Showing posts with label Thanksgiving. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Thanksgiving. Show all posts
Friday, 28 November 2014
Wednesday, 27 November 2013
Thanksgiving Handprints
Thanksgiving is almost here again. In fact, Ava is already off school for the holiday.
We've been working on a few Thanksgiving crafts to decorate our apartment. Last year we made hand print turkeys and they were such a big hit with the kids. You can see them here. Both Ava and Lola were pretty keen to make hand print turkeys again. This year we decided to mix things up a little and rather than making just hand print turkeys we went for a whole Thanksgiving theme and made hand print pilgrims and hand print Native Americans as well.
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| Thanksgiving handprints on our front door |
Tuesday, 8 January 2013
Little Projects: 2012 Recap
A few days ago we had a look back at all of the Little Adventures that kept us busy over 2012. Now let's have a look at the Little Projects and Little Crafts that filled in the rest of our free time...
Valentine's Day
For Valentine's Day we baked little heart shaped sugar cookies for Ava's friends at pre-school. We packaged them up in little bags with a picture of Ava the baker on the label. The label read "Sweet Hearts for my Sweetheart". Ava thought that this was absolutely hilarious. I think that it was just the right amount of cheesiness for Valentine's Day!
You can see more here.
Valentine's Day
For Valentine's Day we baked little heart shaped sugar cookies for Ava's friends at pre-school. We packaged them up in little bags with a picture of Ava the baker on the label. The label read "Sweet Hearts for my Sweetheart". Ava thought that this was absolutely hilarious. I think that it was just the right amount of cheesiness for Valentine's Day!
You can see more here.
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| Sweethearts for my Sweetheart |
Friday, 23 November 2012
A Thanksgiving Turkey... Costume!
I've mentioned before that Ava had this idea in her head that she must dress up as a turkey for Thanksgiving. I thought this would be a fun idea so I got to work on making costumes for both Ava and Lola.
Lots of felt, coat hanger wire and hours later we had two little turkeys ready to celebrate Thanksgiving!
Here's a look at the costumes I made for the girls. They both happened to have brown onesie tracksuits in their wardrobe (as you do!) which made the perfect base for their costumes. With the addition of tails (wired to stand up), turkey feet and beaks the girls were good to go. Unfortunately Lola wouldn't wear her costume for a photo so you'll just have to believe me when I say she looked adorable.
Lots of felt, coat hanger wire and hours later we had two little turkeys ready to celebrate Thanksgiving!
Here's a look at the costumes I made for the girls. They both happened to have brown onesie tracksuits in their wardrobe (as you do!) which made the perfect base for their costumes. With the addition of tails (wired to stand up), turkey feet and beaks the girls were good to go. Unfortunately Lola wouldn't wear her costume for a photo so you'll just have to believe me when I say she looked adorable.
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| Turkey Ava flapping her wings |
Thursday, 22 November 2012
Happy Thanksgiving 2012
Thanksgiving is over for another year, leaving us with bellies full of roast turkey, maple glazed sweet potato, cauliflower gratin, roast brussel sprouts and home made pumpkin pie. So completely stuffed!
We had a lovely lunch at our apartment with good friends and (as seems to be tradition) a little too much food. Not that we have huge amounts of food left over mind you; maybe just enough for one more dinner for two. Not too bad.
Here's a look at our Thanksgiving lunch with the Autumn Leaf Turkeys that I made used as place cards.
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| Leaf turkey place card |
Autumn Leaf Turkeys
Happy Thanksgiving!
I had intended for this post to go up last night but a little technical glitch (I reached the limit of Blogger's included photo storage space) threw a spanner in the works. All sorted now.
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In the lead up to Thanksgiving our apartment seems to be full of Autumn leaves and turkeys. So I thought, why not combine the two in a fun craft project? Why not indeed!
Ava has a five day weekend for Thanksgiving and the weather is pretty grey today so it's the perfect opportunity to work on another fun craft project: Autumn Leaf Turkeys.
I had intended for this post to go up last night but a little technical glitch (I reached the limit of Blogger's included photo storage space) threw a spanner in the works. All sorted now.
--
In the lead up to Thanksgiving our apartment seems to be full of Autumn leaves and turkeys. So I thought, why not combine the two in a fun craft project? Why not indeed!
Ava has a five day weekend for Thanksgiving and the weather is pretty grey today so it's the perfect opportunity to work on another fun craft project: Autumn Leaf Turkeys.
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| Autumn Leaf Turkeys |
Tuesday, 20 November 2012
Sneak Peak : Turkey Costume
Remember how I mentioned here that Ava wants to dress up as a turkey for Thanksgiving?
Well, her request got the better of me and I started thinking of ideas for a costume. I know there's no need for costumes for Thanksgiving but I just couldn't help myself! Plus it gave me an excuse to get out the new sewing machine and play :)
Ava's costume isn't quite finished yet but I thought I'd share a little sneak peek of some of what I've come up with so far. So here you go, one turkey beak and and two turkey feet!
The rest of Ava's costume will be revealed on Thanksgiving so stay tuned!
Well, her request got the better of me and I started thinking of ideas for a costume. I know there's no need for costumes for Thanksgiving but I just couldn't help myself! Plus it gave me an excuse to get out the new sewing machine and play :)
Ava's costume isn't quite finished yet but I thought I'd share a little sneak peek of some of what I've come up with so far. So here you go, one turkey beak and and two turkey feet!
The rest of Ava's costume will be revealed on Thanksgiving so stay tuned!
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| Ava in her turkey beak |
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| Ava's turkey feet |
Sunday, 18 November 2012
Autumn Leaf Garland
Autumn really is such a beautiful time of year. The trees are so full of colour in various shades of reds, oranges, yellows, browns and green. And as the trees shed their leaves, so too do the gardens and sidewalks become full of colour. While I love seeing the leaves scattered everywhere I'm sure that those of you who have to sweep them up aren't quite so fond of this time of year!
Over the past few weeks the girls and I have been collecting Autumn leaves as we walk to and from school. I wasn't really sure what we were going to do with them but we kept on collecting them anyway. I really wanted to preserve the beauty of Autumn by bringing the colours into our apartment.
I've come up with a few projects for our collection of Autumn leaves and here's the first one: an Autumn Leaf Garland. It's pretty simple to make and I think it looks lovely hanging in a window.
Over the past few weeks the girls and I have been collecting Autumn leaves as we walk to and from school. I wasn't really sure what we were going to do with them but we kept on collecting them anyway. I really wanted to preserve the beauty of Autumn by bringing the colours into our apartment.
I've come up with a few projects for our collection of Autumn leaves and here's the first one: an Autumn Leaf Garland. It's pretty simple to make and I think it looks lovely hanging in a window.
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| Autumn Leaf Garland |
Thursday, 15 November 2012
Turkey Hand Prints for Thanksgiving
In just one week's time it will be Thanksgiving. It feels like only yesterday we were celebrating our very first Thanksgiving here in America. It sounds like such a cliché, but the time really has just flown by.
Ava is super excited about Thanksgiving - especially the turkey part of the holiday. She can't wait to eat turkey, she wants to dress as a turkey and she's eager to create turkey crafts. Dressing as a turkey may be a little odd but making turkey crafts is right up our alley.
A little search on Pinterest provided a lot of inspiration for turkey themed activities. I've got a few turkey projects planned for the girls but first up here's the messiest (and therefore the most fun!) of the lot: turkey hand prints.
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| Hand print turkey |
This is a really simple project and the kids had a lot of fun with it.
Friday, 2 December 2011
Pumpkin Pie & Tofurky
I'm getting a little slow with my posts.
Here it is, a week since Thanksgiving and I'm only just getting around to posting about it...
Our first Thanksgiving was a nice day. We had one of Kim's workmates (who also happens to be an old friend from Adelaide) over for lunch and stuffed ourselves full of holiday food; turkey, sweet potato, potato bake, green beans, broccolini and crusty sourdough followed by home made pumpkin pie. Oh, and "Tofurky" for our vegetarian guest. I couldn't resist buying the "Tofurky" roast - even just for the name! Actually, the "Tofurky" tasted pretty good. Quite similar in flavor to real turkey however the texture just wasn't quite right, kind of like a turkey meatloaf!
I have to admit that I succumbed to laziness (or lack of time and baking equipment) for a lot of the meal. The potato bake and sweet potato (with maple glazed pecans and cranberries, mmm...) were both ready made side dishes from our local Trader Joe's supermarket. The ready made meals here are fantastic. Nothing like the flavorless mush passing as ready meals in Australia. There are so many good options when it comes to ready made meals here that you could get away with never cooking yet eat a healthy, home-made style meal every night. And now while we're living in our furniture-less new apartment at the moment that's just what we're doing!
Anyway, back to Thanksgiving...
The one thing that I did make myself was the pumpkin pie. Ok, so there was a little bit of cheating involved (I used a store bought pie base and tinned pumpkin) but I'm still going with calling it home made. I got my recipe from joyofbaking.com. You can find it here. Or, you can follow my much shorter, edited version of the recipe below.
Here it is, a week since Thanksgiving and I'm only just getting around to posting about it...
Our first Thanksgiving was a nice day. We had one of Kim's workmates (who also happens to be an old friend from Adelaide) over for lunch and stuffed ourselves full of holiday food; turkey, sweet potato, potato bake, green beans, broccolini and crusty sourdough followed by home made pumpkin pie. Oh, and "Tofurky" for our vegetarian guest. I couldn't resist buying the "Tofurky" roast - even just for the name! Actually, the "Tofurky" tasted pretty good. Quite similar in flavor to real turkey however the texture just wasn't quite right, kind of like a turkey meatloaf!
I have to admit that I succumbed to laziness (or lack of time and baking equipment) for a lot of the meal. The potato bake and sweet potato (with maple glazed pecans and cranberries, mmm...) were both ready made side dishes from our local Trader Joe's supermarket. The ready made meals here are fantastic. Nothing like the flavorless mush passing as ready meals in Australia. There are so many good options when it comes to ready made meals here that you could get away with never cooking yet eat a healthy, home-made style meal every night. And now while we're living in our furniture-less new apartment at the moment that's just what we're doing!
Anyway, back to Thanksgiving...
The one thing that I did make myself was the pumpkin pie. Ok, so there was a little bit of cheating involved (I used a store bought pie base and tinned pumpkin) but I'm still going with calling it home made. I got my recipe from joyofbaking.com. You can find it here. Or, you can follow my much shorter, edited version of the recipe below.
Wednesday, 23 November 2011
Almost Thanksgiving
It's almost Thanksgiving - another first for us here in America.
Ava is pretty excited about Thanksgiving although she has absolutely no idea what it's about! All she cares about is that she gets to eat turkey and cranberry sauce, and for that she's very thankful.
I'm looking forward to roasting a turkey and baking a pumpkin pie. I have this image in my head of me roasting an entire turkey, so big that it takes up the entire oven. Of course, there's no way that we could realistically eat that much turkey (no matter how much Ava loves it) so I've let practicality take over and I'm roasting a turkey breast roll instead. This way we get all the best turkey meat anyway. I'm not so good with all the "gooby" bits!
Ava has been drawing lots of turkeys for Thanksgiving decorations and for friends back home - who of course will not be celebrating Thanksgiving. Here are a few of Ava's best turkey drawings.
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| Ava's first attempt at drawing a turkey. |
