Christmas ABCs

I've been trying to teach Eli what Christmas is all about so all the time we're reading books, looking at ornaments on our Jesse Tree, and playing with the nativity talking about Jesus being born and all that. Well, I thought it would be fun to come up with a little Christmas ABCs list so a lot of times at meals we'll use this to go through the Christmas story, filling in info as we go along...

Angel
Baby born barn in Bethlehem, birthday
Carols
Donkey
Everlasting
Faith
Gift
Herod
Incarnate
Jesus, joy
King of kings
Lord of lords
Mary
Nativity
Ornaments
Prince of peace
Quiet night
Righteousness
Star, shepherds, Savior
Tree, triumphant
Universal (king)
Virgin
Wise men
Xciting, x-mas
Yuletide
Z ?? (help??)

Activity: Fingerpaint Christmas Tree

Remember when we did the fingerprint tree for fall? Afterwards I realized it would have been easier for Eli if I had drawn an outline of a tree for Eli to put fingerprints inside, since he couldn't understand the concept of clustering the prints up top to form a tree. The colors were beautiful though and it turned out great anyway (with the help of mom). Anyway, that gave me the idea to do this for Christmas season:

1. Draw an outline of a Christmas tree.
2. Put colorful fingerprints inside to make "ornaments" and "lights".

I let Eli do it on his own this time, and it actually turned out a lot like I had imagined when I planned the activity. He did ask me to do a few prints so a few of those dots are mine, but overall it's his own creation! (click on pictures to view larger)

set up and ready to be painted!
Eww!

dirty fingers! (actually, I had already started to wipe them off)

There was a little bit of an episode with Eli trying to show off his work to the camera. He wouldn't listen about the paper being wet and he ended up with wet paint in his face and a frustrated mom. But here we are...

So colorful and pretty! A few oopses outside the tree, but he did pretty good.

Eli loves when things match, so he wanted to put it next to our Christmas tree to make a match!

The moments I live for...

The family I love...

Preparing for Christmas!

Seeing that we don't have a house of our own right now (or any of our belongings that are in storage), Christmas is a little different this year. At first I was really bummed, but now it's actually turning out to be okay!

Christmas celebrations for us started Friday after Thanksgiving with a small German Christmas festival in my hometown. We listened to brass Christmas carols, watched the grand lighting of main street, saw fireworks, ate some yummy pie, and drove by a big Christmas light display always set up at a local family farm. We didn't think we were going to have a Christmas tree at all this year, but a lady I know well from my Dad's church offered a small one she always used to use in her school classroom. That was sooo nice of her and we're delighted to have a lil' tree, even if it's Charlie Brown style! For the first time this year we're doing a Jesse Tree throughout Advent season. It highlights the stories of the Bible, reminding us of all that God is and our need for Jesus. We get the kids in their jammies and each night before bed we read the story for the day from Eli's Storybook Bible and then hang my homemade ornament/symbol right on our little Christmas tree. You can read more about the Jesse Tree HERE.

Since we don't have any other decorations to get out, I thought it would be nice to make a point of going to Kevin's parent's house to help them set up their tree and decorations. Kevin's dad trucks so it's usually just Nannie and Kevin's mom who has physical limitations due to health problems. So we're going to make a day of it today by putting on some Christmas music and having fun! It will be a blessing to them as well as to us!

Also this year we'll be watching The Nativity Story movie and getting out a plastic nativity set to teach the story to the children. I love this time of year, and it's such a joy to involve the kids in the celebrations!

Safety during the holidays!

Kevin's family has a jade plant in their house and when I looking it up to see if it poisonous for children or not, I was surprised to see several common flowers and plants that are a danger! So I thought I'd just pass along the info on some of the common plants. These are just a few but you can check the complete list HERE.

Poisonous plants:
Mistletoe
Holly
Iris
Daffodil
Azalea

Non-poisonous plants:
Poinsettia
Christmas cactus
Petunia
Rose

Happy Holidays!

Activity: Thankful Tree

Part One: I traced Eli's hand and arm to make the tree trunk.

I lightly drew a circle on the paper so Eli would know where to put leaves.I cut out 20 leaves for Eli to glue onto his tree.

I told Eli to smile for me and this is what he did. Silly boy.

That's better.

I tried very hard to just let him put the leaves on how he wanted and allow him to be creative. And here's his tree!

Part Two: Write on each leaf things we're thankful for.

Give thanks. Always.

"Give thanks in all circumstances,
for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus."
1 Thessalonians 5:18

My thankful list:

Beautiful fall weather. Safety in deer accident (we hit a deer Sunday night). Place to stay during this transition. Prospective job. Food. Family. Friends. Wonderful husband. Clothes. Dreams. Joy. Shoes. Warmth. Blogging friends. Wisdom through books. Hot tea. A good night's sleep. Cozy blankets. Sunshine. Quality time with kids. Quiet evenings. Dates with Kevin. Laughter....

It's easy to be thankful for the good things in life, but what about the not-so-good? Here is a list of things that have been challenging me lately and my reflections on how I can still be thankful.

* We REALLY want to get settled into a place of our own BUT God is teaching us to be patient and follow HIS plan.

* I'm anxious to get our things back--our clothes, shoes, and kitchen stuff--BUT God is reminding me that I don't need them.

* We are anxious to have an income especially around holiday time BUT God is reminding s that we can bless family and friends in other ways.

* I wish we could set up a Christmas tree and decorations, BUT this time is teaching us how to simplify.

* The deer accident is at a really inconvenient time in life when we're already busy with decisions BUT God was and is our mighty protector. And He is reminding us that we are not in control. HE is.

* I so miss high speed Internet BUT God is helping me finally learn to spend less time on the computer anyway.

* I very much miss my kitchen supplies like a mixer, whisk, and spices, BUT God is reminding me not to take little things like that for granted.

My favorite baby carrier

I've been wanting to do this review sometime, and then when I saw on my friend Sharon's blog today that it's International Babywearing Week (Nov. 12-18), I knew I just had to get this posted today!

We've tried a sling and an Infantino (Bjorn type) carrier. But I just could not figure out the sling--when Eli was a newborn, the sling seemed to swallow him up, and when he was older and I tried him sitting up facing out it seemed like his legs were completely squashed in there. The only way I could kind of get the sling to work was with him on my hip, but it never felt secure enough for me to let go. So most of the time we used the Infantino front pouch carrier, but it always seemed to slip on me so it wasn't snug, and it hurt my back. Not to mention that once Eli was 15 lbs or so, he was just too heavy to carry in it. So before Hannah was born we looked into other baby carriers, and we decided on the Ergo Baby Carrier.

It had great reviews and looked like it would really work for us all the way from infancy through toddlerhood. Instead of the weight pulling on your shoulders, there's a thick band around the waist, so the weight is support there instead of your shoulders and back. It's very comfortable to wear! There are only two buckles, so it's quick and easy to get baby in and out. And it adjusts so Hannah is snug and tight right against me. Newborns fit in this carrier sideways, and even then she was nice and snug. She was so tiny in there, most people didn't even know I was carrying a baby! Then when she was about 4 months old, she could then switch so she saddled up against me instead of sitting sideways. I'll admit, there were a couple months then where she didn't like it, but I guess she got over it because now she loves it. AND there's a sleeping hood for baby, or a shade if you have a newborn. And there are enough small pockets on it for me to fit my keys, wallet, and a burp cloth.

This carrier can be worn on your front, hip, or back. The hip position felt horrible on me, but it works well on either the front or back. And even Eli can ride in it! He can still be worn on both the front and back, even as a toddler. We don't do this often, because he is an independent toddler, but in a pinch we have used it as an option.

Take a look at the pictures...

testing it out when we first got it

This was a Boston trip in which the sleeping shade was great for while Hannah napped.

This was a zoo trip and we started off with Hannah in the carrier...

...but then we did a flip flop of the kids so Eli could be up to see the zoo exhibits

someone's getting sleepy

worn on our New Hampshire vacation for long hikes
For day trips it worked just fine to wear a backpack in addition to the carrier.

We don't just use a baby carrier for special occasions. I most frequently use it every week when I go grocery shopping and need Eli in the cart. Every week the same cashier guy tells me my back must be hurting me because I'm wearing Hannah around and she's 9 months old now, and every week I tell him, "Nope, not at all. It's a good carrier!"

So there ya have it! My lovely review of the Ergo Baby Carrier.

Letter of the day: B

Last week I was thinking about all the crafts I had been doing with Eli and knew that we wouldn't always have so many activities to do every day. But I was just so excited about all we could do for Fall that I crammed 'em all in. Now that we've done most of them (except for our Thanksgiving projects next week) I sat down with my planner and came up with a "schedule" I'm going to try to follow to offer Eli variety in his activities and learning:

Monday--educational activity
Tuesday--kitchen project (bake something or help me prepare dinner)
Wednesday--creative craft (play dough, coloring, painting, etc)
Thursday--library day (storytime/pick out books)
Friday--structured craft (like the sunflower, scarecrow, and fall wreath)

Of course if there's something else going on that day, that's totally fine, but this gives us structure on days that we're just home with nothing to do.

So for our first day of "educational activity" I did a project with the letter B. I looked through my baggie of magazine cutouts and found more pictures for the letter B than any other letter, so we just started with that one. I found a few more pictures in the weekly circular and other ads, and the project was ready to begin!

picture cutouts: ball, boots, birthday/balloon, banana, baby, bear, bike, bacon
which picture next...?sticking to paper. next to each picture I wrote the corresponding word.
Once Eli had all the pictures glued on, then I had him find the letter B in each of the following papers. Then we cut them out and added them to our collage. Letter search #1.
Letter search #2Letter search #3just wants to go show daddy!All done! Now I'd like to keep them and put them together in a little book as we continue to go through each letter of the alphabet.