11 November – Learning With My Boys

Thanksgiving Turkey (fruit & vegetable) Platters -25

Storm loves fresh fruits and vegetables, so we made turkey platters to snack on while Thanksgiving dinner was being made. We also made a meat, cheese, and cracker platter as well.

Fruit Platter

We placed half of a pear on the bottom of the platter for the turkey body, with sliced olive eyes and cut carrot feet and beak. Then we placed strawberries, orange slices, and grapes around the platter for the turkey feathers.

We also used waffle cones for the kids to make their own cornucopia’s with their fruit.

Vegetable Platter

I cut the top off of a red pepper and cleaned our the insides to make a bowl for the turkey body. We placed it near the bottom of the platter. I used the end that I cut off for the turkey’s head, with sliced olive eyes and cut pepper feet and beak. I also cut yellow peppers into strips coming out the of top of the turkeys head like feathers. Then we placed cucumber slices, baby carrots, celery sticks, and more pepper strips around the platter for the turkey feathers.

To make the ranch, I used 16 ounces of sour cream and a ranch dry mix packet.

Meat & Cheese Platter

We placed a cheese ball on the bottom of the platter for the turkey body, with sliced olive eyes and cut carrot feet and beak. Then we placed cheeses, crackers, meat slices, and honey candied almonds around the platter for the turkey feathers.

Gingerbread Castle

I found an Oreo cookie castle kit for our Thanksgiving Gingerbread House Tradition. We added all kind of Oreo’s and Christmas candies including Mini Oreo’s, Christmas lights sprinkles, spice drops, snowflake sprinkles, pull and peel Twizzlers, and mini candy canes.

We used the icing that came with the kit as the glue for the cookie pieces, but I made my buttercream icing for the decorations on the bottom. Then she used my piping bags to put icing wherever she wanted it.

Buttercream Ingredients:

1 cup butter
1 cup Crisco
4 cups powdered sugar (2 lbs)
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 tablespoon milk (if thick)

Buttercream Directions:

Cream together the butter and Crisco with a mixer.
Slowly add in 1 cup of powdered sugar at a time.
Add the vanilla, if it seems too thick you can add a bit of milk.
Color with yellow food coloring.

Here are some of our other Thanksgiving Gingerbread posts:

And here are some of our other Family Holidays:

Preschool Pocahontas Photoshoot

My granddaughter is 3 years old and loves to dress up as a princess. This month we chose Pocahontas from Disney’s Pocahontas because I think of corn and sunflowers in the fall. Also, her dress is brown like the November fall leaves.

Princess Pocahontas is an adventurous, bold, respectful, generous, daring 18 year old girl from Powhatan tribe’s territory in Tsenacommacah, Virginia. Her sidekick is Meeko the raccoon.

Pocahontas quote: “My dream is pointing me down another path.”

Jeremiah 31:3 states, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.”

We went to a local park that had a lake for this photoshoot. She wore her Pocahontas dress and her brown strapy sandals with the “Pocahontas” hair bow from this Disney Princess Bow Pack. She also held a bouquet of sunflowers.

Here are some more of my toddler and preschool photoshoots:

You might also enjoy some of my other Pocahontas posts:

Thanksgiving Gingerbread Nativity -24

Every year we make gingerbread houses on Thanksgiving. We made a Nativity scene with graham crackers and gum drop people. We used coconut for the hay and animal crackers with candy canes as well. We tried something new this year, using peanut butter instead of icing; but it wasn’t sturdy enough so the gumdrops kept falling over. Next time we will have to add some powdered sugar to the peanut butter to thicken it up.

We also got this Gingerbread Train to try.

Homemade Apple Cinnamon Play Dough

We made some homemade Apple Cinnamon Play Dough, it is included in my Teachers Pay Teachers Fall Fun Autumn Preschool Pack. I also laminated the Apple Tree Orchard Play Dough Mat that is included in the pack.

Ingredients:

1 Cup flour
1/3 Cup salt
2 Teaspoons cream of tarter
2 Teaspoons Apple Pie Spice
1 Cup water
1 Tablespoon oil
Red food Coloring

Directions:

In a small saucepan, mix together 1 cup of water, 1 TBSP vegetable oil and a few drops of red food coloring.
In another small bowl mix together 1 cup flour, 1/3 cup salt, 2 teaspoons of cream of tartar and 2 teaspoons Apple Pie Spice.
Turn the stove on medium heat and slowly mix your flour mixture into your water mixture.
Continuing mixing until the color is fully blended and the playdough begins to pull away from the saucepan. The batter will be lumpy but as you stir the playdough begins to form and sticks to itself.
Place the playdough on a piece of parchment paper and allow it to cool a bit.
Once it’s cool to the touch knead for a few minutes until soft.

Here are some of our other Thanksgiving Gingerbread posts:

And here are some of our other Family Holidays:

Gingerbread House Tradition -23

Our family Thanksgiving tradition is making Gingerbread Houses. This year we used a Wilton House Kit with the icing and candies.

We use the icing like the glue to hold the gingerbread house together. Then once it was pretty sturdy, we used the glue to attach the candy decorations.

This is a tradition that my little sister and I started when we were teenagers. I have continued it with my kids (and sometimes their cousins) for over 20 years now.

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Fall Sensory Tot Tub

I put together some small fall items that I found at our local dollar store to create a fall themed Tot Sensory Tub. She liked sorting and using the toddler tweezer.

This tub kept her happy for a long time and we could practice sorting and counting all the objects. We sorted by color and by item, then we counted each pile. We had orange pumpkins, leaves, feathers, and fall jewels; yellow corn, leaves, feathers, and fall jewels; red leaves, feathers, and fall jewels; and brown acorns, leaves, and fall jewels.

Happy Fall!

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Family Thanksgiving Minute-to-Win-it

We visited some family for Thanksgiving. We played a few Minute-to-Win-it challenges together. Our family has a large age difference, so we tried to choose games that would be equally challenging for each of all.

Corn Cob Roll

Materials:

Directions:

Make straight lines with your masking tape that are at least 12 feet long and 1 foot apart.
In less than 1 minute…
Players should slowly roll the corn cob down the lane
If the corn cob rolls out of the lane, players have to roll it back to where it left the line and keep going
No sliding the corn cob with the spoon

Pumpkin Seed Suck It Up

Materials:

1 minute Timer
10 Pumpkin Seeds
Straws
Plates or Napkins

Directions:

Player needs 2 plates with 10 Pumpkin Seeds on one plate.
In less than 1 minute…
Use the straw to suck up the seeds, one at a time and place them on the second plate.
Try to get all of the seeds to the second plate in less than a minute.
You can adjust the difficulty of this challenge by adding or taking seeds.

Thankful Plate Stack

Materials:

1 minute Timer
6 Plastic Cups
3 Large Paper Plates

Directions:

In less than 1 minute…
have players stack the cups starting with 1, then a plate, 2 more cups, plate, 1 cup, plate, 2 cups!

Match Maker

Materials:

1 minute Timer
9 mini Pumpkins
9 Acorns
18 Plastic Cups
2 Empty Cups (across the room)

Directions:

Place a pumpkin under each cup and an acorn under each cup… and spread them out on the table.
Place an empty cup several feet away.
You have just 1 minute to…
uncover 1 pumpkin and acorn at a time and run it to the empty cups across the room
Sort the pumpkins and acorns into the appropriate cups.

Candy Corn Shake!

Materials:

Directions:

place candy corn into cups with 1 in a cup, 2 in the next cup, 3 in the next cup, 4, then 5
Cover the opening with card stock and glue – write a little number of how many candy corns are inside for your eyes only
In under a minute…
Players should shake the cups and order them in order 1-5 candy corns.

Shake Your Tail Feather

Materials:

1 minute Timer
an empty tissue box – the rectangle kind
pantyhose
1 bag of feathers
scissors and tape

Directions:

Tie the hose through the tissue box with the legs for the hose extending out of the backside
Fill the tissue box with feathers
In under a minute…
players should shake their tail feathers – emptying feathers out of the box

Inertia Yank

Materials:

Directions:

Place a cup with a piece of card stock on top of it. Then a cup on top of that with another piece of card stock on top. Place 1 more cup on top.
In under a minute…

Players should yank the card stock out from between the cups
If they are quick enough the cups should stack up without toppling over.

Pumpkin Bop

Materials:

Directions:

Players keep one hand in their pocket and try to keep two orange balloons up in the air for one minute.
You can adjust the difficulty of this challenge by adding or taking away a balloon.

Leaf Blower

Materials:

1 minute Timer
leaves, they can be real leaves that are dried out or fake leaves
straws (or turkey basters)

Instructions:

In less that 1 minute…
Player will use a new straw (or turkey baster) to blow/race the leaf to the other end of the table.

Turkey Trot

Materials:

Instructions:

Place one candy pumpkin on a spoon and stand at the beginning of the obstacle course.
In less than a minute…
Have players race holding onto their spoon with one hand (you can allow younger kids to use both hands).
If their candy drops off, they have to start back at the beginning.
To make this game more challenging for adults, you can create a bit of an obstacle course.

Acorn/ Pumpkin Toss

Materials:

Instructions:

Place the bucket on the floor 10 feet from where the player will be standing.
In under a minute…
The person with the acorns needs to throw all of the acorns into the bucket.

Turkeys of a Feather

Materials:

Directions:

The object of the game is to keep your feather in the air without touching the ground or any other surface by blowing on them.
players need to attempt to keep their feather in the air for a full minute by blowing it up.

Buckets of Acorns

Materials:

1 minute Timer
2 bowls
Jumbos kids tweezers or chopsticks
10 acorn

Instructions:

2 bowls side by side. All of the acorns in 1 of the bowls.
In under a minute…
Players will try and get all of the acorns into the empty bowl using only the tweezers.

Pumpkin Head

Materials:

Directions:

Give each player a mini pumpkin to balance on their head.
In under a minute…
The players must run from one end of the yard to the other without the pumpkin falling off their heads. If you want to make it more difficult, you can set up an obstacle course.
(our pumpkins were too small and light for this one… I suggest an actual tiny pumpkin)

Cousin Fall Forest Photos

We went to the backyard forest for these pictures. These three girls are cousins; we decided to take the pictures for as a Christmas gift for the grandparents.

We decided on fall colors for their clothing. She wore a brown striped sweater dress and tiny cowboy boots. The older girls wore red tops with their red converse.

I love fall in this part of the country. The leaves turn all of the colors and the temperature feels so nice after the long hot, humid summer.

Little Miss Storm wasn’t interested in cooperating with her smiles today., but we did get a couple of smiles from her.

Here are some more of our group photoshoots:

15 Month Old Pocahontas Toddler Photos

Disney’s Pocahontas is a great movie to introduce this real life princess (daughter of the chief). Pocahontas’s dream is to have the courage to walk in another’s footsteps, and she has a cry for peace to stop a war. Of course every Disney princess has a sidekick, and Meeko is such a goofy one.

Princess Pocahontas is such a respectful, daring and bold girl.

I like to sing positive song to her, I sing to her is to the tune of “Mary had a Little Lamb”…

“Storm is a bold girl
Bold girl, bold girl
Storm is a bold girl
She’s my big bold girl”

We went to a local university park on this beautifully warm November day. I brought this fabric sunflower for her to hold.

She wore a super cute fringe romper that I found on Amazon. I added her tan bow for her belt, I just put the bow in the back. Then I found this turquoise necklace that a thrift store and got these tiny turquoise earrings on Amazon. I just parted her hair and put is little braid hanging down.

1 Peter 2:17 “Show proper respect to everyone, love the family of believers, fear God, honor the emperor..”

You might enjoy Storm’s other Pocahontas photoshoots:

Or some of her other Princess Photoshoots:

Thanksgiving Baking

My brother and his family came to visit us for Thanksgiving this year. We had fun playing inside and outsied!

Gingerbread Men

Making gingerbread houses is our family Thanksgiving tradition. This year we tried something new and decorated home made gingerbread men…

Ingredients:

3 cups flour
3/4 cup melted butter
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup molasses
1/2 cup water
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ginger
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp salt
1 egg
Icing
Decorating Candies

Directions:

Combine all ingredients in a medium mixing bowl. Once dough begins to form a ball in the center, dust generously with flour.
Cover dough with plastic wrap or wax paper and chill for at least 4 hours, or overnight.
Dust a smooth surface with flour, and roll out a section of the dough to about 1/4 inch thick.
Use a gingerbread man cookie cutter slice out your Gingerbread Men.
Bake at 350˚F/180˚C for 10-12 minutes.
Cool completely before decorating with icing and candies.

Hershey’s Freezer Pie

We love chocolate freezer pie for Thanksgiving dessert…

Ingredients:

8 oz. Hershey’s bar
8 oz. Cream Cheese
16 oz. Cool Whip
2 Prepared 8 inch Graham Crust
1/4 cup milk

Directions:

Heat the chocolate and 2 tablespoons of the milk in a saucepan over low heat, stirring until melted.
Beat the cream cheese and add the remaining milk. Add chocolate mix and beat until smooth.
In a bowl, fold the chocolate mix into the cool whip and blend until smooth.
Spoon the mix into the crusts. I decorated the pies with some extra cool whip and shaved chocolate bar for my son’s birthday.
Freeze for 4 hours.

Cinnamon Rolls

I made homemade cinnamon rolls for Thanksgiving day breakfast…

Ingredients:

Dough

1 cup warm milk
1 tablespoon instant dry yeast
2 tablespoons white granulated sugar
1 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons softened butter
1 large egg
3 cups all-purpose flour

Filling

1/2 cup melted butter
1 cup brown sugar
2 tablespoons ground cinnamon

Icing

4 ounces cream softened cheese
1/4 cup softened butter
1 to 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 to 2 tablespoons milk

Directions:

In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine warm milk and yeast… let set for 5-10 minutes.
Add sugar, salt, butter, and eggs. Add in flour. Using a dough hook, turn the mixer on to a low speed.
Once the flour starts to mix into the dough, increase the speed to a medium range. Add more flour as necessary so that the dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl. It should be soft, but not stick to your hands.
Transfer the dough to a lightly greased mixing bowl. Cover with a towel and let rise until double in size, about 1 hour.
Lightly grease a baking pan. Punch down the dough and roll into a 12inch by 18inch rectangle.
In a small bowl, combine the butter, brown sugar and cinnamon. Spread on top of the dough. Roll up tightly lengthwise so you have one long roll. Use a sharp knife to cut the dough into 12 one-inch slices.
Place the slices onto a lightly 9×13 pan. Cover and let rise 30 to 45 minutes.
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Bake the rolls for about 20 minutes, until the tops have a touch of brown.
While the cinnamon rolls are baking, make the cream cheese icing by using a hand mixer to whip together cream cheese and butter in a bowl until light and fluffy. Whip in powdered sugar and vanilla extract. Add enough milk to get a super soft consistency.
Frost the rolls while still warm. Serve immediately or cool and store. Stays good for 4 to 5 days.

I made them the night before and placed them in the refrigerator before the last rising. In the morning I set them on the counter for an hour before I baked them.

3 Month November Leaves Baby Photos

Baby received this adorable sunflower outfit as a shower gift, so I thought it would look great with my November leaves photo shoot. Baby girl wasn’t in the best mood today, so I just got one little smile when Daddy walked into the room! I am still very happy with how the photo’s turned out today!

It was too cold outside to take picture with baby in the leaves, so I had to make do with fabric leaves. I think they looked great, but she was covered with glitter when I was done since a few of the leaves had gold glitter on them.

This is what my kitchen looks like whenever I want a wood floor in my photos!