Chinese New Year.

The year of the Ox. Sue May and Jim lend me their beautiful lantern and banners

We made some noodles which were quite long to make, but the children enjoyed doing the activity and were looking forward for their lunch meal

(pasta sheets drying a bit befor we make noodles)

A bowl of dried food (chinese new year's custom) was served at snack time alongside with hemp crackers and cheese (Cow and soy) and fresh apples.

We told the story about how it came to be that each year is named after an animal

For lunch we had our nooddles with a drizzle of toasted sesame oil and soy sauce and agave syrup, nutritional yeast, which is a success for most of the children, peas (none for Juliette!) and omelette. For desert , chinese baby mandarins, sweet as honey and fortune cookies (maybe not the best idea...as some fortunes don't speak to children ...but they liked the taste of the cookies.
We ate with chopsticks and I constructed some giant chopsticks to tell a story about how the gods gave a lesson to the greedy people by serving them the best food with giant chopsticks. The poor folk, could not eat a morsel...while in another room some compassionate people were given the same food with the same chopsticks and managed very well, by feeding each others...Not sure they understood, but they will remember the giant chopsticks...

In the afternoon we painted Blue for the sky in which the dragon roams, yellow for the sun and red for its cave. The children could choose which color they wanted to use for their dragon.

Then did some coloring , each of their favorite animals
Dragon: Charlie and Keir
Rat: Louve
Hare: Marina and Kiona
Pig: Menna
Horse: Juliette


Tuesday: mixed herbs for tea



To the organic herbs I purchased, we added:
Mint leaves from the garden
Rosehips harvested in the Fall and apple peel from our apple drying session



Decorated our dragon which got beautiful shimmering coats and scales
The snack of popcorn served with a bit of organic melted butter and nutritional yeast was well received... (I just am puzzled how fast my big pail of Red Star nutritional yeast is going down!)


Made chinese almond cookies


Finished embrodery of dream pillow


Wednesday:


The energy was high but the girls settled coloring and cutting and the boys after having been wild horses for a while and threatened to go run further out in the snow outside, calmed down into building mood.

Laker joined me cutting the fruit and decorated it artistically in a flower shape...



Then while the Wednesdays children worked on decorating their dragons, Louve and Marina started making a file to store their drawings. Both are really busy drawing every day and since the story of Lao Lao cutting out a lot of paper...



After a lenghthy snack, Thomas and Leif went on dishes chores. First a little bit unwilling, but then they were knights responsible of a whole float of boats (the bowls)...and all of a sudden their interest sparked.


As I felt that the energy was building up again, I warned the children of a dragon hidden in the forest going to "circle time " kingdom and that we should be very quiet in order to not wake him up (since Anatole was working upstairs... they thought , he was the dragon, and showed a lot of respect). Never had such a quiet circle time with all the children joining in.

To finish Chinese New year, I pulled out the delightful story of Tikki-Tikki -Tembo- no -sa- rembo -chari -bari -ruchi -peperi- tembo.

Then finally they were let free outside and played with lots of enthusiasm for an hour while I was preparing a quick fix of Pita Pizzas which we were discussing the topping at snack time. We aggreed on : tomato sauce, pineapple, ham for the non vegetarian,and white cheese which would taste like orange cheese, or soy cheese for the vegetarian. Those were served with sunflower sprouts ( Hey, Laker loved them!) and carrot sticks.

The afternoon we finished baking the cookies and putting our dragon together.

Week of 19th to 21th January 2009
On Monday:

We played a lot.

We decorated bag for our granola with paint

In the afternoon we settled reading the story of Lao Lao of Dragon Mountain and finished the afternoon sewing Frederick's dream pillow. It was so funny as Marina kept asking me: Are you working? (repeating a sequence from the book). Then some of the children went eagerly drawing. They decided to draw the squirrel in the yard and went back and forth observing the squirrel in the yard and then drawing what they saw. The next morning I showed one of the drawing to Fabienne, who said right away: it is a squirrel!

I really enjoyed our hour outside, even so the weather was above normal temperature and had wrecked partly our ice castle. The children were so inspired to play: fox and mice, and digged holes for the rabbits,...

Fabienne was sick and Thomas was feeling a little bit queer and so it we had a quiet slow day . But the children were fantastic, very cooperative and compassionate. The older ones were very helpfull. Just dressing for outddors took forever...
I could see how well they really have settled in a daily routine and that the flow run so smoothly.And even so the day was quiet, I think the children had a gret learning experience.

Here at the dinner table enjoying some perogies and fresh vegetables

On Tuesday:

Inspired by Mother Holle's snow, we made strands of snowflakes: :

Oh, oh, douce neige tombe a gros flocons

Du ciel, oh douce neige fleurit les buissons

Tombe et protege le toit des maisons

Oh, oh, oh, douce neige , tombe a gros flocons.

Then we pretended being little mice and with some baskets we raided the kitchen counter. We were looking for some fats and some food which would give us some quick energy and some slow energy and some food which may make us grow. So in a playful way I introduced the children to the different food categories.



Here is what we gathered to make:

"Happy Frederic granola":

partly inspired from the Hollyhock cookbook:

Mix together:

3 cups oat

1/2 cup sunflower seeds

1/2 cup coconut

(1/4 cup crushed hazelnuts or almonds: most of the children didn't want me to put it in, so I did two different batches)

1/4 cup pumpkin seeds

1/4 cup hemp seeds

1 tsp cinnamon

1 Tbsp vanilla

Add a mixture of:
1/2 cup melted butter

1/4 cup honey combined with the melted butter

Put in the oven at 350F for 20 minutes without forgetting to stir halfway

Then add dried cranberries and dried blueberries or any dried fruit which suits you.

Here the children were building a prison. As we asked them what the prisons are for, they told us it is "to make the people become nice". I think indeed that their prison is very therapeutic with all the beautiful colors!


On Wednesday:

we baked



and decoratrated our bags to receive some granola to take home

Story this week: Lao Lao odf Dragon Mountain:

Another story about how the snowflakes come to be, this time inspired from a story from China. It comes from a beautiful book, probably more suited for the older ones and so the storytelling with the table puppets made it more suitable for the younger ones.

Also since the children were so much inspired to do some folding and cutting from paper this story fitted in just nicely.

Nice to explore different culture in a suttle way.
Also next week , it is Chinese New Year, so we will buid on this story to have a little peak in a different culture.

Another week went by fast. This week the story of "Mother Holle" gave the color to the week. Mother Winter or Mother Holle is inspired by the german fairytale written by the Grimm Brothers.. The story comes with many variations, and I gave it my own note.

On Monday, we baked a cake:

Carrot Cardamom cake

adapted by Jill Boadway from The Voluptuous Vegan by Myra kornfeld

2cups whole spelt flour

2 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp sea salt

2 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp cardamom

1/2 cup unrefined sunflower oil

2/3 cup maple syrup or brown rice syrup
2 Tbsp ground flax seeds
2/3 cup soy, rice, almond, hemp milk

1 tsp vanilla

2 cups shredded carrots

2/3 cup dates, soaked, drained and chopped or combination of dried fruit.

Preheat oven 350F. OIl a 9 inch cake pan.

In a large bowl, combine the dry ingredients. In a medium bowl whisk together the sweetener, oil, flax seeds, milk and vanilla and let it sit for 10 minutes.

Whisk the wet ingredients again, and then add into the dry and stir just to combine.

Add the carrots and dates and stir to mix.

Spread the batter evenly in the pan. Bake the cake until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean, about 35 minutes.

Serve with sweet cashew or almond butter....We didn't manage to do that, but will send you the recipe another time.

We stirred our herb salt together combining, our own ground sea salt with unrefined sea salt from the marais salants de Guerande...which are in Brittany...and brought back many memories as an eager organic activist being trained as an agricultural engineer in a chemical loaded farming culture...

with dried parsley and dried lemon thyme from the garden...all organic!

and organic granulated garlic.

We also worked more on our pillows:

On Tuesday we baked bread :

and made a carrot salad with a dressing using our own herb salt

On Wednesday, we did some modelling with beeswax and formed some icicles...

A new circle was introduced this week. Usually circle run for three or four weeks...Here it is both in French and English:

Oh golden sun

Shining so bright

Please warm me with your golden light.

Let's join our hand

That there may flow

A stream of warmth and golden glow.

Good morning everyone!

Here is the woodcutter

Sturdy and strong

With his axe on his shoulder

He strides along

Mark your steps

with your feet On the white snow

Little holes

Big holes Watch where you go!

Tippy toe, tippy toe

Hop, Hop,...

Walk,...)

Magic wand

Ribbon wand

Call forth for me a wind

Call forth for me a ........wind

Shivering, quivering, freezing cold

Rub your hands and your arm hold. Brrr!

Shivering , quivering, frosty as ice

Rub your feet hard at least once or twice. Brrr!

Shivering, quivering blow out air

Take a deep breath and blow it out there.

Chip Chop Chip Chop

Cut down some wood for the winter cold

Chip Chop Chip Chop
Collect all the wood that the basket will hold.

Oh no, he ripped his jacket. He has to mend it and gets a needle and a thread.

The thread follows the needle

The thread follows the needle

In and out the needle goes

That's the way we mend our clothes.

(The little mouse comes and nibbles the stiches loose...)

But now it's time for tea:

Polly put the kettle on, the kettle on, the kettle on

Polly put the kettle on we'll have some tea

Here's a cup

And here's a cup

And here's a pot of tea

Pour a cup

And pour a cup

And have some tea with me.

The more we get togrether, together, together,

The more we get together

The happier we'll be.

Happy New Year To all !
This blog will allow me to share our weekly adventures in our preschool and to give you some more insights about the activities, rhythm, festivals we offer to the children.

We have welcome Fabienne as our new assistant. Karen has left the program on a daily base, but she will be volunteering here and there as she is pursuing further her diploma in Early Childhood.


We had a great week together even so the weather kept us mostly inside. It was filled with playfull activities.

With all the snow, I brought in a poster featuring the work of Wilson A. Bentley, "The Snowflake Man":
"Under the microscope, I found that snowflakes were miracles of beauty; and it seemed a shame that this beauty should not be seen and appreciated by others. Every crystal was a masterpiece of design and no one design was ever repeated., When a snowflake melted, that design was forever lost. Just that much beauty was gone, without leaving any record behind."

His pictures of snowflakes fascinate me. Without wanting to give the children a science lesson on crystals, I just wanted them to take a look at the manifold of shapes the snowflake come in. Also I displayed crystals and semi precious gemstones, for the children to look and play with. If they felt inspired they could sort them out by color or shape, and so on. I also brought out crystals of sea salt and showed them the different colors of salt one can find.

Then I offered them to grind the salt, so that they realize how the table salt is made. Various kind of mills allowed them to work on fine motor skills.

I also finally brought out the herbs we had been gathering in the fall: thyme, oregano, marjoram, parsley and offered them to rub the leaves off. These will be powdered in an electric grinder and then added to the sea salt to make an herb salt they will bring home. We will probably make some vegetable dip with some of it.

On Monday, we made Pretzels, a german tradition to celebrate the New Year. Pretzels are a symbol for good fortune, good luck. We read the story of "Walter, the baker" by Eric Carle, which in a funny way describes the whole process of making Pretzels involving throwing the dough to the ceiling (where it gets its shape by twisting itself in the shape of the Pretzel), have it fall in a pail of water (we used a pot of boiling water) and having the cat spill the salt over it( well, a simple shaker will do)...Keir's eyes got all excited as I announced that now we are going to throw the dough to the ceiling! I hope he was not too disappointed that we ended up just twisting it on the table... Our Pretzels turned out quite rustic as I only had 100% spelt flour on hand, but my children who came home hungry after school, told me that they tasted quite fine. They didn't even leave me a crumb...

Still with the crystal theme in mind, we decorated crowns in the afternoon with paper jewels. The children were fully involved and really enjoyed themselves . We repeted the activities on the other days , so that each child made a crown. Each of the children is a King bringing a special gift to the child who is born in the darkess time of the year. A New "seed"filled with new inspirations, skills is ready to sprout and each King child brings its special gift to honor it and prepare the soil for it to thrive.

It was good for me as I could "assess" each child on their "color, cut and paste" ability skill, not that it means a lot to me, but it just seems to be on what most of the children are evaluated. I do not particulary do much of these as such but I do believe that with all the fine motor exercises we do, their cut and paste skills improve as well. I can reassure parents that all of the children are doing just fine at their level.

On Tuesday, we painted watercolor: ultramarine blue as the big wide sea from which our salt is coming...and we sprinkled salt on it...With prussian blue, we then painted deep snow and as an experiment we placed our watercolors out hoping that Jack Frost would play with them...but he didn't...He must have been too busy since it was soooo cold! (yes , I was hoping that it would draw nice shapes on the painting, but the experiment didn't work!)

On Wednesday: we celebrated the Three Kings. Following the French tradition, we baked our Three Kings pie in the morning with puff pastry made in the Alpine Bakery, homemade marzipan (so easy to do: 1 cup ground almond, 1 cup powder sugar...I may cut a bit on it next time..., a few drop of almond extract, mix it together with 6 Tablespoons of water, stir and heat...without letting it burn, Ready!) and apples and had a royal celebration in the afternoon. Each of them took a turn under the table to determine for who the next piece of pie was going to be...Laker was the Queen! I feel always a bit queer when I single out someone, and I could also have chosen to have three kings, but still it would have singled out some children. However, I must say that the children didn't seem bothered, especially since they already each had their crown...

We ended the day reading the book "Frederick" by Leo Lioni about a little mouse who is doing an unusual harvest while her brother and sisters are gathering substantial food for the winter monthes to come... Inspired by the little mouse , we had the little mouse with a colorful tail and a poky nose run through our fabic and started making a dream pillow...The children were enthrilled and hard working...
Our circle and story time this week kept still the focus on the Christmas story and the Three Kings arriving in Bethleem. We told the russian story of Babushka who was too busy tidying her house, rather than following the three Kings and had fun after playing it out. Here is the circle to give you a taste:

Babushka, Babushka

She swept and swept all day.

Babushka, Babushka
Could not take time to play.

Kings came riding 1,2,3

Over and and over sea.
Following the shining star
Calling to them from afar.

Babushka, Babuskka

She swept and swept all day.................

Melkior the King in red

Knocked upon her door and said:

Oh Babushka come with me

And the tiny babe we'll see.

But, Babushka, Babushka

She swept and swept all day
Babushka, Babushka
Could not take time to play.

Balthazar the King in blue

Knocked and said I'm asking too

Oh Babushka come with me

And the tiny babe we 'll see.

Repeat...Babushka, Babushka......


Then King Caspar all in green,
Is the last one to be seen.

Oh Babushka come with me

And the tiny babe we'll see.

But, Babushka....repeat

Then at night in bed she'd pray

There she thought I will not stay.

Toys and cakes with me I'll bring

And search now for this little King.

Now--Babushka, Babushka

She walks and walks all day.

Babushka, Babushka

is searching on her way.

I translated it in French as well for French day.:

Babouschka, Baboushka,

Elle balaie et balaie

Babouschka, Babouschka

Balaie toute la journee.

Trois grands rois s'en sont alles

Par dela monts et vallees

Trois grands rois ont poursuivi

La grande etoile qui resplendit.

Mais, Babouschka....

Melchior , tout en rouge, a ete le premier

De frapper a la porte pour demander:

Babouschka, Babouschka, arrete de balayer

Viens avec nous saluer le bebe.

Mais....

Buis Balthazar, en bleu, s'est arrete pour l'inviter

Et lui aussi a pris le temps de lui demander:

...

Mais...

Finalement Caspar, de vert vetu, a essaye

Et une derniere fois lui a demande:

...

Mais dans son lit cette nuit,.

Babouschka s'est rappele.

Et elle a decide qu'elle devait s'en aller.

En hate elle rassembla pain, gateaux et jouets

Et les rois et l'etoile, elle s'est mise a chercher.