Glue and salt Pysanky art project

There is a craft project that has passed through my fb feed a half dozen times in which one uses glue to make a design, then sprinkles the glue with salt, then decorate with watercolor paint after it dries.  At the beginning of the homeschool year I had been wanting to plan a field trip up to Seattle to visit Mr. W's friends the Hs so Mrs. H could teach us how to do Ukrainian eggs as a homeschool art project. Now that we have to shelter in place, not to mention how hard hit the Seattle area has been with the corona virus, I needed to modify my egg decorating plan. I decided that we could try out the glue/salt/watercolor project with traditional Easter egg patterns.

I found some Pysanky coloring sheets to use as a guide and paper clipped them to half sheets of watercolor paper so the children could trace the pattern. Then they copied over those lines with the glue. I'm not sure what type of salt was recommended in the fb post, but we were all out of kosher salt (thanks, pandemic) and resorted to iodized salt. We had to let that all dry overnight. Then we set up watercolor paints today and did the dabbing technique shown in the video which results in the color bleeding out through the salt.

The dabbing was a little tedious for one child so he asked for another sheet of watercolor paper and painted a rainbow instead.

While they were painting I read to them from Jesus Speaks to Me About Easter by Angela M. Burrin and This Was The Day! by Ann Kmit. The latter was one I picked up at the Polish fest in the fall along with a red egg.

Quarantine Good Friday and Tomie dePaola Tea

What a week! A second full one of trying to homeschool three children of three different grade levels, two of whom have distance learning parameters, one of which has special needs, another or which is a grumpy tween, and it is Holy Week. Whew! I'm tired! Fridays have mostly been a day for field trips, special projects, and such for us  this home school year. Today my goal was to make both Lenten pretzels for the last time of the season and hot cross buns for our tea time snack. The pretzels were supposed to go with a vegetable cheese soup at dinner time, but the way things worked out we just had tea time with both and skipped dinner entirely.

We always do some of the pretzels to look like arms crossed in prayer, but it is also an opportunity for the kids to get creative. Deuce likes to cut them into pretzel bites. T-Bone decided to make a pretzel man, which was fine until I I got to the step where I need to boil them for 30 seconds. I felt a bit guilty. While they were rolling out and shaping their creations I read Brother Giovanni's Little Reward by Anna Egan Smucker like I always do.

In between the mixing of the dough and waiting for it to rise I did some reading from Minecraft Holy Bible and Catechism of the Seven Sacraments by Kevin and Mary O'Neill in which the illustrations are all lego pieces while the children did coloring sheets. We did this yesterday for Holy Thursday too although I didn't mention it. The boys were remembering all the plagues that they learned about earlier in the year when we were studying Egypt and Moses. This format does a good job of keeping their interest to illustrate the stories.

And today we finally had our Goodbye, Mr. dePaola Tea. The children helped to set the table. Little Miss brought down her crucifix she scored while antiquing, Deuce arranged the two crystal crosses.

And I assembled a stack of all my copes of his books including the two new ones I ordered Quiet and The Birds of Bethlehem. We went through the stack and everyone said which ones were their favorites. We ended up reading from The Knight and The Dragon, The Legend of BlueBonnet, St. Patrick, and the Good Friday pages from Bible Stories.

Deuce made some tiny pretzels and Little Miss thought they were perfect for American Girl dolls so Mary got to join our tea party. So cute!

Deuce's pretzel bites that he topped with cinnamon and sugar.

I just like my pretzels as original recipe with salt and the basic shape.

And the tulips I planted last fall have bloomed in our front triangle. So cheery. I love the ones that have the more traditional Turkish shape.

Lenten Poetry Tea

Since Little Miss has joined out homeschool she has been asking and asking to have another Poetry Tea. She put it on our list for the week on Monday. I had three brown bananas that needed to become bread so it seemed like a reasonable request to fulfill. But T-Bone took it upon himself to lead the baking of the banana bread himself earlier this week; he is into baking. I was not allowed into the kitchen while they prepared it. I thought it was very sweet and was quite proud of his leadership. But then they woofed it down before we even had a chance at setting up tea. I felt the pressure at our morning meeting to pull of the tea today since it is Friday. After our Quarantine Stations T-Bone and I make quarlesami the Italian lenten biscotti. He paid nice attention to detail, even during the process of removing the filbert skins. First they are baked into logs shapes and then they are cut diagonally and baked a bit longer.

Little Miss wanted to read a couple of the Bear Snores On books which I felt could qualify since they have some meter and rhyme. She also was so excited about the tea that she wrote her own poem earlier this week and she shared that too.

Deuce had some sensory overload at the time and didn't want to read anything aloud, but he did recently finish XX a children's version of the Iliad and the Odyssey so we talked a little about Homer being a poet and how the meter and rhyme would help the storytellers memorize the the epic poems. T-Bone brought Shel Silverstein to share and I read from Robert Lewis Stevenson's Child's Verse illustrated by Tasha Tudor.

Mr. W also joined us in our tea; he shared Robert Burns' Ode to Haggis and Walt Whitman's Oh, Pioneer.

The Virtues

In February I had started to teach Deuce about the Theological and Cardinal Virtues as part of religion class. And then we got side tracked and now we have two new students in our school so I have needed to modify my original plans a bit to accommodate 1st, 3rd, and 6th grade levels. Initially I was using these definitions as a concise explanation. I struggled to find something at a 3rd grade level, most things seemed geared towards high school students and I'm not sure if these concepts are mostly taught to those going through the sacrament of Confirmation and learning about the gifts of the Holy Spirit? Eventually I found and printed out this younger kid friendly packet on the virtues.

Because I feel like sometimes I don't have their focus and because some of us are visual learners I also looked for some videos to accompany them. Everyone has been raving about Formed, and I have an account through my parish, but they didn't have a lot geared to the younger ones. But then I found the Tomkin and Blaise videos that EWTN puts out on youtube. They are each about 2 minutes long and are definitely helpful for the 1st grader, a bit childish for the 6th grader, but they are short enough so I don't lose his attention entirely.

Before the pandemic I had checked out several books on ancient Greece and happened to find this beautiful book about the saints, The Loyola Treasury of Saints by David Self. It is nicely illustrated, well organized, and at a higher content level than some of our books about saints that are geared more toward the younger readers. I liked it so much I added it to my recent order from Powell's Books. (Save your local bookstore during the quarantine; avoid purchasing from huge online retailers if possible.) I have been using this books to have the 6th grader read aloud and then we discuss some of the virtues we can think of that the saint exhibited. We also read the page about St. Thomas Aquinas since his work is quoted so much in our studies of virtues. Since we have been studying the ancient Indus valley and the Aryans who settled along the Ganges river and the caste system I also introduced St. Teresa of Calcutta the virtues she reflects. The book was published before she was canonized, but it is still very useful. Formed did have an animated video on St. Boniface which we watched as well.

Goodbye, Mr. dePaola

I am absolutely heartbroken by the news that Tomie dePaola has passed away. He was among my favorite illustrators during my childhood and once I became a mother myself I began stacking my home library with his books or ones he had illustrated. Just yesterday morning I started our school day by reading The Holy Twins which he illustrated because we have dedicated our homeschool to St. Benedict.

I put in a big order at Powell's for hardcover copies of his books including the new one Quiet. I also saw a link shared about an interview with him. What a wonderful person he was! I will definitely need to visit these two churches in New England where he has paintings.

Rest In Peace, sir; we will surely be having a tea party in your honor.

Daisy Space Science Explorer Badge

I had signed Little Miss up for a workshop in May to earn this badge, but now everything in our council has been cancelled through mid May. Fortunately in this time of quarantine lots of older scouts and adults are putting together virtual lessons. Yesterday she did all three of those video lessons which included making a Mars rover.




When I looked at the actual badge requirements I felt like the videos didn’t quite cover it all so I went into our home library to fill the gaps on the sun and moon.  A Child’s Introduction to the Night Sky by Michael Driscoll was the main source I used, but I filled in with This is the Way to the Moon by M. Sasek and Little Kids First Big Book of Space by Catherine D. Hughes.

To cover the women in space bios I used the cut sheet designed to go with the badge which features Mae Jemison and Huy Tran and our council’s spring program guide which had a blurb on Sally Ride. I also read her the page on Sally Ride in our copy of She Persisted by Chelsea Clinton.

Hōkū The Stargazer by Ellie Crowe is a fun glow in the dark book about using the stars as navigation that we will probably read tonight when it is dark enough to see the glow.

I have a feeling I’m going to be ordering a lot of badges for independent work during the quarantine.

In the Garden for the Annunciation

We weren't able to cancel our spring break cabin at Black Butte so we transferred our quarantine to achieve cabin fever in the mountains. When we returned home the first thing I did was walk the children through our yard to check out what had popped up while we were away for 5 days. (Also I really didn't want them going from a few hours in the car straight to play video games.)

The Mount Hood daffodils in the Marian Garden are up and looking very happy. I think I need to move the statue of St. Mary to be in front of the white fuchsia (or I ought to have cut it back in the fall.) The Marian name for daffodils is Mary's Star.

Also some of the petite peachy daffodils are up although they are not as robustly growing as the Mt. Hoods.  One of my purple pink Lenten roses in the background.

Under the fig tree is an eruption of violets or Our Lady's Modesty. It is associated with the Annunciation because of St. Mary's humility when the angel Gabriel told her she would be the Mother of God. I just love how these Marian flowers tie in the season of the bloom with the holy day or feast day. I think the little grassy spikes are camas flowers which have self seeded (exciting!!) or maybe native blue eyed grass? I will have to keep an eye out on what develops here.

And look at this happy patch of native wild ginger! Look at that bloom! I don't think I have ever noticed them blooming before, but it is such a subtle color and it is such a humble, modest plant itself. I'm thrilled at how things are establishing themselves in the native hedgerow bed.

Lastly I read a page on the Annunciation from Tomie de Paola's Mary The Mother of Jesus book.

Martinmas Lantern Walk

I have posted before about how I discovered Martinmas in a book about old fashioned, Victorian holidays while I was living in NYC. Obviously I wanted to incorporate this into my domestic church after I had children. Interestingly 3 of the mothers in my online mommy group live in Germany right now due to work or deployments. I love hearing about the popular holidays that they and their July 2013 children get to celebrate while living there. Martinmas is one of those popularly celebrated holidays and their children have lantern walk celebrations at school. It is so nice to think about the universal church and doing an activity here that people are doing on another continent.

I used to just take flashlights with us on lantern walks if I even managed to get us outside. In recent years I have put together lanterns for the children. I use fancy jam jars, construction paper, used tissue paper, white glue, and wire. First I cut out the construction paper and tissue paper in strips that will fit around the circumference of the jar. (I could have taken a lot of time measuring out something that would fit perfectly, but I haven't done that. I just cut a straight strip knowing that I will have to trim off the edges on the bottom and that there will be some overlap where they fit together. We use these once a year in the dark so simple is good enough for me on these.) Next we use the glue in a thin layer on the outside of the glass jar and apply the colored tissue paper to it. Then I have them draw out some designs on the construction paper that either they or I will cut out. I try to recommend a cross for Jesus or an M for St. Martin.  We put glue on the back of the construction paper and apply it to the outside of the jar on top off the tissue paper. I use a rubber band or two to hold the paper in place until the glue dries completely. Lastly I pass them off to Mr. W and have him cut and wrap the wire around the top rim of the jam jar and form a little handle on top.

Last year I remember that the tea light candles kept blowing out during our lantern walk which totally frustrated the older kids. The reason why I put the paper on the outside of the glass was so that I could have an open flame on the inside. Anyway, this year I got smart and put battery operated tea-lights inside. That eliminated that complaint.

I suggested that we stop by one of T-Bone's friend's house on our walk to say hello, but he was mortified by that idea. When I said, why not, they are Catholic too?, he said, yes, but they aren't Catholic dorks.  I probably should have been offended by that, but I couldn't help but laugh. He has me totally pegged! :D

Mr. W opted to stay home and make a nice dinner for us instead of joining us on the lantern walk. Most sources suggest goose for Martinmas too, Cooking With the Saints has a recipe for duck, but we decided that a pork loin would be nice and seasonal. The Feast Day Cookbook has a recipe for cinnamon apples for St. Martin's Day so he made that as an accompaniment. The children's lanterns make a nice table decoration.

After dinner I read the book Snow on Martinmas to them. It mentions lantern walks in there too so I am not the only dork.  

All Saints and All Souls Days

I posted about what they boys did as part of our new homeschool group for All Saints' Day, but we also decorated at home and had a nice dinner together. I have accumulated these saint statues since my childhood. Several were gifts I received for sacraments like First Communion. The Sacred Heart of Jesus I rescued from an acquaintance who was going to donate him. St. Patrick I found at a gift shop at the church we attended for Palm Sunday in Maui. The St. Anne I recently picked up at an antique store. I have been spending a lot of time lurking on Sancta Nomina and she has St. Anne as her blog's patroness so I was inspired to rescue the statuette and add it to my collection. I regret that I did not plant marigolds this year so I snipped a few chrysanthemums

Those two prayer cards in the back the boys won as prizes the day before from Stump The Priest.

At dinner T-Bone read aloud to us. We had The All Saints' Day Party by Jerry Windley-Daoust and Jackie's Special Hallowe'en by Brenda Castro. Little Miss has been enjoying reading this herself with her 1st grade reading skills. I'm Bernadette by Emily Ortega is also a good All Saints themed book, but we didn't have anyone at that reading level this year who hasn't already read it.

Pumpkins, cider, and poetry

The Freddy's had a huge display of season treats including pumpkin donuts from Franz bakery. I could not resist that kind of temptation and, therefore, decided to have another Poetry Tea. I bought a jug of fresh apple cider to round it all out.

We had cheese, crackers, pretzels, and salami to accompany the pumpkin donuts.  I asked the boys to bring down their Shel Silverstein books; each has received one from us on their 7th birthday. I had some Mother Goose verse out for Little Miss to read aloud from too.

This poem about perseverance from The Children's Book of Virtues edited by W.J. Bennett spoke to me. Homeschooling is a significant challenge.

The best part about this is that the kids really like reading these silly poems aloud. The books were still on the table tonight from yesterday's tea and the boys were still taking turns reading aloud.

Indigenous People's Day

I once pinned an article on ways to decolonize one's Thanksgiving menu. I still haven't gotten around to trying out any of the recipes, which is a shame because I have thought I could make some of those dishes to celebrate Indigenous People's Day. The best I ever end up with is reading books we have collected on our travels during tea time. This year I read: Crazy Horse's Vision by Joseph Bruchac,
Great Wolf's Search by Bruce Swanson, and The Girl Who Loved Horses by Paul Goble. I also had Trickster A Graphic Collection of Native American Tales for the boys to read on their own.

Celebrating St. Francis

St. Francis Day is a particularly special day to celebrate in our house. Little Miss's school was doing a blessing of the animals at the end of the school day so the boys and I packed up the bunnies to take them in to be blessed.  There were a lot of dogs, but our bunnies were very popular with so many of the students. Deuce found a beetle in the grass while we were waiting and was hoping Fr. would bless the little beetle too.





I'm not a dog person, but I enjoyed this St. Bernard representing on St. Francis Day.


Mr. W is back at his college celebrating 100 years of his fraternity chapter so I threw together a very light supper and we ate inside, I just did not have it in me to set up a picnic in the yard while solo parenting for 4 days. We always have a meatless meal to celebrate St. Francis and tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches is a crowd pleaser here. I don't even follow a recipe for the soup anymore, as long as I have a big can of crushed tomatoes I can pull something together.


Fortunately the kids were super helpful and enjoyed decorating the table for our meal. T-Bone cut some hydrangeas for me to arrange for the centerpiece and put out the fruits. (Hence the stickers still on them.) Deuce had requested pears for the holiday so I bought several options for him.

As everyone finished their meal I read St. Francis and the Animals by Leo Politi and my autographed copy of St. Francis of Assisi: A Life of Joy by Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

An Introduction into Poetry Teas

I wouldn't say that I am overwhelmed by homeschooling, but I am certainly researching homeschooling tips and tricks anytime I get a chance. Sometimes that might take me down a rabbit hole. One such hole was the concept of Poetry Teatime. My curiosity was piqued; this takes something very near and dear to my heart, tea time, with something I cannot stand, poetry. I have never been able to understand poetry, my brain just doesn't work that way. So much so that the few books of poetry we have been gifted have sat on bookshelves unread by me to the children. (And I am sometimes guilty of donating them to charity.) Now this homeschooling tangent had brought me to a website essentially challenging me to not pass my bias along to the children. And it could be fun for all my children, both homeschooled and traditionally schooled because tea time snacks has always been a part of our after school lives. If nothing else it would give me a chance to set a pretty table.

I began by perusing bookshelves in everyone's rooms looking for any book that might technically contain poetry, or at the very least have a nice cadence. Once this pile of books was assembled it sat on a spare chair in the dining room awaiting me to get it together to actually host the tea time, after school activity schedules are hard. Finally yesterday I found that perfect combination of free time and beautiful weather so I decided that our inaugural Poetry Tea could be held outside. In recent years I've gotten sucked into Emma Bridgewater pottery and I just splurged on a big teapot during a sale so I decided to set the tea table with them. A little bit of fruit, a box of Ikea alphabet cookies, and apple cider were enough to satisfy the children into sitting for me to read aloud.

I was pleased that all of them read a couple poems as well. We talked about authors they might know of who write poetry and eventually they landed on Shel Silverstein. Both the boys have one of his books and I encouraged them to bring those to our next tea.

This is the collection of books that we read:
All For Love by Tasha Tudor
Hi, Koo! by Jon J. Muth
The Springs Of Joy by Tasha Tudor
The Real Mother Goose