Literature in the Kitchen - Tomie DePaola

No wonder I have put on 5 pounds! I've recently learned a little homeschooling trick that is not too friendly on my hips. I'll tell you my little secret but you have to promise me you'll use if for good and not evil. And you must promise to share anything you produce from implementing this little secret. OK, here it goes.........the kitchen makes learning FUN!!

I came across a Scholastic book that shows things you can do with the kids while reading Tomie DePaola books. We recently read "Watch out For Chicken Feet in Your Soup." What an adorable little book. The boys loved my bad Italian accent. Or maybe I imagined that they loved it.

In the book, the old Italian Grandma makes bread dolls for the little boys. I tried doing some research on the origin of these weird concoctions, but I didn't come up with much. They seem to be a popular bread in Europe, especially during the Easter holiday.


Here's Quinn with his unbaked and baked Bread Doll. Isn't it cute? I'm sure he named it before he ate it. He's very creative when he names things so I'm guessing it was something like "Baby Bread."

And here's Simon bo Bimon with his finished masterpiece.

Fall Time Fun with our Homeschooling Peeps

Circle S Farms...good times. The boys had a blast. This place had quite a corn maze and a very intimidating Hay Barn. Again, I am just thrilled that the boys are making friends with some other Homeschooled kids. This is really helping Liam and Simon. Liam actually came up to me the other day and admitted there were some advantages to homeschooling. Wow! This is big!! Quinn still just tags along everywhere we go and loves it.

There were a gazillion of these caterpillars at the farm and the kids had them crawling all over them. We later found out that from Grandma that the orange stripe on these critters has something to do with how harsh the Winter will be. Not knowing how long their stripes were last year, I can't dole out any Winter tips. We will all just have to wait and see.