December 6-11, 2017
Hello!
Here is some info for you about our activities Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and today. Thanks for reading, and have a great night!
Anine : )
Wednesday Activities
Wednesday, we celebrated our friend’s third birthday. Happy birthday! Some of our activities included singing “Happy Birthday”, giving our friend a homemade birthday card, making cupcakes, singing Christmas carols, reading Christmas board books, practicing a fire drill and a tornado drill, playing in the classroom space, and painting with a new set of paint brushes.
Inside our Advent bag on Wednesday, the kids discovered a new book, a cake mix, frosting, and sprinkles, and other ingredients for our recipe.
Wednesday Favorite Activities
Some of the things the kids said they really liked today were playing downstairs, cracking eggs for cupcakes, playing Kitchen, playing with friends, our Fire Drill, playing with Baby Dolls, playing Princesses, playing at the blue table, and our Tornado drill.
Thursday Activities
The Nice List/Compliments: Thursday morning we had some fun thinking about “The Nice List”. At breakfast we had just heard the song “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” play via a Pandora station on the computer, when I told the kids I had something exciting to tell them. I told them that I happened to know that all of them were on the Nice List, and that while they played this morning, I wanted them to look around and try to notice some of the reasons why their friends are on the nice list. I told them that when we sat down for lunch time later, I was going to ask them what they had noticed. That ended up being a very cute morning. I heard the kids exclaiming out loud that they saw their friend doing something nice, or that they just did something nice for their friend, or that “Look, Neena! We are using teamwork!” (two of them were carrying a large toy bucket together). I modeled the complimenting, too, of course, and told each of the kids something good I noticed them doing that morning.
Wishes/Classroom Space: Before we headed to our classroom space Thursday morning, I asked each of the kids if they had any little wishes for today – something they hoped to do, or someone they hoped to play with, or something they hoped we would read, etc. Most of the wishes were little things that we could “grant” during the kids’ time in the classroom space, and we were able to make everyone’s wishes happen before the day was over.
Homemade Ornament: Each of the kids enjoyed using some fun foam craft supplies and making a Christmas ornament to take home with them on Thursday. The kids also made a paper/crayon ornament on Thursday, and got a sneak peek at a photo ornament kit we will make together later this month.
Advent Bag: In our Advent bag Thursday morning, the kids found brand-new colored pencils, a paper ornament for them to color, and the main piece of our photo ornament kit.
Christmas Carols: We had Christmas music playing on and off all day via Pandora in the background.
Birthday Card: Happy Birthday this week to our friend’s Mommy! The kids finished a group birthday card for her on Thursday.
Thursday Favorite Activities
Some of the things the kids said they really liked today were playing with their friends, playing in Areas, playing Batman, playing Baby Dolls, playing Fire Drill, playing Princesses, and playing Super Heroes.
Friday Activities
Friday our friend shared a Christmas Tradition – “Family Christmas Craft Celebration.” Our friend’s church has a special day each December full of children’s Christmas programs. In addition to other choices, like stopping to enjoy some chili and cinnamon rolls; in-between programs families can visit craft stations where the kids can do activities. On Friday our friend shared multiple craft kits with her classmates. Everyone got to make up to three crafts before heading home for the day, and the youngest kids had help, if they needed it, from the older kids. Our friend shared a CD of the Christmas songs her group sang in front of church, and everyone listened to it during breakfast, and then again during snack. Thank you to our friend and her family for sharing!
Friday Favorite Activities
Some of the kids’ favorite activities on Friday were playing in Areas, listening to our friend’s music from her Christmas program, playing downstairs, working on a reindeer craft, making a mouse craft, putting a puzzle together, playing Princesses, and playing Super Heroes.
Monday Activities
Today our friend shared one of his family’s Christmas traditions – Making Gingerbread houses! Some of our activities today included:
Gingerbread House: Our friend and his extended family make gingerbread houses together each year. Today, he brought the gingerbread house he completed this year so his friends could all get a chance to see. Our friend heard some excited comments from his classmates about his candy choices. The kids liked the long multi-colored licorice ropes on the roof, and the shark gummy candies on the side of the house were exciting for the kids to see, too. We definitely have some shark fans in this group!
Photos: Our friend shared photos of some of his family’s Gingerbread house creations over the years. Everyone looked at the photos two different times today, and we looked slowly enough to notice and talk about what kinds of candies we saw on the houses.
Craft Gingerbread House: The kids got to make a gingerbread house today out of paper and fun foam stickers and that was a really fun activity. Our youngest friends took their turns first, and each of them had an older volunteer assistant sitting next to them in case they wished for any help (they mostly didn’t need help, but having the older friend’s attention was fun for them). When our youngest friends were done with their houses, they went to play and the older friends decorated theirs.
Advent Bags: We opened three Advent bags this morning – Saturday’s, Sunday’s and Monday’s. In today’s bag we found a new board book for us to read “Gingerbread Friends” by Jan Brett. In Saturday’s bag – December 9th – the kids found a book of words to popular Christmas carols – and twelve new glue sticks that they can use on their homework and on our crafts. In Sunday’s bag – December 10th – the kids found a new Christmas-scent foaming soap called Vanilla Bean Noel for them to use this week, and a new board book called “Llama, Llama, Jingle Bells.”
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Monday Meals
Wednesday Meals
Breakfast was Cinnamon toast waffles, bananas and milk. Lunch was seasoned, sautéed chicken breast, Rice-a-Roni, steamed corn, fresh blueberries, whole grain bread/butter, and milk. Snack was Holiday-shape Goldfish crackers and apple juice. The kids also each had two mini birthday cupcakes today – one around lunchtime and one around 3:00 - and we saved two for our friend who was not here today!
Thursday Meals
Breakfast was blueberry waffles, bananas and milk. Lunch was homemade chicken and vegetables - kind of like the middle of chicken pot pie (shredded, seasoned chicken breast, peas, carrots, corn, Knorr Vegetable soup mix, Knorr Leek soup mix, chicken broth), fresh blackberries, homemade buttermilk biscuits, and milk. Snack was Wheat Thins, American cheese slices, and apple juice.
Friday Meals
Breakfast was Homestyle waffles, fresh raspberries, and milk. Lunch was homemade potato casserole (diced polish sausage, steamed broccoli, onions, sliced, cooked potatoes, salt, pepper, and white sauce with a little bit of Velveeta in it). The kids also had black beans, applesauce, bananas, Oatmeal bread/butter, and milk. Snack was “Scrabble” Cheez-Its and apple juice.
Monday Meals
Breakfast was breakfast burritos (flour tortilla, scrambled egg, sausage, cheese), banana, and milk. Lunch was homemade goulash (Barilla elbow macaroni, ground beef, salt, pepper, onion, and Prego Three Cheese pasta sauce), fresh broccoli, mandarin oranges, Pepperidge Farm Oatmeal whole-grain bread/butter, and milk. Snack was Holiday shape Goldfish crackers, Whole-Grain Pretzel Goldfish crackers, and apple juice.