Books of the Week – November 14, 2009

I want to share two fabulous Thanksgiving books today.
The first is The Thanksgiving Beast Feast by Karen Gray Ruelle.
This is an early reader book,  but I’ve found the simple text of this type of book is perfect for a preschooler too.  It has 3 chapters, but don’t let that scare you – it’s a very quick read. 
Two children (cats actually) are learning about Thanksgiving.  They learn, briefly, the basics about the pilgrims and the first Thanksgiving feast.  They see animals that are hunting for food and decide to make a “beast feast” for them so they can have Thanksgiving too.  They make a variety of treats for the squirrels, birds, and chipmunks, and watch as the little animals enjoy their feast. :)  It’s really a cute little book and it has some great ideas for extension activities, like baking cookies and making treats for the animals.  M is really into watching the birds and squirrels lately, and we actually had a chipmunk in our house recently (another story entirely…) so we may do just that!
The only thing that bothered me a tiny bit about this book, was that it was focused on being thankful for our food, and that was given as THE reason for Thanksgiving.  While it’s true that the pilgrims did not have food and were thankful for the bounty they eventually received, I don’t feel that food is the main reason for being thankful.  In our home we try to be thankful for every blessing and thankful *to* God, who is never mentioned in this book.  However, it’s really a sweet book, and I feel comfortable reading it to M because he learns what we believe in many other ways.
The second Thanksgiving Book is Thanksgiving With Me, by Margaret Willey. This book is so moving it brought tears to my eyes the first time I read it.  It is basically the story of a little girl who is asking her mother about the uncles who are coming to visit for Thanksgiving.  It gives an overall warm family feeling… most of us know the anticipation of seeing family whom we haven’t seen in a long while, and how special it is when this happens at holidays.  I love this book; however, if you are looking for an explanation of Thanksgiving, this one doesn’t talk about the pilgrims a single time.  It gives one the feeling of Thanksgiving in a wonderful way though!
For more book reviews, go here.
Have a beautiful day! :)

Bob the Builder Game Cards

M loves Bob the Builder… obsessively. It’s really a great show – very positive about working together. It’s full of encouragement and confidence building and even forgiveness when something goes wrong or a mistake is made.

So, in our house the Bob talk is non-stop lately. I remember someone saying you can use something your child is interested in to help them learn about anything.

Well, I made these for M this week… Name cards for some of the trucks with glass pebbles to match the letters with. I found some flat glass ones at Dollar Tree (um, of course!) and wrote the letters on them with permanent marker. M loves it and gave me a list of names for other trucks that he wants me to make. Hee hee.

I also made these game cards: I printed two sets and we used them for a memory game today. He LOVED them and was so excited. I’m going to use them to teach him how to play “Go Fish” too.

Of course they are printable. :) If you have a Bob the Builder lover just click on the image above and you can download the set. There are 17 cards in all. You’ll need to print 2 sets of course. The names of the trucks are printed on there too because moms can’t always remember important things like that! ;)

I want to make some more activity pack type things with these lovely trucks since he’s responded so well to these two. Any ideas??

Have a beautiful day! :)


**UPDATE** The original version of the game cards had an incorrect name for one of the trucks in it. It's been corrected and the new version is now linked up. 11/13/09