Christmas Book

The kids did not have school today, so we stayed inside ALL day long, but it was a great day! After breakfast I told them the Christmas story about Mary and Joseph and travelling to Bethlehem and Jesus being born there.  I created a PowerPoint slide show with each scene (Mary with the Angel, Joseph with the Angel, travelling, manger scene, etc.) to keep their attention and to help them visualize the story better.  They really enjoyed it and I plan on doing it again on Thursday, when they are home all day.

After story time, we had craft time.  I found online and purchased "The Tale of Christmas" activities to do with the kids.  It is basically the Christian Christmas story broken up into all the scenes.  I will probably do a craft every Tuesday and Thursday.  I also have 4 different lessons I will teach them each week, leading up to Christmas.  I hope they enjoy it and it makes learning fun!

Sorry for the blurry pics of the kids, taken on my phone and I didn't know the lens was completely caked with fingerprints until afterwards!

Today they created the cover page for the Christmas book they will be working on throughout this month.  It is supposed to be an Angel out of their hand prints.  Jase's wanted his to be white and went up to his room to get a book to show me what a real angel looked like (not kidding)...so his is white! I told him we had to back it with a different color so you could see the angel...he finally agreed.

Then, on his own he glued together two yellow strips and created a cross and drew Jesus on it.  He said, "I know this is Easter."  Although he is only 4, he really loves Jesus and tells me that Jesus lives in his heart.  The other day he asked us when he could be baptized and Shawn was explaining to him when he believes in Jesus and lives for Him, and Jase responded with "I believe, he lives in my heart."

Back to the Christmas book...it is a very simple outline and each page tells one part of the story...very basic and maybe too basic for him.  After the cross picture, he drew the nativity scene and said that could be the first page of his book!! Haha!! He will probably be upset when we make another Angel in a couple of days.  He will probably tell me "Mom, we are drawing this story way out!"

On a different note, we recorded The Elf on the Shelf 30 minute movie last week and are finally getting around to watching it today...they both LOVE it!! It's a cute little show.  We may have to look into getting an Elf this year, especially since he has watched the show (too many times already) and understands what it does.