Giggles and Grace

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

{25 Days of Christmas: Day 4}

Our book for today was I-Spy Little Christmas by Jean Marzollo.

Christopher likes the I-Spy board books and is getting good at being able to locate all the little items in the picture. I was excited when I saw this book at a Thrift Store, looking brand new, for 10 cents and knew I had to snatch it up!

Our activity for the day was supposed to be setting up Christopher's mini Christmas tree and then playing an I-Spy game with the ornaments. (More information on game found at The Activity Mom) I thought playing with his tree/ornaments would be the best idea just in case he took them off.

We weren't able to complete this game yet due to travel so instead today we used stamps to make holiday gifts tags. I got the idea from A Day of Wonders and knew Christopher would have a good time.

Stamps and Stamp pad set from Dollar Tree

Stampin' away

So much fun!

I bought a stamp pad and some foam stamps at the dollar tree and let Christopher go to town on some white card stock. I then cut them out and am planning on using them as gift tags on the gifts with the wrapping paper he will make.

In case you are just joining us, here is the post with all the Christmas books.

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

{25 Days of Christmas: Day 3}

Our third book was 10 Trim-the-Tree'ers by Janet Schulman

During my last year of teaching I got the book 10 Trick-or-Treaters from the Scholastic flyer and thought it was adorable. When I found out there was a Christmas version I knew I wanted to check it out. In this book 10 little kids are decorating a tree and with them you count all the beautiful decorations 1-10.

Our activity for the day was coloring wrapping paper! I bought 2 yards of plain white butcher paper and let Christopher decorate it with crayons and stickers. Lately he has been loving stickers and asks for, "More stickies!" We both spent some time coloring, putting stickers on the paper and talking about what we're going to do with our giant picture. I'm hoping, since that's a lot of paper to decorate for a little man, that we can pull it out several times over the next few weeks to have it be nice and beautiful.

I have to color that spot, way over there!

It wasn't too long before he asked where the "stickies" were.

After we're finished decorating I'm going to use it to wrap one present for each person we're giving gifts too, that way they'll have special wrapping paper made just for them.

In case you are just joining us, here is the post with all the Christmas books.

{25 Days of Christmas: Day 2}

Our book for today was Jesus, Me, and My Christmas Tree by Crystal Bowman

I love this book not only because of it's simple rhymes, beautiful illustrations and the fact that the book itself is shaped like a Christmas tree, but because of the story of Christ's birth told through using ornaments on the tree. It's a great way to take a fun tradition and reflect it back on the true reason for the season!

Our first activity for today was a felt Christmas tree with felt ornaments. I'm looking forward to playing with this all of December and for many Decembers to come! Due to some traveling, and forgetting to take a picture, I can't post a picture of our felt tree but will make sure to post it ASAP because... I LOVE it! Here are some sites that helped inspire it:
Johnny in a Dress
The Mother Huddle
Empty Bobbin
I Can Teach My Child

*UPDATE PICTURES OF OUR FELT TREE

Hoping to add more ornaments and gifts next year

Made the little man a car ornament

Our second activity was a Christmas light color match. This activity was inspired by Tons of Fun and since I couldn't get her download to work I made one myself. I wanted to do more colors, since Christopher already knows these six and I was hoping to practice some others, but I didn't have any pink, grey, black or brown pom-poms so I kept it simple this year. He did a lot better than I expected but really just wanted to put the pom-poms in their little container and carry them around :)

In case you are just joining us, here is the post with all the Christmas books.

Monday, December 3, 2012

{25 Days of Christmas: Day 1}

Up first, The Story of Christmas by Patricia A. Pingry.

I chose this book first because Christopher is obsessed with Jesus right now. He loves reading his little Bible, praying, singing Jesus Loves Me and telling us what Jesus does and doesn't do. I thought this book would be right up his alley and what better book to start with than one that portrays the true meaning of Christmas.

Our activity was making cards to send to the Holiday Mail for Heroes program (you can read more about that here!) When I taught preschool we did this each year and I think it's such a wonderful program to shower our service members with gratitude and love during a time of the year that it's hard to be away from home. A simple message that we put inside all of our cards is, "Thank you for your service and sacrifices today and every day! Merry Christmas!"

I had also wanted to do a North Pole Breakfast like Jessica at Little Pumpkin Grace but found I just didn't have the time this year and since Christopher isn't really that into sweets I figured I would save the sugar for next year when he'll probably be addicted :)

Here are a few pictures from our 1st day!

~~Pink~~ Red pancakes for breakfast!

Opening his first book! All this practice with wrapping paper he'll be a pro by Christmas!

So excited there was a book inside!!

Asking Elfie if he is enjoying the story

Coloring cards for Holiday Mail for Heroes!

Some of our finished products. I also included some regular Christmas cards too.

In case you are just joining us, here is the post with all the Christmas books.

Saturday, December 1, 2012

{25 Days of Christmas}

The Countdown to Christmas is on!

This year we are starting a new tradition of counting down to Christmas with 25 books and activities. I started making a list of Christmas books a few months ago and pulled out all the Christmas books that we already had. 25 books sounds like a lot, so if it's your first year and you don't have many just choose a lower number and build up to the 25. Other cheap/free resources to get books are thrift stores, Scholastic flyers, yard sales, gift cards, put on wish lists and of course, borrow some from the library or better yet swap with some friends!

After starting with a list of 70+ Christmas books I finally narrowed it down to "25ish" (I love books and Christopher loves reading so I had to throw in a few extras!!). I tried to pick books that I knew would interest Christopher or books that weren't too long for him. Here's our 25...

This year I wrapped each book but next year I would love to make these reusable fabric bags! Cute and save on paper/time... who knew wrapping/numbering 25 books would take so long?

Follow along and join in too :) Tomorrow, after some much needed sleep, I will post about how our first day went!