American Girls: Samantha Week 6 (time #2)

This week in Samantha class, we discussed book six in the series, Changes for Samantha. I also read from Welcome to Samantha's World about orphan trains. For craft, we made a pressed flower bookmark and animal chains. The animal chains pattern and idea came from Addy's craft book. I thought about making paper dolls, since it was discussed in the book, but chose animal chains instead.

For the bookmark, this idea came from Samantha's Craft Book. I gave each girl one piece of 2 X 6" piece of pasteboard and parchment paper. I cut one piece of 8" blue cord per girl. I put glue in a bowl to use to paint on the poster board and parchment. They glued the flower on the bookmark and put the parchment over top. Then we punched a hole and inserted the cord. They turned out lovely! I used my own flowers again, as my pink impatiens plant has been blooming for 3 months! I pressed the flowers in dictionaries to dry.

 Painting the posterboard piece with glue...

 Flower pressed onto the glue, covering the parchment paper with glue...

 We had Sugar Cookies for snack. The snack mom this week used her own recipe. Another mom brought chocolate chip cookies too.

 Making the animal chains with tracing paper and construction paper...

 Tracing onto construction paper...

 Eating another cookie...

 This girl graduated from six semesters of American girl class! I will miss her quiet sweetness!

 Animal chains sample...

 My daughter's bookmark completed sample...

 I got a flowering gerber daisy from a student! So sweet!

I've loved teaching this class this Spring... I'll miss the girls this summer! In the fall we will be studying Rebecca and Kit in the timeline of American Girls!

Isaiah 40:8
The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever.”

Matthew 6:28
“And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin.

Luke 12:27
“Consider how the wild flowers grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.

Kindergarten: W week

We had a Wonderful week last week during W week! We talked about wind, water, wood, watermelon, weather, watches, walking, wonder, who, whose, woodchuck (Nana's book), wolves, days of the week and more. We did read "Wacky Wednesday" on Wednesday of course! My girls love that book!

Bethany was sick for two days this week, so we didn't get everything done as we planned. I didn't take too many photos, since she was sick... 

She made a cute mini-windsock and hung it on my water bottle. Silly girl, it's not very windy there!

We got the pattern for it from Family Fun magazine. 

We made a weather book (found online by Scholastic) and she did a weather match page. We had a lot of wind the week before, and it reminded me of this part of "Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day:"

"Happy WIndsday, Owl," said Pooh... Owl says..."I wouldn't go so far as to call it Windsday. Just a mild zephyr." : - D

On Friday, we talked about watermelon. Bethany colored one on half of a paper plate and pretended to eat it! We also found the states Wyoming, Washington, and West Virginia on a map. We talked about the World map and the globe too. We planned to write with white chalk on black paper, crack and open walnuts, and discuss the watermelon life cycle, but we didn't get to it. Here's to good health for the rest of the school year! Cleaning up yucky beds in the middle of the night is no fun!

Next week is X & Y week... with lots of yellow! (but not yawning!)


Matthew 8:26-27
He replied, “You of little faith, why are you so afraid?” Then he got up and rebuked the winds and the waves, and it was completely calm. The men were amazed and asked, “What kind of man is this? Even the winds and the waves obey him!”

Genesis 1:10
God called the dry ground “land,” and the gathered waters he called “seas.” And God saw that it was good.

John 4:5-10
So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon. When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

American Girls: Samantha week 5 (time #2)

We had a lovely class in American Girls this week. We discussed book 5, Samantha Saves the Day. I also read the page in Welcome to Samantha's World about Women's Suffrage to the class. It was discussed in book four last week.

This week in class we made May day baskets. The May baskets pattern and directions are found in Samantha's Craft Book. We took one sheet each of 12 X 12 card stock, drew a tic-tac-toe pattern on the card stock, and cut two portions on two sides. Then we folded on all of the rest of the lines, and stapled the sides into a basket. They got stickers to decorate it and a piece of ribbon for the handle (another one inch piece of card stock cut for each girl). They turned out cute, and would look great with flowers in it!

 Our second craft was doily party favors. You can find the directions here. We rolled up a doily, glued it, put a tulle round in the center, added a ribbon and a string of pearls to the outside and put a small bottle of bubbles inside. We discussed Uncle Gard's wedding and how this might have been used during that time (except no bubbles. Maybe mints would have been used?) The girls loved them!

For snack we had Corn Oysters. You can find the recipe here. The girls tried them, but not many liked them very much. It was a different snack this week! Since we had extra time, we played "Hide the Thimble." It is a game where everyone puts their heads down and closes their eyes, then the teacher hides a thimble (or spool of thread, in our case.) in someone's hands. Everyone else guesses who has it. Whoever guesses correctly gets to hide the thimble the next time. It was a fun and simple little game!

Next week we will discuss book six. Only one more week left of Samantha for the semester! : - (


Matthew 13:48
When it was full, the fishermen pulled it up on the shore. Then they sat down and collected the good fish in baskets, but threw the bad away.

Matthew 14:20
They all ate and were satisfied, and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over.

Acts 9:24-25
...but Saul learned of their plan. Day and night they kept close watch on the city gates in order to kill him. But his followers took him by night and lowered him in a basket through an opening in the wall.