Cat and Eilir Day 4

 

Grandad's Christmas card (come New Year card/frame)

 

No Christmas box this year as my dad (aka Grandad Leigh) is not coming over to visit this year because he's in the middle of moving so his presses will have to wait until the new year. We thought we'd make a more post-friendly collage card instead. Eilir chose pictures from old cards and cut them out. He rejected most of the ones I picked (the only one making the final cut being the goose that he deliberately stuck upside down).  He did the gluing and chose the tinsel border, but couldn't be bothered with attaching it, so I got to do all the stapling. He wanted tinsel borders on both sides, so we decided to make it multipurpose and made the flip-side a photo frame with a New Year message underneath (we were also hedging our bets here in case it didn't arrive in France in time for Christmas!). Our excuse is that New Year cards are more the French tradition for festive card giving anyway ;-)

 

 

 

 

 

Kora and boys Day 4

Noah is 6. Noah is a boy. Noah dislikes writing tasks of any kind. Jonny is 4. Jonny is a boy too. Jonny prefers party bags to writing. Jack is 2. Jack draws endless circles and screams when someone steals his felt pen.

However, Friday night saw an amazing event. I was sitting writing some Christmas cards. The older boys can never be more than a meter away from me at the moment so they sat down. The next thing I witnessed was Noah writing his 29th Christmas card and Jonny handing me a card addressed to Mam containing a chocolate heart. Made my weekend... just hope Noah didn't miss out anyone in his class!

Silver and girls Day 4

Snowman Christmas Card

Using some black crafting card which I cut to size for Nim, she added glue on the front and stuck cotton wool balls to it, to make a basic Snowman shape.  Next she used metallic pens to write "Merry Christmas" on the front of the card, before letting rip with the glitter glue!

She used the glitter glue to add a face to the Snowman and I cut a scarf shape out of coloured tissue paper, which was also glued on.  Again this was a 15 - 20 minute project to make and Nim really enjoyed doing it as she got to practice her writing.

Johana and T Day 4

On Sunday it was a lovely sunny day and after the market we wandered into the park and collected leaves and other bits of fallen foliage that took the boys fancy.  When we returned we collected some green sprigs from the trees in the garden and tied them together to make a wreath and then wove in the park finds. My oldest boy said "Wreaths are for when people die?". I hadn't really thought of this association, but thought that it was probably pagan in origin, so I looked it up. Apparently this type of wreath originated with the ancient Celtic people of Germany and Scandinavia and the 'living wreath' was at the centrepiece of their spiritual rituals and was made with a 'cartwheel woven with evergreens'. The evergreen wreath or wheel symbolised the unending circle of life, the rotation of the seasons. The evergreen was a part of the earth that lived steadfastly through the winter darkness and was displayed indoors.

Our wreath was slightly more oval than circle and we'll see how long it last, but it smells lovely, does the job of bringing the hope of fresh green growth into the home and overall we felt quite pleased with it and can add to it if bits start wilting or falling off.

Adeola and boys Day 4

 This was Scott’s most fantastic idea. Everyday since 01^st December we have been doing a chalk drawing on the pavement in front of your house (mostly). This is a bit of street art and anxious excitement before rushing off 5 minutes later than intended to get to school on time. Weekends were more relaxed. 18 more days to go 'til Christmas.

Steph and G Day 4

Rudolph's carrot soup and Christmas toast,
slow cookers rock! I cut up the onion, because I think they are slimy and slippy, G was able to do the carrots, rule being 'if you are not cutting straight down on the board, Stop!' Everything else G could assemble herself because everything is cold, stock, lentils, pepper, water, happy few minutes stirring it around like a cauldron then lid on and turn the knob to low, forget about it for a day, yay!   My experience is that soup is deemed more fun if you have a little ladle to serve it out with, and something to dip, occasional reminders to actually eat the good, good soup can be required however.
We read a book where the child detectives made secret messages with milk which when the paper was ironed, revealed what they had written. This inspired us to try milk inked Rudolphs on white bread expecting to toast it and see the brown reindeer appear, bit of food colouring for nose.  On toasting, Rudolph stayed pale while the rest of the toast browned! Who knew. We were pleased, although appreciating others may find Rudolph a bit turin shroudesque in the picking out.