The Creation Story

When teaching my children about the Bible, I decided to "start at the very beginning - a very good place to start." Genesis 1:1 say, "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." So the Creation Story is the beginning.

• Kids' Sunday School Place offers a complete lesson plan about "God the Magnificent Creator." Although this is intended for a Sunday School class, this would work well at home, too. The Creation Blocks craft is easy and appealing and helps the children to remember what God created each day. The skit about Adam naming the animals encourages your child to think about different animals that Adam named.
• Danielle's Place offers directions and an illustration of a Paper Quilt Craft on her Paper Crafts for Kids Page 1. Have your child use light-colored construction paper to draw pictures for each of the 6 days of creations. He can make more than one picture per day if he wants to make a big paper quilt.
• Kids4Truth/Art Works page offers a free color sheet for each day of Creation.
• MSSS Bible Lesson offers several pages of Creation ideas: Creation (general), Days of Creation, Adam and Eve (for "God made man"), and The Sabbath (for the seventh day). I especially liked the Days of Creation page which offered various activities for each day of Creation. Day 1 includes a link to this Earth Pendant craft. Day 2 offers directions for transforming your child into "Cloud Nine." Day 3 links to this Learn About Flowers Craft from DLTK's Growing Together. Day 4 offers a Sun Mask craft from KinderArt.com. Day 5 offers a cute and simple Footprint Fish from Idea Box. Day 6 ideas include Enchanted Learning's multiple egg carton animals. Day 7 emphasizes that this is the Lord's day when we need to go to church to worship Him. This Matching Pieces Church

creation clipart courtesy of fotosearch.com

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More Valentine's Day activities

A lot of people have been looking for crafts and activities to do with Hershey's Kisses. I've found a few of those crafts as well as more Valentine's-related ideas.

Family Fun.com offers this very cute Valentine's Day Blast Off Rocket Candy Card. (Whew! That's a mouthful!) This craft features both a Hershey's Kiss and a roll of hard candy, such as Life Savers.

Perpetual Preschool offers many, many Valentine's Day ideas submitted by readers. Submissions include instructions for creating candy necklaces, handmade cards, hand print flower bouquets, play dough hand print hearts, Valentine's mailboxes, room decorations, and so much more.

BlessingsforLife.com offers unique ideas including Chocolate Heart Sandwich Cookies, several varieties of Homemade Hearts, Hershey Kiss Roses, and A Box of Love. You can also read about the Origins of St. Valentine and Valentine's Day or choose a special saying from three pages of Valentine's Day quotations.

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Valentine's Day fun

It's a little late for some of these suggestions, but you can always file them away for next year if you like.

• Create a Valentine's Tree. A friend of mine purchased a white Christmas tree during the after-holiday clearance time. She decorated it with white lights, heart ornaments, and heart tinsel. (see photo above) The kids could hang any Valentines cards they received.
  
• Create a "Countdown to Valentines" calendar with a special Valentine themed activity for each day.
• Make a giant (non) Hershey's kiss. Melt a bag of chocolate chips. Use the kind of chocolate you like to eat: milk, semi-sweet, or dark. Set a greased funnel (small end down) on a sheet of parchment paper or a cookie sheet - somewhere from which it can easily be removed after the candy has cooled. Pour the melted chocolate into the funnel and let cool. Create your own variations by adding a spoonful of peanut butter as you are filling the funnel (makes a peanut butter kiss), adding nuts, or melting Andes mints along with the chocolate for a mint kiss. Let your imagination soar.
• Help your child create one-of-a-kind handmade old-fashioned Valentines (directions later in post if needed), or let them create a lovely yet simple 3D heart Paper craft.
  
• Make a special gift for someone in need of some TLC. (Think nursing home, shut-ins, singles, sick people, those who have recently lost a loved one; you get the idea.) These Valentine Tear and Paste Activities for Kids would be easy to make for this use.
  

Handmade Valentines Cards

Supplies:

• Construction paper - pink, red, white (any or all)
• Glue
• Stickers (scrap booking stickers are great, but any will work)
  
• Real lace or a heart-shaped paper doily
• Scissors
• Pen or markers
• Glitter pen or regular glitter (optional)

Directions

1. Cut a large heart out of construction paper. (A nice idea is to cut out another smaller version in a different color to glue on top of the big heart.)
2. Cut your paper doily so that you can glue it around the edge of your heart. You can also use real lace to glue around the edge.
3. If you cut out a smaller heart, glue it on top of the large heart.
   
4. Write a Valentine's message in the center.
   
5. Add stickers, glitter, and other decorations as desired.

I'll post later with ideas for classroom and homeschool use.

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Hand print sheep

Here is a craft that children enjoy which can also be used for educational purposes. For example, our PeeWee Patch Club used this craft when the children learned about the shepherds coming to visit Baby Jesus. It would also work nicely with a science lesson on sheep or with a Bible Lesson about David or about Jesus being the Good Shepherd and our being His sheep. Perhaps your child could trace his own hand and work on his motor skills. You may purchase your own supplies or may buy a ready-made Baa Baa Hand Sheep kit from Guildcraft Arts and Crafts.

Targeted age:

• For the child to complete on his own: 6+
• With help: any

Materials List:

• white card stock
• black construction paper
• glue
• stuffing or cotton balls
• wiggle eyes (optional)
  
• self-adhesive magnetic tape (optional)
  

Directions:

1. Trace your child's hand print (keep fingers spread apart) onto a piece of white card stock.
2. Cut out the card stock hand print.
3. Using the card stock hand print as a template, trace your child's hand print minus the thumb onto the construction paper.
4. Cut out the thumb-less hand print.
5. Glue the construction paper on top of the white card stock. The legs (fingers) should be black while the head (thumb) should be white.
   
6. Glue the stuffing or cotton balls onto the palm of the hand print as pictured above.
7. (Optional) Add 2 wiggle eyes and a nose - glue on an oval of black construction paper.
8. (Optional) Cut a strip of magnetic tape and stick it on the back of the sheep.

Now you have your child's hand print immortalized as a little sheep. Thank you to Guildcraft Arts and Crafts for the idea.

photo courtesy of Guildcraft Arts and Crafts

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