Last Minute New Year's Eve Countdown

Are you looking for a last minute countdown chart for the New Year?
Usually I am coming up with last minute ideas because I procrastinate. (Actually, I think better under pressure and usually come up with my ideas last minute, quite stressful.) This time, however, I wasn't even really thinking of doing something with the girls until last minute. I looked at other ideas out there: snack ideas, countdown ideas, craft ideas, noisemaker ideas. You can check out my post and check my New Year's Eve Celebration Pinterest board for some off the neat ideas I came across.

But yesterday afternoon I came up with an idea for our very own countdown, which will incorporate some other ideas. When I first started this blog, I was very much into making countdown charts. Though I haven't had as much time to make them recently, I think I might get back to them. This countdown chart is a little different than the ones I have done in the past. We will be counting down the hours to midnight, starting at 1pm today.

It is our:

Countdown to 2013

I traced a BIG circle onto white posterboard and glued it to foil lined posterboard. I then traced the bottom of a cup to get the circles for the numbers. The numbers are just taped onto the big clock face. 

Starting at 1pm we will be taking one circle off per hour. Underneath the circle the girls will find out how many hours are left until 2013 and what we are going to do that hour. The first few hours are just our normal day. After dinner it gets a bit more fun.

With this clock countdown chart you can put whatever fun activities you want to do with your children. We are going to be using some of the ideas I posted about last night during some of these hourly events.

The First Week of Advent in our Homeschool

This week we have been busy preparing to get ready for Advent in anticipation of Christmas. I've been trying to get some cleaning and organizing done. The girls saw the Christmas decoration boxes and decided they needed to "decorate." So of course we had a mess of tinsel all over the floor, a few decorations scattered around, a smushed decoration that my pregnant hormones didn't take too well (it was my mother's Little Drummer Boy which I remember being on the tree when I was a child) and an attempt at hanging stocking on our banister.

I absolutely love my girls and the fact that they are so excited to help.  With every thing else I am trying to get done, I still have to fix the stockings and finish decorating. However...

We have been taking a section off of our Advent Countdown Trees every night at Bible Time. 

Below our Advent Countdown Tree you will find a pile of Christmas presents.

I saw this idea on a couple of blogs. I hunted through our bookshelves and took out some books from the library. The idea is to wrap enough books to be able to open one a day to read during Advent. The thing that is great with this idea is you can start with how many days are left until Christmas. For example, today there are only 17 days left until Christmas. You could still wrap 17 books and have your child(ren) open one book a day. 

Here are the girls all ready to wrap the books.

Amelia got to open the first book.

Tabitha opened the second book, but she didn't want me to take a picture. Hannah then opened the third.

She loves books and proceeded to look through it right away.

Then I decided I wanted to make a Advent Place Mat. I had the girls color a nativity scene.

Then I cut it out, glued it onto black paper and wrote the numbers 1-20 (as that was how many days were left until Christmas by the time I got to this).

Tabitha's:

Amelia's:

Hannah's:

I then covered them in contact paper as I want them to be placemats.

Every evening during Bible Time we are covering the highest number with a star sticker, showing how many days are left until Christmas.

So there are two more Advent Countdown ideas I wanted to share. I realize it is now Dec 8th, but as I mentioned, these ideas are very flexible and can still be used no matter what day you start, just adjust your days accordingly.

I am linking to

25 Days of Christmas-Advent Countdown Tree

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25 Days of Christmas

I am thrilled to be participating in the 25 Days of Christmas.

As we get ready for Christmas we, as a family, try very hard to emphasize the importance of the celebration of the birth of Jesus, our Lord and Savior. This starts at the beginning of the month with an observance of Advent, focusing on the joyful anticipation of his coming. Quite a few years ago I decided to create a countdown chart that would ultimately focus on this true meaning of Christmas. I originally saw this idea on a Christmas card and decided to incorporate it into our celebration.

I started by painting a Christmas tree onto poster board:

Last year I didn't want to paint a tree, so I just made one out of construction paper, but I prefer the painted tree. Tabitha loved the texture effect I was creating. In fact she wanted to try to make a tree herself and add texture. I will share the trees the girls made in a later post.

The children cut pictures out of old Christmas cards to use as ornaments/decorations on our tree. 

I then divided the poster board into 24 sections. 

And we attached the decorations with tape. I wanted to attach them with tape because on the back of each of them I had put the names of the people who had sent the card. We will pray for each person or family as we go through the month. 

In the past we have cut off a piece of the tree each day. I have put different things on the back of the piece being cut off. For example, my original tree (when the older children were little) had pictures that represented different Christmas symbols and we discussed how they related to Jesus. This year we have the Bible Verses we are going to read during our Bible time. I found a great site for Advent Activities. Homeschooled-Kids.com. Not only do they have the Bible readings (which I needed because I can't find my book I've had for years) but there are recipe and craft ideas.

The "tree" will not be cut until this evening, Dec 1st. Then each night we will cut off one section and read the verses along with singing the suggested songs and doing the activities. As we cut the tree we will reveal the picture underneath which is a cross.

I just drew a cross on another piece of poster board and colored it with crayons.

Then I painted fallen branches. 

The card I got this idea from had several pages in which the needles and branches slowly fell off the tree, until at the end we were left with a cross, a reminder that Jesus didn't remain a baby in a manger.  

On December 24th, after our Christmas Eve candle lighting service at church, we will come home to have Bible time and cut off the last piece. Revealing the cross underneath.

Originally the tree was huge (I actually covered the window in the trailer where we were living). So on Christmas morning my children were opening their presents under the cross, not by a tree. Here is a picture of the tree (couldn't find one of the cross on Christmas morning).

Here are a couple of shots of the tree I made last year (so you can see the difference in size).

The great thing about this advent countdown tree is that you don't have to start it today. There have been years that I procrastinated and the tree didn't get made until later in the month. You can customize how many days you count down by drawing less sections!

Do you have a Christmas blog post you would like to share with our readers? Sign up on our linky below to share your posts! If you are one of our readers and would like to see more Christmas posts click on the Linky below!

Merry Christmas to All!

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School Time: Week 13

Not the most productive week. We started out with Muffin Tin Monday of course. Can you guess the theme?

And spent some time making music:

I pulled this out today while she was sitting on the floor.  She really enjoys hitting the keys and making music.

Then we worked on our Advent Countdown Calendar Tree.  This is actually a miniature version of the tree I used with the older children after their dad left me.  Originally it was made out of 5 sheets of poster board (the big ones, the 5th one was cut in half and taped to the bottom) taped together onto which I painted a tree. We used in in place of a real tree. 

For this version I cut a tree out of green paper, glued on a star and colored a stump.  I gathered up old Christmas cards for the girls to use to cut out ornaments.

Okay, so I couldn't get them to stay still, this was the best shot I could get.

Of course then I decided I wanted to section off the days left til Christmas so it would be easier to know where to cut (with the original I just cut where I thought would work).  So the girls needed to re-attach the ornaments.  This time I had them place one in each section so they could take turns taking ornaments off so I could cut.

If you look carefully you will see we have cut the first section off leaving 23 days til Christmas in the above picture.  A second picture is underneath the tree, the children will not know what it is until we remove enough of the sections.  The older children already know because it is the same as before.

I got the idea years ago from a Christmas card I saw.  As you turned pages the branches were falling off the tree, leaving a pile behind and unveiling a cross.  As I mentioned, we used this instead of a tree. So on Christmas morning we were opening our presents under the cross, not a Christmas tree.  

I also decided it was time to put our weather duck to use.  He's been attached to our living room window, not really accessible.  I decided to bring him into the dining room next to the school table.  

Just wish the accessories would stay on better.

I have been very unstructured this week.  The one day, Tabitha decided to draw a picture of herself (she's the one on the left with all the hair).  

Then SHE wrote this sentence under the picture:

translation: man came to Tabitha. She actually started Tabitha on the bottom line with the rest of the sentence (note the T, A bottom right) then she realized she wouldn't be able to fit the whole word so I suggested she write her name above it.  After she wrote this, she then drew the man (figure on the right).  She said, "The man is walking side by side to me." I offered to write it for her.  As there was no room we wrote it on the facing page.  Then she drew a flower being held by her, I believe.  Later, when daddy was up, we found out the man was daddy.

Tiny Tot Time

Some Baby Signing Time:

Hannah spends a lot of time sitting on the floor now.  I surround her with soft toys in case she falls over, which happens less and less often.  She really enjoyed the Teddy Bear Teddy Bear soft book the other day.  She had right a hold of the interactive teddy bear that you can make jump up and down on the bed.

 Wasn't as fond of the Baby Panda book.  There weren't as many things to grab a hold of.

I love the Teddy Bear Teddy Bear book.  Here are the lines it uses:

Teddy Bear Teddy Bear touch your nose (you can move the paw to touch the nose)

Teddy Bear Teddy Bear touch your toes (you can lift the legs up to the paws so they can touch)

Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear turn around (the teddy bear spins)

Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear up and down (stuffed little bear is attached to a ribbon so it will move up and down on the bed).

Teddy Bear Teddy Bear tucked up tight (the blanket folds up)

Teddy Bear Teddy Bear say good night.

She loves to play with the big white bear too:

She kept moving, so this was the best picture I could get.

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