Advent activities

Here's some photos from some activities we've being doing during Advent.

First is making icing biscuits. The kids love this activity, mainly because they get to eat sweet icing and lollies - I think. They each got to choose a colour for their icing - Ben chose black and Joanna chose blue. Then there was a variety of lollies to choose from to decorate (licorice, mnms, mini marshmallows, choc chips).

We also spent a morning decorating some boxes to use with our Nativity scene dress-ups (another advent activity that I intend to blog about sometime this month), for the wise men's gifts for Jesus. We each decorated one (Ben's is the 1st, mine the 2nd and Joanna's the 3rd), the reason we did 3 was so there is one for each type of gift the wise men brought for Jesus (gold, frankincense and myrrh) - not to perpetuate the 'three wise men' error.

Knight in white armour...

When the kids were getting dressed the other morning, Joanna decided to try out her skirt (with in-built bike pants) on her head. Ben was the first to recognise the similarity of it to that of knight's armour.

Summer is here!

We have now had 4 days of sunshine with maximum temperatures above 20C (which is comfortably warm by NZ standards - definite shorts and tshirt weather!).  Just in time for our beach holiday!

War on Santa - Attack no. 2 (aka...Christmas Tradition - Advent)

Here is the first of my more detailed descriptions of some of the Christmas Traditions we are starting this year (that I promised I'd do earlier in the week).

Advent Calendar

The main reason that we are doing an Advent calendar is so the kids (and us) are reminded of the reason for celebrating Christmas, every day leading up to Christmas.  There are a couple of reasons I think this is important:

1. So the kids (Ben especially) become familiar with the details, meaning and significance of the birth of Jesus.  Doing a little each day means Ben is able to memorise details of the story, so he can recall them whenever he wants to (which he does frequently when 'playing').  This means he is also able to tell his friends this knowledge, which they may not hear in their own homes.
   
2. It is a tool to help counteract the many messages about secular 'Christmas' (Santa, presents/materialism etc.) that bombard the kids everyday leading up to Christmas.

Ok...on to the details of what I have done for our family Advent calendar this year:

We are doing readings that concentrate on the events around the birth of Jesus. We have 25 readings mainly from Luke and Matthew's gospels.  I got the material from Wendy, who specifically wrote it to aim at a preschool age audience.  Each day there is a Bible passage to read (we're using the NIrV version); some questions to help reinforce the main points of the reading and check/aid comprehension of the passage; then there is a key verse selected from the passage and some suggested activities related to the passage (usually drawing a particular scene or person mentioned).

The actual calendar is made up of paper lunch bags (tuckshop bags), each numbered and strung up on a ribbon.  Inside the bag each day there is a piece of paper with a paraphrased version of the key verse for that day, plus a 'fun' something for each of the kids (well not for Naomi, she's a bit young).  Some days these are small gifts (eg. balloons, bubbles, pencils, special food) and some days it is a special activity (eg. icing/decorating biscuits, special story time, having ice creams for afternoon tea).

Work Christmas Party...

Was last night.  We got friends from church to babysit Ben and Joanna so we could go (Naomi came with us).  As I mentioned the other day, it was at Vilagrad Winery.  The food was 3 course buffet style (here is the menu if your interested), with a yummy cheese platter to finish the evening.  The entertainment for the night was a live band 'The Sound Workshop' with accompanying space for dancing.  Peter's company also organised a challenge...solving a reubik's cube where the solution resulted in the new company logo (which most employees didn't really know what it looked like) being displayed correctly on each side.

Creative discipline...

Yesterday, Ben was sent to play in his room by himself for 10 minutes, as he was not playing appropriately with Joanna (whinging lots, getting overly frustrated with toys, and generally over-reacting to everything).  He initially protested to the consequence, but when I went back to his room after the 10 minutes to tell him that he could come out and play with the rest of us again, this is what I found...

A ship

The Flower mill

He said he'd made it as a 'surprise' for me.

A week of lasts...

From this Wednesday just gone, till the end of next week, there a quite a few things that will be the last for this year or forever in some cases.

1. Wednesday -  was the last day my parents were here.
2. Thursday - was the last morning Bible study for the year.
3. Friday (today) - was the last visit from my midwife - Naomi had her 6 week check and will now see a Plunket nurse (child health nurse) for her health/development check-ups
4. Saturday - is Peter's work christmas party (which I'm really looking forward to - we're getting a baby sitter for Ben and Jaoanna, plus it's as Vilagrad Winery which I've been wanting to go to sometime)
5. Tuesday - is the last day of Playgroup for the year
6. Thursday - is the last day of kindy for Ben (there is actually 1 more week of kindy after this, but we will be on holidays)
   

Immunisations... False start

I took all the kids to the medical centre for Naomi and Ben to get their immunisations (Naomi's 6 week ones and Ben's 4yr old ones).  I thought it was easiest to get both done at once instead of making 2 separate trips. Well I get there and the receptionist tells me I can't get them done today for 2 reasons:

1. Naomi has to see a Dr before she can get her 6 week immunisations (I didn't know this), so we need to make an appointment for the Dr and then an appointment to see the nurse.
2. Ben couldn't get his today because there was a nurse away sick, so with only 1 nurse there wasn't any spare time to do it.

So...we have made appointments for next Wednesday morning, for Naomi to see a Dr and both of them to see the nurse to get their needles.

Mixed emotions...

I've been experiencing very mixed emotions today including:

1. Sadness - because my parents have gone and I really enjoyed spending time with them and sharing my children (their grandchildren) with them and I am missing them.  Plus the kids really liked having them here and enjoyed spending time with them and are going to miss them too.
2. Fear - I haven't had to deal with all 3 kids on my own doing the whole day to day routine since Naomi was born (my parents arrived 1 week after she was born, so Peter was still home until then).  So I know it is going to take a bit to adjust our routine a bit and get used to getting everything done in a day on my own.
3. Excitement - About accomplishing all the daily tasks on my own without too much drama and also spending some time together as a family by ourselves.
4. Loneliness - I've gotten used to constantly having other adults around the house during the day and therefore having extra adult company and conversation to normal. (hence the marked increase in the number of blog posts today - I guess)
   

I seem to frequently be feeling more than one of these emotions at any one time.  Mum and Dad melded so well into our family life/routine, doing lots of little things (and some big things) to help out, that most things I've done today (including doing the washing, making lunch for the kids etc.) have reminded me of them and hence stirred up the emotions I've mentioned.  It is great to have had such good family support (of the practical kind) for the past 5 weeks, but it is hard to go from that to totally nothing (not having any family living in NZ).

Survived kindy drop-off...

It is one of the things that Mum and Dad were totally doing for me while they were here (and I was very thankful for).  Ben starts kindy at 1pm and Naomi is due to feed between 1pm and 1.30pm.  I like to stay at kindy for a little bit at the start and do some activity/play with Ben (and Joanna also likes to get some time to play there too!).  So as of today, it means I have to drive to kindy so I can spend a short amount of time there (a bit shorter than I used to), then jump back in the car to get home in time to feed Naomi.
 I then have to fit in sleep/rest time for Joanna and I (Naomi is still you enough that she sleeps anywhere still), before getting back in the car (or maybe walking if we have time) to get back to kindy to pick Ben up at 3.30pm.

It should become a bit easier when Ben starts going to morning kindy, but that won't be happening until sometime during first term next year.