advent calendar countdown: december 17-19 (play!)

i’ll admit it… it’s really tiring doing a new activity every day (and blogging them all). even my little girl sometimes would rather just play on her own or watch tv instead of putting in the energy after school and swim lessons to do some activity. so these have been much calmer advent days.

december 17: there are some very cool pictures of faces you can download and print here. before cutting them out, i glued the faces onto cereal boxes to make them more resistent. it’s lots of fun to mix and match the two parts of the faces. then make up stories about them. you can even make footballs (or rugby balls) from the mouths!

lots of laughs + very little effort on my part = perfect activity!

december 18: once again from the same website, i downloaded these playing cards with faces on them showing different emotions. again, i glued them onto cereal boxes before cutting them… or rather, before having my daughter cut them out, here with her not-so-helpful assistant. we played memory and every time someone got a pair, she had to say how that person felt without repeating adjectives.

december 19: i was tired, so i promised sofia she could watch the beatles’ animated movie “yellow submarine,” which she just loves (even though she’s afraid of the “snapping turks,” the ones with the mouth in their tummies). i think this movie is so cool, full of meaning and very, very funny for both grown-ups and kids. if you haven’t seen it, i suggest you do!