Turkeys

In preparation for Thanksgiving, we have talked about Indians, Pilgrims, and today Turkeys.  Evan knew that we were going to talk about turkeys today and he kept asking if we were going to talk about ducks and roosters too!  We were given a turkey craft kit by a dear friend (thanks Nanny!!!), and Evan just loved it!  It is going to be our centerpiece for tomorrow's feast.  While making the turkey, I taught Evan a little turkey rhyme.  It goes like this:

The turkey is a silly bird, it's head goes bobble, bobble.
And all it knows is just one word - Gobble, gobble, gobble! 


Evan loves glue.  His turkey had so much glue on it, I didn't think it was ever going to dry!



Putting on the body feathers.



Putting on the wing feathers.



Putting on the tail feathers.



He was so excited to see it all coming together!



Evan and his turkey.  He kept pretending to feed it the corn.

 Evan also made a turkey using his handprints.  He kept calling it the baby turkey and wanted it next to the mommy turkey.  He kept being silly and wouldn't hold it upright for me to take a picture (hence the upside turkey!)


Red handprints for the turkey wings.



Silly turkey boy!



Mommy and Baby Turkey as our centerpiece!  He was so proud of his turkeys!

Pilgrims

Today we continued with Thanksgiving adventures.  The library storyhour theme was all about Thanksgiving too.  They read several Thanksgiving books and then made Indians.  Evan was so excited!  In the middle of one of the stories, he said, "Evan has Indians too!  I have Indian puppets at my house!"  When making his Indian craft, he kept calling it Squanto! 

When we got home from storyhour, we read through "The First Thanksgiving" book that we had made yesterday.  Evan followed along with his mini book.  He knew that we were going to talk about Pilgrims today.  As soon as we were done reading, he was begging to make Pilgrim puppets.


Evan piecing together the Pilgrim puppets.

Of course, then it was show time!  At first he just wanted his 2 Pilgrims, but then he said, "They need their friends.  Where is Squanto?"  So then he put on puppet shows with the whole gang.  Alan wanted to play too!


Meet Mr. and Mrs. Pilgrim.



Both boys putting on a show with the Indians and Pilgrims.

 We had checked out several books from the library about the First Thanksgiving.  We read through all of those and talked about what it may have been like living back then.  We made lots contrasts from what was shown in the pictures and what it is like today - things like the clothes, the houses, the way they cooked, etc.  Then we did a 'Thanksgiving is a time to be thankful!" worksheet (courtesy of Nanny!).  It had a neat Pilgrim poem on it with little pictures for Evan to glue on.  The poem went like this:

Pilgrim, Pilgrim by: M. Hubbard
Pilgrim, Pilgrim, what do you see?  I see the king refusing my plea.
Pilgrim, Pilgrim, what do you see?  I see the Mayflower ready for sea.
Pilgrim, Pilgrim, what do you see?  I see a new land to set me free.
Pilgrim, Pilgrim, what do you see?  I see a hard winter, tough as can be.
Pilgrim, Pilgrim, what do you see?  I see a green bud on a spring tree.
Pilgrim, Pilgrim, what do you see?  I see an Indian helping me.
Pilgrim, Pilgrim, what do you see?  I see corn growing 1, 2, 3!
Pilgrim, Pilgrim, what do you see?  I see praise, for thankful are we! 


Bible Words Say to be Thankful!  Ephesians 5:20

Nanny had given us another worksheet about how the Indians worked very hard to raise their food.  This was perfect because we had just noticed in the library books how the Indians and Pilgrims gathered, prepared, and cooked their food much different than we do today.  We talked about how their tools were not like the tools we use today.  They used tools made of stone and wood.  They would use a heavy round rock to crush nuts and corn into meal.  Their bowls were made from hewn rock and they baked on big flat rocks in an open fire pit.  The Indians raised corn that was multicolored.  It was very hardy and made delicious cornbread.  God also provided them with deer, elk and turkeys.  Evan glued pieces of corn all over the worksheet.


Gluing corn onto the worksheet.

 While we were outside playing, I found a couple of rocks that Evan could use to try to make corn meal like the Indians and Pilgrims.  He really enjoyed this.  We talked about how much time it would have taken them to prepare their food.  We sure have it easy today.  I pulled out some Jiffy corn meal mix and he dumped it into a bowl.  Then he mixed in an egg and some milk to make some corn bread.  While the corn bread was baking, I made Evan a pilgrim hat.  He loved it!  He said that he liked Pilgrims better than Indians!  We then enjoyed some warm corn bread together. 


Making corn meal like the Indians and Pilgrims.



We sure are blessed today!  We have so much to be thankful for!



Dumping his corn bread mixture into the pan.



My little Pilgrim!



My little Pilgrim made some great corn bread!



Indians

Since Thanksgiving is on Thursday, I thought I would spend this week teaching Evan about the first Thanksgiving and do lots of little Thanksgiving projects.  I made a coloring book for him titled "The First Thanksgiving."  We read it together a couple of times and talked about the Indians, the Pilgrims, the Mayflower, Squanto, etc.  He really liked Squanto, which was great because I had planned to focus on the Indians today.  I had miniature pictures of the images in the coloring book for him to cut out and make his own book.  After he cut them all out, he matched the pictures to the images in the book and glued them onto some construction paper (which he had just cut out too).  Then we read back through the book and he followed along in his own book. 



Cutting out the mini 'Thanksgiving story' pictures.



Matching the mini pictures with the big pictures to create his own book.



Proud of his completed 'Thanksgiving' book.

 Then we made some Indian puppets.  Evan was so excited to make Squanto.  We named the girl Indian, Squanta, and we called the baby Indian, Squantito.  Evan just kept saying, "Ohhhhhh, those are cool names!"


Piecing together Squanto.

After we got the Indians put together, it was show time!  We made lots of Indian chanting sounds together.  When it was my turn to put on shows, I talked a lot about seeing the Mayflower approaching in the ocean and about watching the Pilgrims.  I talked about how Squanto was a big help to the Pilgrims.  Evan would then talk about all of this too in his shows. 
 

Putting on a puppet show with Squanto and Squanta.



Evan wanted to put Baby Squantito down for a nap in a bed of leaves.



Alan wanted to put on a show too!  He wanted to play the part of Squantito!



Daddy and Alan put on a show for me and Evan.

 We talked a little bit about what Indians lived in and then made a little teepee for Squanto and Squanta.  This then became a new prop in our puppet shows. 


Squanto and Squanta are going to lay down in their teepee.

Evan liked Squanto so much, that I made him his very own Indian headdress so that he could look like Squanto.



My little Squanto!

My evening ended by watching all three of my boys put on an Indian puppet show for me.  If only I had my video camera!  You can only imagine all the Indian sounds coming from our schoolroom!!!

One little, Two little, Three little Indians!

Dd is for Donut

Today, Evan learned that Dd is for Donut.  So what do you think we made for breakfast?!  Evan was so excited to make donuts.  He used a cookie cutter to make the donut holes.  He like watching the donuts float in the fry daddy.  I asked him what color of frosting he wanted on his donuts, and he wanted blue.  So he dunked the donuts in the blue frosting.  He had to lick his fingers in between each dunk too!  After his first bite, he said, "UMMMMM, this is my favorite!"  They were good too.  My dad used to make donuts like this when I was a kid.  We had never done it before and the smell and taste brought back a lot of fond memories.  I hope that when Evan and Alan grow up they have lots of fond memories like this too!


Cutting out the donut holes.



"Look at them floating!"



"These are all Evan's!"



Evan wanted blue frosting on his donuts!



Better lick the frosting off my fingers!



"UMMMMM, this is my favorite!!!"

Marvel Cave

"And Angus ran to find his house.  But SNOW came, and WIND came, and into a CAVE crawled Angus, and he waited and waited and waited until -- DAY came."  From "Angus Lost" by Marjorie Flack

One of Evan's favorite parts of "Angus Lost" is when Angus has to wait in the cave all night long until morning comes.  There is a cave in Evan's "Angus Lost" Lapbook, and he loves to put Angus in and out of the cave.  This has brought up some discussion about what caves are and what there is inside of caves.  So today, we took a field trip to Silver Dollar City to visit the Marvel Cave attraction.  Evan was so excited.  We probably talked about Angus at least 20 times while we were walking through the cave.  He thought it was so neat to be in a cave, just like Angus. 

To get down into the cave, we walked over 600 stairs, and went through lots of deep tunnels and narrow passageways.  Marvel Cave is a wet limestone cave, and we were able to see lots of formations that are still alive and growing!  When you first go in, you travel 300 feet below the surface and enter what they call the Cathedral Room - the largest cave entrance room in the United States.  You can see a virtual tour of the Cathedral Room at this link:  http://www.bransonsilverdollarcity.com/rides-attractions/index.html  Since the whole park is decorated for Christmas, they had a huge tree made out of lights.  The guide turned all the lights off, making it pitch black, and then she turned on the Christmas Tree.  Evan thought that was really neat.  But then he decided he didn't like the dark, and started shouting, "I don't want it to be dark anymore!"  The guide quickly turned the lights back on!  At the end of the tour, they have a train that takes you up out of the cave, so both boys loved that!  It was red so Evan kept saying that we were riding on James.  It was a really neat experience.  I'm anxious to read "Angus Lost" with Evan tomorrow to see the new appreciation he has for the cave in the story.  He'll remember "the cave" for a long time!


Evan waiting to go on his first Cave Tour.

 

Diagram of Marvel Cave.  Sure glad we didn't have to walk back up!

 

I think cave formations are some of the neatest looking things there are!

Cave tunnel.

 

Evan thought it was really neat to be in a cave, "just like Angus!"



Christmas tree in the Cathedral Room - this picture doesn't do it justice.  It was huge!



Evan was eager to see what was around every corner.



"Come on Mom!  Are you coming Dad?!"



All three of my boys!



Another amazing cave formation.

To see more pictures from our tour of Marvel Cave, visit: 

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=33581&id=1707958162&l=4218cf620e

Dd is for Dairy Farm

To complement our study of the Letter Dd, we have been reading "Angus Lost" by Marjorie Flack.  Throughout this book, Angus, the little Scottish terrier, wonders where the milk man came from.  So today, we set out to answer that question.  We took the boys to a local dairy farm so they could see first hand where the milk man comes from.  The farmer told us to be there at 5:00pm for the milking, so Evan was excited and full of anticipation all day long.  He kept asking if it was almost time to go see the cows.  And for some reason, he kept saying that we were going to see snakes there too!  Fortunately, we did NOT!  When we arrived, we were greeted warmly by Kevin Wilkerson, the dairy farmer.  He is a 6th generation dairy farmer and they have worked the same homestead since (I believe he said) 1856.  His 14 year old son was helping him and told us that he planned to continue in the family business.  They currently have 45 cows that they are milking.  He milks them twice a day and each cow produces approximately 5 gallons of milk a day.  The milk is all pumped into a 500 gallon tank which is picked up every other day.  He told us that he sells the milk for $1.50 a gallon.  He said he couldn't understand why it was so much in the store!  He and his family just always drink the raw milk.  He said, contrary to popular belief, it won't hurt you!  He said that when the milk sits, the cream will separate to the top.  They take the "good stuff" (what he called it) and turn it into ice cream, cheese, cottage cheese, etc. and use the remaining milk on the bottom to actually make milk.  He said once they homogenize it, it will no longer separate like that.  He dipped a carton into the tank and filled it with some raw milk for us to bring home and try.  We were naturally a bit hesitant to try it, so we had the boys drink it first!!!  The whole way home, Evan kept saying he wanted to drink the milk the milk man had given us.  Both Evan and Alan downed it, so we went ahead and gave it a shot.  It really just tasted like milk, maybe just a little richer and thicker.  Adam said he actually liked it better.  The farmer told us that it was probably about the equivalent of 4% milk.  It was a really neat experience.  We read "Angus Lost" when we got home, and Evan had a whole new appreciation for the milk man!  There is a flip chart in his "Angus Lost" Lapbook that goes through the whole milk process.  We reviewed that and talked about what we had seen at the Dairy Farm.  It was very helpful that we had seen it all first.  It made it much easier for him to understand.  Evan glued little pictures of the process onto each step in the book.  It's so fun that we get to go on all of these field trips and create so many memories together as a family.  I know that he won't soon forget going to the Dairy Farm.  I'm so thankful that we are homeschooling our boys!


Farmer Kevin telling us all about the Dairy operation.



Evan checking out all the cows.



Changing the pump.



He said cows are just like people, some are more "endowed" than others and they all hang differently!



Looking at all the milk in the tank.  They had just picked it up earlier in the day so it wasn't very full.



Excited to get home to try "milk from the milk man."



Yummy milk!

 

Alan was a big fan too!