Letter of the Week

We have some really awesome parents at Advent including, Tijen Owings. She has been making" Letter of the Week" treats for her son's PreK-4 class. 

Here are some of the fun treats she has been bringing in:

What a better way to learn than by eating something scrumptious?  Especially when learning things that start with the letter they are working on in school! Parents can build off of this at home by making "letter" themed dinners or lunches. 

For example, with the letter E, you could have: egg salad sandwiches, ears of corn, edamame, eggplant parmigana, empanadas, elbow macarroni, enchiladas and the list goes on.

All you have to do is Google, "Food that starts with the letter _" and you get great search results.

Thanks Tijen, for sharing your fun and yummy way of learning letters!

Pumpkin Pie Play Doh

Can you believe it is October? 

What better way to celebrate fall with your children, than to make pumpkin pie play doh! It is something you can to together, it is easy, and it smells awesome! After making your play doh, you can make it really cute to give to griends, classmates, or others by putting it in a plastic baggie without the ziplock, draw a pumpkin face with a black sharpie marker and tie it together using green yarn. How cute!!

What you'll need to make pumpkin pie play doh:

• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 cup salt
• 2 teaspoons cream of tartar
• 2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 1 cup water
• Food coloring (we used 6 drops of red and 15 drops of yellow)

Combine the dry ingredients in a nonstick saucepan. Add the oil, water, and food coloring and whisk until smooth. Stirring constantly with a rubber spatula, cook the mixture over medium heat until it forms a ball, about 3 to 4 minutes.

Turn the dough onto a counter, let it cool slightly, then knead the dough until it has a smooth texture, about 1 minute. The dough will keep up to a week in a ziplock bag.

To make stems, place some pasta (we used fusilli) in a ziplock bag. Add five drops of green food coloring and a teaspoon of water. Seal the bag, then let your tot squish the pasta around until it's tinted. Pour the pasta onto a piece of waxed paper and let it dry for about five minutes before pressing it into your pumpkins.

Activity adapted from: http://spoonful.com/crafts/pumpkin-pie-play-dough