the ELLA echo

wordless wednesday: easter egg hunt

library rainbow craft

this past week ella and i went to the inglewood branch of the nashville public library for the wednesday preschool story hour, which we love, even though neither of us is a preschooler.  mr. andrew, the children's librarian, had a wonderful craft that i just had to share with you.  he gave me permission to write about it and i wanted to make sure to document it as soon as possible so he'd get credit for it right away.

you need a paper plate cut in half--some markers or crayons--a bit of green clay, and some shaped pasta.  (more about each of these items as i go).

first the child colors the rainbow on the rounded part of the plate.  mr. andrew tried to make sure the kids colored each stripe in the correct order but really that is kind of too complex for that age.  ella played along until she decided that she didn't have room to add the colors in the correct order so she just put them where they fit.  :)

 

next take a small piece of green molding stuff--mr. andrew had modeling clay but you could use play doh--homemade or store bought--or some other clay-ish stuff--it only takes a little bit.  smoosh it along the straight edge of the plate to form the grass.

 

then stick in some uncooked, shaped pasta to create a scene.  since it is holy week, mr. andrew gave the kids pasta shaped like bunnies, chicks, and eggs, but i could easily see this with the pasta that is like a flower with pipe cleaners for stems.  or for that matter, you could just as easily use things like foam shapes from the craft store or the-dollar-tree-i-love-that-place. 

 

this was such a simple craft that the very little kids were able to handle—they got a chance to see, touch, and talk about colors and shapes, and to work with different mediums in one project.  it gave the big kids a chance to discuss the properties of light and color, weather, seasons, and holidays.  everybody enjoyed this craft, they were all proud of their finished results, and it is so adaptable that we might even do this as a seasonal craft—for example, using brown clay in autumn with twigs and pieces of torn construction paper for falling leaves—white clay for winter, with glitter for falling snow—for spring we could definitely make the pasta flowers.  i could easily see this as a sunday school craft, with blue clay for water and a construction paper ark.

 

*how would you adapt this project for other occasions?

the greatest story, told by the greatest storyteller

*i first published this post on my "placeholder" blog on 10 april, 2009.   it is the best "translation" of the story that i've ever heard.  i re-publish it each year in celebration of easter.

the passion and resurrection of jesus, as told by ella at age four:

"so jesus took his friends to lunch and told them he was going away.  and he broke their bread but he made them eat it anyway.

"then he went to the yard and prayed and the soldiers came and got him.  that wasn't very kind.

"the soldiers took him to the pilot and the pilot said he had to get on the cross even though he didn't do anything wrong, because that was why he got born.

"so jesus got on the cross with two other guys, and one of the guys said, 'i'm sorry, jesus', and jesus said, 'i know. it's ok, i forgive you.'  jesus will forgive you too, you just have to tell him you're sorry.

"then his friends put him in a cave and moved the rock and he stayed there the next day, and then the other next day jesus came out of the cave and he was alive again. that was the first easter.

"then all his friends wanted to look at his boom-booms ["boo-boos" = his hand wounds]  and then he rised up on his cloud and one day he will rise down again to visit us.

"and then his friends had a meeting because they were worried about jesus being up on the cloud and all their hair caught on fire but it didn't burn them.  they had to tell a grown up about the fire and then stop-drop-and roll.

"and then his friends told everybody to watch the clouds in case jesus was rising down again."

 

long time, no blog

you're about to see why.

after my last post, this is what went on here:

ella built a covered wagon and went out on the trail, taking her trusty dollies and one adventurous cat (notice she also hand-crafted a candle holder for looming in the dark).

 

then she built a wide-body car with custom woody panels and set out on the road for a cross-country tour. 

 

then the whole family set out in our non-wide-body, non-woody car for georgia:

 

illinois:

 

and twice to virginia to visit family.  the first time we woke up to a surprise:

 

which was immortalized in paint by a neighbor and friend:

 

and on the next trip we got to celebrate a very special milestone for people we love:

 

and betwixt and between it all, we have gardened:

 

*catch me up—what have you been up to since i’ve been gone?