Finishing off our Winter Bucket List (and Link-up)

We didn't quite mark off everything from our list, but we came close, and most importantly we had fun doing the activities together. We worked right up until the very last day and managed another three from the list.

The boys wrote a winter themed story together, one sentence per person at a time. I love doing these with the boys because while you may have a great story in your head the next sentence someone else gives can send the story in a totally different direction. The pat summer the boys had written another story and they all tried to turn the story back to their version, this time they worked together and played off each other to make the story flow. The sentence rotation for the whole story is Jacob, Joey, then Jordan. I did not help with the ideas, I only wrote what they chose to add and to stop them after saying just one sentence. I am very proud of their story and their teamwork to create it.

Here is the story they came up with

Bill and the Snowman

 

Once upon a time there was a man med Bill. He was lonely and had no friends. So one day he decided to go sledding. Then he realized he didn't have a sled. He goes to the store and spends $50 on sleds. Once he bought the sleds, he found a person and said "will you be my friend?" the man says "Buzz Off!". So feeling bad Bill decided since he got some sleds to go sledding and make friends. While Bill was sledding, at the bottom of the hill he met someone; not a man, not a lady, but a snowman. The snowman started to move and spoke. "I've come because I've seen you are lonely, I was sent by God". "God sent you down to be my friend?" asked Bill. "God has a message for you "No matter what people say, you should never give up" said the snowman. Bill looked at the snowman like "Huh?". Then the snowman said "take all of them there sleds up to the top of the hill". Bill feeling encouraged trudged through the snow. Once Bill and the snowman finally made it to the top o the snow hill, Bill asked "What's your name?". The snowman said "My name is Ace". So the snowman tells Bill "I want you to make so more snowmen". Bill starts making snowmen and snowladies. Then Bill said "this is too much work" and sledded down the hill. Once he was at the bottom, the snowman appeared next to him and said "remember the message, "Never give up". Bill goes back to the top of the hill and builds more snowmen. Another man finds him and says "I'm lonely will you be my friend?'. Bill says "Yes! You want to help me build these snowmen?". So Bill and the man go build snowmen. The man said this is too much work, and went down the hill. The man said we need more help. Suddenly everyone in town comes to build snowmen. Then a little pipsqueak yells "Let's go sledding!". So they all use Bill's sleds and go sledding. Bill is no longer sad and lonely and wonders were the heck is Ace my snowman friend.

 

The End

 

 

We also marked off put on a puppet show. They boys used the story they wrote to act out. I made copies of the story and the speaking parts were spilt up amongst the boys. While I was copying and highlighting everyone's parts the boys started working on the background and characters. They used a mix of paper on popsicle sticks and toilet tissue rolls. After rehearsing a couple times they preformed their story while I taped them, there were a couple mix up in lines and some of the characters were later for their roles, but the boys had a blast. We saved our puppets and "scripts" so they can preform their play for their grandparents when we go visit them.



I was a afraid that we wouldn't get to mark off pillow fight (that the boys were really looking forward to) due to too much testosterone and little patience among the boys. I knew when we added this one to our list that it had the possibility of ending in tears. With the boys word that they would not wail on each other, we proceeded with caution. My thinking was a time limit would be a good idea, so for five minutes they went at it. The boys kept to their word and we extended the time. I was pleased to watch them all laughing and giggling after snapping at each other for majority of the day.

While we made a great strides in our coloring book, we just couldn't pull it off. When they were younger they loved coloring and occasionally will dig out the crayons. As they are getting older they have other interest they would prefer doing (like anything with a screen).

Winter Bucket List Link-Up

Winter Bucket List Link-Up

Winter Bucket List Link-Up

WINTER BUCKET LIST LINK-UP

. http://www.inlinkz.com/cs.php?id=371479

Snowmen and Penguins For This Week's Bucket List Update (and Link-up)

Our Winter Bucket List is still moving along a little bit slower pace this week, but we still marked off another two item from our list. Last week we started growing our icicle candy as they take a 5-7 day s to grow. We were off to rocky start as half of our icicles weren't growing. We tried re-saturating our solution, but it didn't seem to help much. We'll restart them this week, hopefully with more  success.

With the freezing temperatures and even more snow coming down we continued with more of our snow themed activities while staying toasty warm in the house. We completed our popcorn snowmen. Those were a lot of fun to make and more difficult than we could have thought to get them to stay standing. We used mini chocolate chips for eyes, an orange Tic Tac for the nose, pretzel sticks for the arms, and a marshmallow for a hat. Our scarves made from fruit leather did not cooperate either, Jordan used a toothpick to get his to stay. Toothpicks were also used behind some of our snowmen to help keep them from looking like they were melting. While we were playing with our food we also made some snowmen using marshmallows and used mini Reese's peanut butter cups for a hat. They enjoyed snacking on the snowmen as much as making them.

We were the most successful with our pop bottle penguins though. We used 12 ounce root beer bottles. Cutting the tops off of three and the bottle 1/4 of another three. We were going to glue hem, but they seemed to stay put rather well. First everyone painted the white bellies of their penguins and after letting them dry, painted the rest of the bottles black. We saved painting the faces for last. While we were waiting for the pain to dry Jordan and I crocheted scarves and hats for them. Joey and Jacob tried to crochet their own, but just weren't getting it. Everyone dug though my extra yarn for which color they wanted. We were even able to "attach' the hat and scarves without using any glue (except for the one hat I made a little to big). Jordan and I kept the hats really simple with making a couple rows and turning them into tubes, tying the tops closed with a rubber band. These turned out so much cuter that I had envisioned.

Also we are still very slowly working our way through our coloring book (very slowly). You'd think being cooped up in the house they'd be more willing to color a couple pages, it just doesn't seem to have the appeal that Lego do.

Weekly Winter Bucket List Link-Up - week 3