Christmas blocks

It's been a while since I've posted on this little blog...I see I'm still getting a little traffic here and there, thanks mostly to Pinterest! I thought I'd share these cute Nativity blocks I made this week. I found the idea on Pinterest, of course! Here is the picture I used for inspiration.

 I used DJ Inkers clip art for this project, but you can use any Nativity clip art or stickers. My husband cut the blocks for me.

 I used 'glossy' Mod Podge to adhere the pictures to the wood. I let them dry between coats, but gave them each a good 3 or 4 coats of Mod Podge.

I added the blocks to my "Christmas" tub on the Religion shelf. It has my Nativity puppets, Christmas books, a Christmas puzzle, and now these Nativity blocks!
Thanks for checking in and have a great day!

Marble Candy Canes

Mmm...looks like yummy whipped cream, doesn't it??

But it's not.

It's shaving cream and red paint.

We used it to make marble candy canes.

Updating a few December projects.

We are now officially on Christmas break. ; )

Enjoy the weekend!

5 Days and Counting!

Well, we are down to the last 5 days before Christmas break.  December, as we all know, can be a crazy, busy, fun month. I always like to give my students a little Christmas gift. The past few years I've purchased ornaments for each of them. Last Sunday I had an idea....that I would like to make each of my students a gift this year. So I got busy and crocheted each of them a little snowflake ornament.

I did a few each night and finished today...one week later! I needed to make 16 of these beauties!

I found the pattern here. I absolutely love to crochet and was happy to find this cute pattern. It is very easy and quick!

I attached each snowflake to blue card stock and added a hook for hanging...so hopefully, they will look like this on each student's tree...

I definitely plan on doing this again next year, but perhaps I will crochet over the summer, so I am better prepared come next December!

Hope your month is going well! Thanks for checking in on my little corner of the kindergarten world!

How many cookies tall are you?

We did a few fun gingerbread activities over the past couple of weeks. We read The Gingerbread Boy and Gingerfriends (Jan Brett).  Here a few pictures of our activities:

Beginning sounds practice: Mrs. Lee style!!

Math activity: add the correct number of buttons

How many gingerbread cookies tall are you?

The children could measure "how many gingerbread cookies tall" they were (with help from a friend) and then complete the response sheet by coloring in the correct number of cookies and filling in their name. I printed out pictures of them to glue on the sheet, too.

ONE more day!

Good evening! Whew...just one more day until Christmas break. I am looking forward to it and I know many of you can relate!! We had our Christmas program today and it was beautiful; we do 2 performances for parents/families...one at 9 a.m. and the other at 1:30 p.m. So, basically, we don't do much else on program day!!! Yesterday we finished our calendar gifts. They turned out great! We wrapped them and they went home in backpacks. Hopefully, they are safe and sound under everyone's Christmas tree. Here are photos of each month and the cover:

The cover and January (children filled in their last name on the blank line.)

February and March

April and May

June and July

 

August and September

October and November

December

 

 

That's a lot of hand prints! I like this calendar because it was simple; everything was on one page and there was no extra gluing involved. I created a different cover, but all of the originals can be found here. I am so grateful for teachers who share!! This made our project pretty stress free...although if I do it again next year, I may get an earlier start.  We started when we got back after Thanksgiving break. That can be cutting it a little close, especially if you have children who are sick and need to make up pages. I hope the families like them. : ) Thanks for checking in and if you have one or two more days of school this week...hang in there!

Rudolph...

Hello! I couldn't resist using the "grow a Rudolph" this month. We put it in water on Monday...he's actually grown quite a bit since then...and the children are very excited to check his progress every morning. I can't help but feel a little guilty looking at him...he looks like he's trapped in the jar of water!!!  : ) Thanks for checking in...hope your days before Christmas are going well.

Candy cane writing

Hello! It's been a busy week...and it's only Tuesday!! Ha!! I'm sure many of you feel the same way! We have school through Dec. 21st...so about one more week to go until Christmas break. Last week we focused on the sound of letter "c." We did descriptive writing about candy canes and made candy canes out of circles. We are working on patterning in math, so this fit together perfectly.

 We also did this pattern activity; the children had to color 3 different patterns on the candy canes.

The Christmas spirit is alive and well in our classroom. : ) These cute Christmas trees are hanging from our ceiling.

We made Christmas stockings to decorate our lockers...

I feel fortunate to be able to celebrate and share the true meaning of Christmas with my students; here are pictures of our door and our prayer table.

Each week of Advent we are focusing on a different aspect of waiting...week one was about waiting patiently. Week 2 focused on working hard while we are waiting. This week we are working on letting our light shine by being kind and helpful.  We are coloring an Advent calendar (the number on the calendar matches the date) each morning as part of our calendar activities.

(clip art by DJ Inkers)

The children will be able to take the Advent calendar home next Wednesday and finish coloring it at home. They are excited to color Baby Jesus on his birthday!! One of my students told me today she is going to draw a smile on Baby Jesus, too! I thought that was so sweet! We are working on this hand print calendar as a parent gift. I will post pics of it when we finish!  Thanks for checking in!

December Writing Center Idea

Hello! I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving break! Today, we hit the ground running...until Christmas break. : ) I have a December writing center idea to share with you. I found the original idea for this activity with fall pictures on Musings of Me. My kids LOVED this! I knew I wanted to keep their enthusiasm for writing going, so I made 12 cards using DJ Inkers clip art and have 2 writing response sheets to go along with them.