Remembering Thankfulness

Normally by this time of year our fall leaf list tree has lost most of its leaves (meaning we've worked our way through most of our fall to-dos)...

...and is beginning to fill up with thankful turkeys (hand print turkeys with one thing we're thankful for, written on each).

Last year, November snuck (or sneaked for you non-American/Canadian readers) up on us, and we decide to save crafting time by re-using turkeys from previous years - recycling thankfulness.

We might have done the same thing this year, except we got the call around the first of November, that my step-father, the children's grandfather, was nearing the end of his struggle with Alzheimer's.  I decided to make last second trip out to Oregon to spot my mother and step-sister, who were doing the heavy work of staying by his side in nursing home and hospice care. 

I arrived in time to spend a few hours with Grandpa, and had the privilege of being there to see him off.  His passing was calm and peaceful, and unlike the last few months of his struggle with the disease - easy.  I was very thankful.

The Man of the House drove out with the children for the funeral, and returned home with them, while I remained on another week to help my mother sort through the details of life as a widow once again.

All this to say, that I returned this week to a fall tree somewhat too full of undone leaves, and completely devoid of thankful turkeys.

Somehow this year, our usual thankful turkeys covered with frivolous, though heartfelt, thanks for things like  "hot chocolate" and "teddy bears" didn't seem sufficient. 

I'm thankful my children had a loving grandfather, even though my own father did not live to see them.
We're thankful his fight with a horrible disease is over.
We were thankful the faithful pastors and church family who extended a great deal of love and compassion to my mother and visiting family.
We were thankful for the safety we all had in traveling to and from every corner of the country.
We're thankful for Grandpa's love for Christ - so that we can repeat the words of Paul with confidence: "Death where is your victory?  Death where is your sting?"

With those thoughts in mind, I decided this year to fill our turkey tree with thankful memories, one for each day from November 1st through Thanksgiving, by cutting, pasting, and printing clip-art hand print turkeys, with pictures of the children with their grandfather.

They are good memories, memories he lost for a time, but now has back I'm sure, as he's been restored in Christ - and for that we are all very thankful.

Gingerbread Turkeys

I had such good intentions of filling November with turkey themed thankfulness for my youngest two, but a family funeral (more on that later) called me out of town for a couple of weeks.

I returned home just in time for the first real snow of the year, and hit the ground running with gingerbread men (no story reference intended).  It's our tradition to celebrate the first, big, sticking snow of the season by decorating a batch of gingerbread men together, and I was truly thankful to be home in time to take part in the tradition.

While the cookie boys and girls were baking in the oven, I decided to try and recoup a little of November too, and get things back on the turkey track by cutting the left-over dough into gingerbread turkeys - or rather, gingerbread flowers (we don't actually have a turkey cookie cutter)...

...which could be trimmed...

...baked...

...and frosted...

...into gingerbread turkeys...

...all ready to be enjoyed with steaming cups of hot chocolate on a snowy, November afternoon.

Columbus Day And Donuts on a String (Real World Math)

If you're just waking up to realize today is Columbus Day, don't worry, BrainPop has you covered.  Their feature (meaning free) film for the day is on Christopher Columbus, and strikes a nice balance between celebrating the accomplishments of his discoveries, and discussing the controversies of his actions.

We celebrated the day with a donuts on a string challenge for breakfast...

...which has less to do with Columbus Day (or Canadian Thanksgiving - which we'll be celebrating later in the day with a Peanuts inspired popcorn and pretzel lunch) so much as knocking another fall tradition off our leaf list.

But, here's a real world math problem for you from our morning to yours:

Given eight foot monkey bars, and children from four to six feet tall...

...what is the average length of string needed, to loop through donuts and tie to the monkey bars...

...in order to give each child a donut hanging at a challenging, but still reachable height...

...to be eaten with no hands (given that the teenagers in the group will inevitably pull the donuts off and eat them by hand after the first few attempts at a bite)?

Happy Columbus Day!

Owl Cookies - Another Fun Fall Family Tradition

We made a batch of adorable owl cookies, yesterday (click here for the recipe and instructions).

We make them every year as a family, and it's always a hoot.

This year, with Grandma visiting, and a busy day, we were a little discombobulated, and so were our owls.  Not only did I roll the dough backwards (chocolate maple on the inside instead of vanilla).  I see now from looking at the pictures, that we all placed our dough slices...

...upside down from normal, too.

Still, the cookies were yummy, and we enjoyed the tradition together...

...so woo cares about a few mistakes.

Fall Leaf To-Do List 2015

It's a little earlier than normal for us to put up our fall leaf tree - listing all the things we'd like to do before the leaves fall.  We've already spotted several trees along our street with leaves changing colors though, so we decided to get a jump on fall, and have our tree all ready for the first day of September.

Per our normal tradition, we printed one item from our fall to-do list on each of the construction paper leaves on the tree. As we complete each item, we hope to mark it off by removing the leaf from the tree and sticking it to the wall around the base of the tree

Then, in November, as the tree is growing bare, we will have room to put up our "thankful turkeys", so by Thanksgiving we should be all set with a Peanuts-inspired turkey tree decorating the dining room.

Our list (below) morphed a bit this year, from early-elementary crafts and sensory experiments to be filled more heavily with art projects, family fun, and even a few handy-man type tasks around the house.

Movies to Watch on DVD or Amazon (that we think have fall release dates):
Cinderella
Avengers: Age of Ultron
Inside Out 
San Andreas 
Shaun the Sheep

Must Watch Fall Flicks:
It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown
Charlie Brown Thanksgiving

Movies Coming Out in the Theater (that might like to see):
Mockingjay Part 2
The Peanuts Movie

 Activities:
Donuts on a String
Tree identification walk
Fall leaf art project
Make the first fire of the season in the fireplace
Attend a fall festival
Go to the last farmer's market of the season
Taste the first snow
Rake leaves
Jump in a leaf pile
Do a puzzle on a stormy day
Grandma's visit
Create a pine cone (snacktivity)
Go to the homecoming parade
Kick a football
Host a game night
Gut a pumpkin
Decorate the porch for fall.

Food:
Taste a Zucchini
Roast pumpkin seeds
Drink a pumpkin latte
Sample a pumpkin milkshake
Make a pumpkin pie from scratch
Bake pumpkin muffins
Bake apple muffins
Have pumpkin pie for breakfast
Make gingerbread men (for first snow)
Make owl cookies (first day of fall)
Make homemade candy corn (on National Candy Corn Day)
Eat a pear
Make caramel apples
Have an apple tasting

Celebrate:
Mom's birthday
Dad's birthday
Grandma's birthday
Grandma and Grandpa's 50th wedding anniversary!!!
Columbus Day
Canadian Thanksgiving (with a Peanuts' feast)
National Candy Corn Day

We have a few other personal milestones and around the house, honey-do type things, and plenty of room left on the tree for all the things we forgot, but will think of later.

Thanksgiving Crafts Made Easy - Recycling Thankfulness

Usually, we spend the last couple of days of October, or the first few days of November, making 20-some hand print turkeys - one for each day, from the 1st of November through to Thanksgiving.

Then, each day from November 1st on, we take turns picking a turkey, writing something we're thankful for, and sticking it to our fall leaf-list tree...

...transforming it into a Peanuts inspired turkey tree - you know...like from a Charlie Brown Thanksgiving...



I have to admit that this year, with the move, and dealing with teenage jobs, driving, and college prep, I was feeling a lot like Sally, when I realized hand print turkey time had rolled around again, already.

But, then it dawned on me - one of the nice things about a tradition, like our hand print turkeys - is that you don't have to do all the work fresh each year, because you already did most of it last year, or the year before, or even the year before that.  We have photo albums full of hand print turkeys, carefully removed from their trees, all preserved, and ready to be used again.

So this year, instead of spending hours crafting new turkeys, we're dipping into our piles from the past.

Instead of writing something new each day that we are thankful for, we're reading what we were thankful for last year, and discussing, and discovering old and new ways we're thankful for the same things again this year, as life and circumstances are changing around us.

Remembering what we have been thankful for in the past, reminds us of what we really, and truly are thankful for in the present.  I'm thankful for traditions...

I'm thankful for memories...

...and I'm thankful for recycling.

  It's great to be a homeschooler.

Simple Fall Science - Comparing Pumpkins

Pumpkins come in all sorts of sizes, and varieties.  We bought a couple of pie pumpkins, and one larger "carving" pumpkin.

The girls cut them open...

...and discovered the pumpkins were different inside and out.  Not only were the seeds of the large pumpkin larger (not surprisingly)...

...but they were more densely packed in the smaller pumpkin.  The large pumpkin had a good deal of empty space in the middle - the smaller pumpkin did not.

The larger pumpkin contained a large amount of stringy, fibrous strands surrounding the seeds.  The fibrous strands (or guts, as we like to call them) of the smaller pumpkin were more gooey than stringy.

The pie pumpkin contained a thin layer of smooth flesh.  The larger pumpkin had a thicker layer of stringy flesh (it was almost like a spaghetti squash).

We roasted the both pumpkins, and pureed them.  Or at least, that was my plan, so we could compare the taste of each...

...as well as the water content, weighing a cup of each puree.  Unfortunately, we didn't have a particularly good pie pumpkin, and once roasted, it only produced a small amount of very bad tasting puree.  The carving pumpkin roasted up nicely, and the puree was delicious, if a little more watery than the canned variety.  For all the hype of the superiority of canned pumpkin, and importance of using sugar, or pie pumpkins over the carving variety, our puree baked up quite nicely...

...in a batch of our favorite pumpkin chocolate chip muffins (click here for the recipe).  I didn't take any pictures of the muffins, but that's just as well, as I would never be able to them justice.  You will simply have to take my word for it - it's a fantastic recipe - really, one of our fall favorites.  As for the seeds...

...we fulfilled another item from our fall leaf list, and roasted them (with cinnamon, of course) and then combined them, large and small together, with cranberries and butterscotch chips for a delicious fall snack.

Canadian Thanksgiving Traditions, and Columbus Day Fun.

What's this? A piece of toast? A pretzel stick? Popcorn? What blockhead cooked all this? - Pepperment Patty

I've been writing a lot about fading traditions this fall, as the children are getting older, and outgrowing some of our traditions.  In the midst of SAT prep, drivers ed, electric guitars blaring, and part-time jobs, I have to admit I nearly forgot that today was Thanksgiving in Canada, and Columbus Day here in the States.  The Man of the House checking an empty mailbox brought me back to reality, and we managed to throw together our usual Canadian Thanksgiving celebration.  Thankfully it's a simple, Peanuts inspired affair.

And, not to forget our American heritage, while I was popping popcorn, and buttering toast a la Charlie Brown, I queued up a quick vintage Columbus Day cartoon for the younger children.  I picked one that made a point of the fact, that Columbus was setting out to prove the world was round, so I could explain to the children, that when I was a little girl, that's what they taught us in school.

We talked about how Washington Irving (who the children know from Rip Van Winkle) wrote a fictional biography of Christopher Columbus, that was taken as fact, and led, in part, to the myth that the people of Columbus' day believed the world was flat.  Of course, today children are taught about the ancient Greeks, and know that all of the educated people of Europe would have known the world was round well before Columbus' journey.

The ancient Greeks, or Columbus, I'm not sure it matters - we know the world is round now.  But, wouldn't it be fun if it had been flat, and you could have just sailed right off the edge?

Thinking about that, we modified a game from Steve and Ruth Bennett's 365 TV-Free Activities You Can Do With Your Child, by taping a large world map down to the center of the table, and taking turns sliding milk cap Niña, Pinta, and Santa Marias off from Spain...

 ...to see who could send their ship as close as possible to the edge of the world....

...without falling off the map.

 Isn't it peculiar, Charlie Brown, how some traditions just slowly fade away? - Lucy VanPelt.

That's as is should be.  Just not today, Lucy - soon, but not today.

Happy Thanksgiving/Columbus Day!