March Lion and Lamb Craft

The groundhog might not have seen his shadow, but March looks like it might come in like a lamb, leaving us with some lionish weather yet to come (at least, if you buy into the folklore). This time of year it's difficult to tell, though. Just because this week's weather has been beautiful, doesn't necessarily mean it will hold through next week. Either way, we're ready, with an adaption of Kathy Ross' changing seasons, tree, puppet craft, which we did last fall.

My pictures are pretty dark tonight, I'm sorry, my light was worse than I thought. But, you can click back to our fall craft, if you need clearer instruction.

Before I brought the girls in, I made the base of the puppets, by cutting one black, construction paper circle, using a salad plate as a guide, and one and a half orange circles.

I stapled the orange, half circle to the black circle.

Then, I cut a slit in the orange circle, horizontally, across the center, big enough for the width of the girls' hands.

With the half circle at the top of the black circle, I placed the orange circle on top of it, and then stapled the bottom half of the orange circle, to the bottom half of the black circle.

For my younger daughter, I added ears, and a face, in white crayon on the black, and in black crayon on the orange.

My 5 year old drew her own faces.

Then, the girls glued strips of brown construction paper around the orange circle, for the lion's mane.

And, they glued cotton balls around the face of the sheep.

Once, the glue was dry, the girls were ready to make some weather predictions of their own.

Lamb:

Lion:

Lamb:

Lion:

They seemed pretty serious, but I'm getting a mixed message.

In case you're wondering about the origin of the phrase, "In like a lion, out like a lamb", click here, for a fascinating cartoon explanation by Jack Horkheimer. I'm not sure if it's right or not, but it's the best theory I've come across so far.

It's great to be a homeschooler.