

For a lower cost winter workout, we will rent different children's workout videos from the library.  Some old  favorites of ours are Sesame Street - Elmocize and Yoga Kids. For some more recommendations check out this article.


Other cold weather options take advantage of our lovely Idaho snow. Sledding, tubing, hiking, snow shoeing and cross county skiing are all great workouts.

What sort of winter PE activities do you do in your homeschool?