Sunday, November 22, 2009

A New Christmas Tradition

I just read about a neat way to celebrate the coming celebration of our Savior's birth. It is called a Jesse Tree. It is similar to doing an advent calendar but uses a tree instead. Each ornament represents a different story (starting at Creation and ending with Jesus' birth) and each Bible passage shows how all the Old Testament points toward the coming of Christ the Messiah. I think it is an exciting way to teach about God's wonderful plan and purpose spelled out in the Old Testament. I plan on making one each day with the children and reading the Bible story that goes along with it. I first read about the Jesse Tree here, and I found all the verses and pictures for ornaments here from the RCA (Reformed Church in America). I'll put up pictures of the kids and their ornaments when we get them made.

"A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him- the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord." Isaiah 11:1-2

Sunday, November 8, 2009

Field Trip

The first Friday of every month is "Free First Friday" at our local museum . I have been intending to take the children since the Spring when I first found out about Free First Fridays and some how always managed to miss it! But this week we made it! The museum centers mostly around local history but also has rotating exhibits. The exhibit on display was "Women's Votes, Women's voices" which although an important part of our country's history, was not very exciting to my 2, 4, and almost 6 year old. They did love the Victorian house display of a home from the early 1900's, the old general store, the bank vault and most of all... the model railroad! It is a "not exactly to scale" model of the Great Northern Railway including several historic railroad routes in the Cascade Mountains. It cost two quarters to make it run... and praise the Lord there were two quarters in my jacket pocket that I didn't know were there!



After watching the train for about 15 minutes (it did 5 loops instead of the normal 3! another miracle!) We wandered through the Pangborn exhibit (first non-stop flight over the Pacific), Coyote's Corner (a little room just for kids to explore and enjoy) and headed down stairs to the Apple Capitol of the World exhibit. The exhibit had an early cleaning, sorting and packing line complete with catapault that Isaiah really wanted to see in motion. Lydia was rather sad that they only had pictures of the Apple Blossom royalty and no Princess dresses on display :( but has decided we should go back during Apple Blossom when they will put some on display.



And of course we had to get a picture with the coyote. (Click on the picture and you can check out Lydia's favorite prize sunglasses from the Harvest Festival!)

I spy...


Monday, November 2, 2009

Autumn colors



Leaves collected on our last outing and crayon shavings made for a fun fall craft to decorate our windows. You can find the link here for directions. The children LOVE to sharpen crayons, or anything for that matter. Isaiah tried to trim his fingernails with the pencil sharpener the other day... that will not happen again, I guarantee! They had a lot of fun and I'm sure we'll be doing more melted crayon crafts soon,

wrestling season




Rayna helped Daddy get his gear ready for wrestling season.