We’ve been keeping it pretty simple lately and just trying to get some things done around the house.  School has mostly consisted of life school lately although we’re desperately trying to get back into our regular schedule!

We’ve been posting our Christmas crafts daily, so I’m not going to repost them.  Here’s a little link cheat sheet though:

1.  Reindeer Handprint Craft (our post)
2.  Marshmallow Snowmen (our post)
3.  Make Christmas Cards (from Baloo!) (our post)
4.  Chocolate Striped Pretzels (our post)
5.  Foot Christmas Tree craft (our post)
6.  Make snow! (our post)
7.  Peppermint Bark (our post)
8.  Noel Banner (our post)
9.  Thumbprint Cookies (our post)
10.  Hand Ornaments (our post)

We got out our Fisher Price Nativity set and talked a bit about Jesus and his birthday.  I’m hoping to go into more detail the closer we get to Christmas, although the boys have really enjoyed playing with the set.

They loved setting up the tree, but even more they have enjoyed sitting next to the tree and playing with the string of lights.  They like to see how the light changes if they cover it with their hands, or get it close to their faces.
 

I cut out these trees and some ornaments with felt.  We’ve played a few games with them.  On this one I had Baloo tell me how many of each color there were (and get the corresponding number) and then we added together all the colors and figured out how many there were total.

We made patterns with the ornaments and I had Baloo reproduce the patterns.

We attempted to play the Dreidel game.  They mostly enjoyed eating the cheerios and just spinning the dreidel.

Baloo has surgery schedule this upcoming week so I’m not planning to do much.  I have found so many printables that I want to try though!!

Baloo really enjoys Diego (and Dora for that matter!) and seems to really get into the stories.  He even retains a little bit of the information about animals!  I thought I’d try to monopolize on this interest and see what we could learn about animals!  I intended on doing the Turkey rescue before Thanksgiving, but it just didn’t pan out.  We got to try it out today though, and it was a hit.  I’m just not sure how much information about turkeys he will remember!

First I told Baloo that there was a baby Turkey separated from it’s mother!  I had printed out a picture of a baby turkey and left it in the kitchen (and printed out a mama turkey and left it at the end).  The first task was to write turkey.  I had written it in yellow highlighter thinking he could trace it, but he wanted to make his own letters!

Next we had to task the baby turkey to his mama, but look out!  There are hunters trying to get the turkey!

So Baloo got on his scooter and dashed off…
 

Until he came to the obstacle course!  He had to crawl under the table, walk through the pit of balls, and the pillows are our version of tires to jump though!

And at the end the baby turkey found his mama!!

After this we went back to the kitchen to put together our Animal Rescue book.  I had Baloo cut out the pictures.

And then we glued them into his book with some information about turkeys!!

The pictures are not mine otherwise I’d share them here.

Turkey:
Habitat: Woods
Sound: Gobble gobble
Specialty: Excellent sight and hearing
Food: Acords, seeds, small berries, and insects.

Next week we’re going to do reindeer and this time I’m hoping to include more information about the reindeer into the fun part!!