Thankful for ...

Super Stars ... :-)  

Aaron's class all have a turn at being Super Star for a week.  They get to bring in photos and things about themselves and create a little display.  They have some things to write on paper stars as well, like "what they are proud of about themselves" and "what they want to do when they grow up".  Can't remember all what they were, but I do know that he wrote he wants to be a Lego Designer when he grows up :-)  That's a change from his usual "I am going to drive a Ferrari!"  :-)

So here he is with his display.

Yesterday he got to bring in a "sharing sack".  They could bring in a collection of things that had meaning to them, not necessarily a bunch of toys!  So Aaron wanted to bring in two sacks ... one with all his Ferrari cars.

And the other with the stuff toy Penguin collection!  He's mad about Penguins, Emperor Penguins in particular.  You ask him why and he says "because they are fast"!!  Riiiiiggggght ... I suppose that's a good enough reason!  hehehe

He asked me to make his favourite chocolate cupcakes to share with the class.  So I made those (late) last night and took them in this morning.

 I also went in after lunch today and read his favourite picture book to the class.  He had a tough decision to choose which book, as we have a rather large library!  Anyway he settled on "The Dog Who Could Dig" by Jonathon Long.  It was quite neat that none of the other kids had seen the book, so they were excited to hear it too.  (It's an awesome book by the way - the pictures are amazing as well.)  I got a hug from him after reading the book :-)

Tomorrow the teacher reads out to the class a letter that Lyndon and I have written about how special Aaron is to us!  I can tell you that it was hard letter to write!  I don't mean that he's not special (we are all special in one way or another), but I found it hard to write a letter that was kinda personal and know that someone else was going to read it out and I wasn't even going to be there!! I don't mind telling him how special he is to us to his face, and we do, but it's a whole different ball game writing it down in a letter!!  :-)  (I will save it for his scrapbook!)  hehehee

And Friday he gets presented with a friendship poster that his class mates have created.

I must say I have quite enjoyed being able to say to Aaron this week when he's not behaving or not doing as he's been asked "Superstars don't do that, Superstars are awesome ... they jump and run to help, especially their Mummy!"  heheheee

Maddison's class celebrated Thanksgiving today with a thanksgiving lunch and a couple of craft activities.

When I arrived the kids were all sitting at the table (desks had been pushed together to create a dining table) and they were wearing "pilgrim hats and bibs"  They looked so cute :-)

One of the Mum's had done an awesome job of making turkey juice cups and she'd also made chocolate marshmallow pilgrim hat cookies :-)

 Was funny watching the kids drink with the turkey feathers hehehe ;-)

Their craft activities were making a turkey pine cone.  (One of the Mums had bought the pinecones in from the USA!)  (The two kiwi mums had a giggle about that!)  :-)

 And another turkey using hand cutouts.

So a busy day all round!  And now I am off to bed!

Thanks for visiting.

Celebrating Canadian Thanksgiving

This afternoon we celebrated Canadian Thanksgiving in Maddison's class.  Another Mum and I were on the schedule to tell the kids about what it was all about, do a craft with them and provide snacks.  I have found some awesome things on Pinterest lately, like this paperbag turkey (filled with popcorn) (from here).

Chocolate cake looking like a pumpkin (from here).

 And a cool handprint turkey (from here).

So yesterday afternoon I got to work baking the cakes ... I had left over mixture so had some extra's ... but they didn't turn out that flash!

and one of the bundt cake cracked on me :-(  Thankfully I was able to salvage it.

In the evening I worked on the paper bag turkey.  I couldn't find plain brown grocery bags, so I asked for some paper bags at a coffee shop one day when I was getting a drink.  But do you know how difficult it is to turn a paper bag inside out without tearing it?  Nigh on impossible!  It wasn't really long enough either.  So I sat and looked at the bags and thought about what else I could use that I already had and remembered I had some large brown envelopes and also some letter sized envelopes.  I decided to make them work!  I folded and hot glued in the bottom corners.

So far so good!

Yay for Martha Stewart fringe scissors that made cutting the white paper so easy!

Drumsticks done and stuffed with coffee shop bags that were too big.  :-)

This morning once the kids were all at school I popped the pop corn and got to work on shaping the rest of the turkey.

Then the problems started!  I had several rips that just weren't possible to hide.

I nearly felt like taking my turkey like this!

Finally though (3 envelopes later) I got it working and filled it with popcorn.

Hot glued up it's "bottom", glued on it's drums and ta-dah, all finished.

Next up was assembling and icing the cake.  I put the cracked one on the bottom and the good one on the top.  Mixed up my icing and poured away.  I cut the leaves using Tim Holtz's tattered leaves die.

The stem of the pumpkin was an icecream cone covered in green icing.

Thanksgiving feast ready to go in class.

"Carving" the turkey!

Kids were really excited to find it was popcorn inside heheee

Of course it didn't last long!

And by 3pm the cake looked like this.  I left it for the teachers :-)

The craft was fun too.  Here's my sample.

And Maddison's. (I think the turkeys should have their legs swapped hehee)

I laughed when I saw she had written she was thankful for turkey!  So typical of her to be thinking of food hehee

Thanks for visiting.