We have had a wonderful Thanksgiving! It started Tuesday with Luke’s Thanksgiving Program and Feast at preschool. It was just precious and Luke actually sang! The only bummer was that the camcorder flaked out half way through and I didn’t get all of his songs recorded. L
Every other two year old had on turkey feathers except for Luke. He refused! The 2 year olds did the Chicken Dance and looked adorable shaking their turkey feathers.

We headed to Florida on Wednesday to Dan’s parent’s house. His sister and her family were already there and the kiddos had a great time with their cousins!

They all giggled and played from sun up to way past sun down every day that we were there.

Dan’s two brothers and their families joined us all on Thanksgiving and we all enjoyed a yummy lunch.

There was a wee bit of Black Friday shopping and leftovers on Friday and then the trip back Saturday.

We read updates of the Florida/Florida State game on Dan’s phone the whole way home. It was Tim Tebow’s last regular season game.

Since my mother is already rolling her eyes that I mentioned Tim Tebow’s name again… I might as well say- Go Gators on Saturday! My parents are going to the SEC Championship game and Dan is a smidge jealous. J

I have officially baked my Crunchy Caramel Apple pie 7 times this season! That’s crazy! I baked one for D3’s teacher, L’s 2 teachers, one at my parent’s early Thanksgiving, 2 for actual Thanksgiving, and then one tonight for our Hanging of the Greens at church. I love the pie, but I think I’m retired from this pie until next year.

We had two great services today to help us center ourselves on Christ’s birth during this Christmas time. I love the season of Advent and the anticipation of Christmas. It is the best time of the year!

I am thankful for my incredible, loving and giving husband. I am very blessed.

I am thankful for my beautiful, spunky little boys. They keep life entertaining.

I am thankful for people with wild enough imaginations and enough patience to write books… that I become addicted to…. That are then made into movies that I also become addicted to…

I am thankful for a great new house with a working furnace and ductwork. It’s great to be warm and cozy when it’s cold and icky outside. J

I am thankful for a great job that I love and a great assistant teacher to work with. It keeps my days filled with fun!

I am thankful that the Thanksgiving Program is done at school! And Luke sang!!

I am thankful for my crappy car. It’s old and beat up, but it’s paid for and gets me safely from point A to point B.

I am thankful for a great church to be a part of. I enjoy my time there and am rather fond of the pastor.

I am thankful for my kid’s awesome teachers this year. They love my boys and take good care of them… and teach them a thing or two also.

I am thankful for December! It brings my favorites- Christmas and the birthdays of my two boys!

I am thankful for all of the many blessings that God has given me- those I’ve listed and the hundreds of others that I have not!

“Give thanks to the LORD for he is good, His love endures forever!”
~Psalm 136:1

Last year I wrote this post about Thanksgiving crafts. Here are a few more Thanksgiving ideas that I either do in my class or would like to!

There is a great set of November printables at abcschoolhouse.

You could use one of the printable turkeys for a Turkey Glyph. This is one of my favorite activities to do with my kids. It really makes them learn to listen to directions.

This is the glyph that I use:

Turkey Glyph  students follow these directions to color their turkey:

  Boys orange beak, girls; yellow beak

  Yellow feet has siblings; Red feet does not have siblings

  Body: like to eat turkey, brown; doesn’t like it, black

  Color the turkey’s eyes the color of your eyes.

Feathers: 4 year old- red and orange; 5 year old red and yellow

Isn’t this a cute turkey hat?

Thankful Turkey

Here’s a cute little turkey from Family Fun.

We always make Indian Headdress in my class. We pattern triangles on a long thin sheet of paper (like a sentence strip), fit it to the child’s head and staple and then attach feathers (I cut out feather shapes) to the back. These always turn out so cute and are a good way to practice patterning.

We also make Indian Corn. I have the kids paint the corn shape with dots of paint using a q-tip. Then we add green paper “husks.”
It looks a lot like the one above.

There are some cute File Folder games at preschoolprintables:

    turkey        ship shape     perfect pies

I’ve never tried these, but they sure are cute.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Last year I wrote this post about cute Thanksgiving cookies. I thought I would do another this year with more super cute cookies.

We made these today in my class. They turned out cute!

I had some leftover ingredients, so I’ll probably have my boys make some at home.

I LOVE these handprint turkey cookies!! You can find instructions here. There is another version at Nick Jr. as well.

I am going to have to do these- maybe next year.

Here’s a super cute Indian corn cookie:

Recipe can be found here at Family fun.

I found these little turkeys on the Betty Crocker website.

And a cupcake for good measure.

The recipe for these super cute cupcakes can also be found at Family Fun.

Luke has been loving preschool and learning so much in his wonderful class this year!  He came home singing the songs that he has been practicing for his upcoming Thanksgiving program.  Mr. Turkey is his personal favorite.

 I find his singing beyond cute…. but I guess I am his mother. 

Mr. Turkey
Mr. Turkey, Mr. Turkey
Run away, Run away
You better be careful
Or you will be a mouthful
On Thanksgiving Day
On Thanksgiving Day!

After a much needed blogging break, I’m back. Not that anyone noticed. Well, except for my mother. J

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving break. We went up to my parents for the majority of the week and packed in lots of fun! My kids got spoiled as usual. Papa was very excited to give D3 a dune buggy. D3 got in and took off.

Hey, wait for me!

The pics are dark, but hopefully they can be seen. He loves the thing and has been whipping around in it ever since he got it!

I didn’t really take many pictures on Thanksgiving Day, but I did get one of D3 enjoying his yummy lunch.

We had a great spread and both of my grandmothers, my grandfather, and my aunt came to join us on Thanksgiving Day.

My sweet Mawmaw, who would not be thrilled to know I put her picture on the website. J

And tuckered out from too much Thanksgiving fun:

We also watched Twilight, shopped on Black Friday, and went on the Polar Express, but I’ll update more through the week.

Have a great week. It’s back to reality!

The card slot on my computer is not working, so I can’t upload the rest of my pictures I wanted to share from the Auburn v. Georgia game that we went to this past weekend! D3 had a ball and loved the cotton candy, if you can’t tell from my previous post!

It’s hard to believe, but Thanksgiving is next week-so, I wanted to post a couple of my favorite Thanksgiving recipes!

Mawmaw’s Cornbread Dressing
Ingredients:

• Cream of celery coup
  
• Cream of chicken soup
  
• 1 ½ tbsp. sage
  
• 1 can chicken broth
  
• Salt and pepper to taste
  
• Cake of cornbread
  

Directions:

• Crumble cornbread into fine piece in a medium bowl
  
• Add the rest of the ingredients and stir
  
• Place in casserole dish
  
• Cook on 350 degrees for 45 minutes
  

And I’m pretty sure my husband’s favorite thing that I make:

Crunchy Caramel Apple Pie
Ingredients:

• 1 deep-dish pastry crust- 9 inch
  
• 1/2 cup sugar
  
• 3 Tbsp. all-purpose flour
  
• 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
  
• 1/8 tsp. salt
  
• 6 cups thinly slice, peeled apples (2 different kinds)
  
• 1 recipe crumb topping (below)
  
• 1/2cup chopped pecans
  
• 1/4 cup caramel topping
  

Ingredients for Crumb Topping:

• 1 cup packed brown sugar
  
• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
  
• 1/2 cup quick cooking rolled oats
  
• 1/2 cup butter
  

 Directions for Crumb Topping:

1. Stir together brown sugar, flour, rolled oats
   
2. Cut in 1/2 cup butter until topping is like course crumbs.  Set aside.

Directions:

1. In a large mixing bowl, stir together the sugar, flour, cinnamon and salt
   
2. Add apple slices and gently toss until coated.
   
3. Transfer apple mixture to the pie shell
   
4. Sprinkle crumb topping over apple mixture
   
5. Place pie on a cookie sheet so the drippings don’t drop into your oven.
   
6. Cover edges of pie with aluminum foil
   
7. Bake in a preheated 375 oven for 25 minutes.  Then remove foil and put back in for another25-30 minutes without foil
   
8. Remove from oven.  Sprinkle pie with chopped pecans then drizzle with caramel on top.
   

Yum! These are always the 2 favorite things I look forward to at Thanksgiving.

What are your favorite Thanksgiving foods?

My week in three words:

It’s been a fairly stressful week for all of our family members (except for the boys and me on our Lazy Day Tuesday J). But I am going to look at our week through the positive lens of thankfulness.

Dan

I am thankful for a husband that is a hard worker and is able to balance all he has to balance and do it well. Dan is so stressed right now. He has had more to do this month than is really possible to do, but he is somehow getting it done. He wrote about that on his blog here. Actually I do know how he is getting it done- his complete faith in God. I am so thankful that I have a husband with a strong faith.

I’m also thankful that I have a husband that really cares for me and actually reads my blog and leaves sweet comments. J

D3
I am thankful that D3 is such a thoughtful boy. Every time that he has gotten a piece of candy out of his Halloween bag, he has gotten a piece for the entire family. He wants to share what he has and that warms my heart.

I am thankful also, that even though D3 is going through a bit of a hard time at the moment (maybe thanks to the above mentioned sugar high) and his Momma has had to fuss at him this week, he still writes things like this:

translation: I Love you Mommy Everyday

Blue
I am thankful for my sweet baby who is going through the terrible twos hard core, but still loves to gives hugs and kisses to anyone that will receive them

I’m thankful for a little guy who works so hard with his play and immediately wants to run to me and show me. His newest thing is to come running up to me with his latest block creation and say “Wow” so that I will rave about his awesome tower!

I am so thankful for all these boys that I get to share my life with.

Have a great weekend!!

We got D3’s Tom the Turkey done. He decided to disguise his turkey as a pirate. I thought it turned out pretty cute.

And continuing with some ever-so-lovely Thanksgiving ideas. Here are some super-cute cookies.

Pilgrim Hats:

Dip top of small peanut butter cup in yellow frosting. Put the cup over center hole of a fudge-striped cookie, forming the hatband and crown. Add a buckle of Chiclets gum.

Here are three versions of a turkey:

Pipe chocolate frosting on outer edge of half of sugar cookie. (Use a ziplock bag with the end tip cut off as a piping bag) Place candy corn on top of frosting as feathers. Pipe orange decorating icing onto each cookie to resemble turkey face and feet. Use orange icing to attach candy-coated chocolate baking bits to turkey face for eyes. Pipe black decorating gel on baking bits for centers of eyes.

Take 1 double stuff Oreo apart and place another whole Oreo on it’s side, sticking to cream. In front of the Oreo on its side, place a malted-milk ball for the turkeys head. Place candy corn, points down, in between the Oreo cookie that is standing on it’s side for feathers. Use decorating gel for eyes and to attach half candy corn piece for beak.

Cover one side of Oreo with chocolate frosting. Attach the malted milk ball (turkey body) near the center of the cookie. Arrange candy corn pieces on chocolate frosting with the wide end of candy along the outer edge. Put a large dab of frosting above the malt ball (turkey head). Push the side of the red M&M into this as the wattle. Push orange M&M’s (feet) into frosting below body.

And a Cornucopia:

Use a half graham cracker as a base. Use frosting or peanut butter to adhere a bugle to the cracker. Fill with Trix cereal fruit pieces.

(You can click on the pictures of the cookies to find the original recipe).

Look who is now residing in my kitchen:

My cute little Thanksgiving Pilgrims are out, so that must mean that Thanksgiving is on its way! My mother-in-law gave us these cute little salt and pepper shakers a few years ago. They are from the Publix Thanksgiving commercials.

I thought I would do a few Thanksgiving related posts through this month. This first one, I will include a few ideas for cute Thanksgiving Crafts:

I love these pilgrims and Indians. I have always wanted to do these in my classroom, but I haven’t yet. They are made from Zoo Pal plates. Turn them over to the back and paint them with tempera paints. Add embellishments- wiggle eyes, wooden noses, bingo dot cheeks… and you have a super cute craft. I found this idea at The Virtual Vine.

My personal favorite the turkey handprint with cute poem:

This isn’t just some turkey
As anyone can see.
It’s made with my hand,
Which is a part of me.
It comes with lots of love,
Especially to say
I hope you have a very
Happy Thanksgiving Day!

I bought the kids plain little tees from Walmart last year and put their handprint turkeys directly on the shirt. They turned out cute.

Every year in my classroom, we make Thanksgiving shirts by using the kids’ handprints to look like an Indian head: 

One year the kids in my class made pilgrim hats out of paper cups. We used these as our place cards for Thanksgiving Feast. They looked similar to this:

I didn’t cut the bottom out for a snack cup, but that’s cute too. We covered ours in black paper and then glued the cup on a black paper circle. I left the white rim of the cup showing and it looked like the buckle.

This year, D3’s teacher is having us decorate a turkey at home. Our turkey doesn’t want to be eaten for Thanksgiving, so we have to disguise him, so that he doesn’t get caught.

My name is Tom Turkey
And I’m afraid as I can be.
I’m wearing my disguise
So you won’t catch me.

Here is are a couple of links for a blank turkey for this project:
http://teachers.net/gazette/NOV02/images/turkey.pdf

http://abcschoo.server341.com/seasonal_pdfs/November%20Web%20Directions.pdf

There are other super cute activities at that last link, as well.