Happy Chinese New Year!

Initially we were not supposed to be home during the day to ring in the Chinese New Year.  However, my little one came down with a fever and that kept us in.  It also allowed for us to do some activities that we probably wouldn't have done otherwise.  Here's what our day looked like:

First I thought it would be fun to make a Dragon Mask since they are a huge symbol in China (helps ward off evil spirits).  My daughter didn't like the idea at first so she decided to look at some books.

Yes, The Boxcar Children & Vincent VanGogh have nothing to do with the Chinese New Year but they were on our table that morning.  The bottom two were sold to us by a door-to-door salesman when our daughter was first born.  Now they are a hit! One is a book about traditions in countries around the world and the other is a sticker book related to it.  Chinese New Year was a subject in the book so I left it out and the children did their thing.  (That's how they love to learn.  Something just happens it's way onto the table, thanks to me, and they show interest in learning about it…so much easier than forcing it down their throats.) The paint on our cardboard box dried so we got started on our Dragon Mask.

Glue, pom poms, and various geometric shapes made from construction paper.  (I have a big bag of these shapes that I cut up our first year of homeschooling and they come in so handy)

I didn't take a lot of pictures while we were getting started because I just refuse to take too many minutes behind the camera.  The only other things we used, other than the supplies shown above, were a paper plate, two large goggly eyes, a little more construction paper for the tongue, horns and teeth, plus a yellow gift bag with the top cut off for the mouth.  Here's what it looked like:

The kids drew the teeth and we glued them to the gift bag.  They also made some tubes for the horns and cut some frill into those too.  My favorite part was the awesome abstract art the designed on the side of the dragon's head to create the scales.  This happened so organically.  They also did a pattern with the pom pons on the dragon's head--awesome!

Here's one side:

 After it was complete they decided it was time to dance around while wearing it.  And, my daughter insisted on wearing her authentic Chinese dress.

One is under the mask, and both are under the blanket.  It's "PARADE TIME!"

The next craft we did was a different take on Chinese Lanterns.  I dug out some little jam jars, but any jar would work just fine.  I added some water to red acrylic paint.  I had no idea what was going to work, so you just have a find the amount that will stick to the jar but also allow a candle to glow through it nicely.  The kids only painted the inside of the jar and then they were able to decorate the outside with yellow puffy paint, glitter, black sharpie marker and some stars.

We ended the day with ordering Chinese Food from our favorite local place (also happens to be where the hubs and I met). Here's my New Year fortune:

HMMM…

After dinner, dad got in on the Dragon Mask action.  Had a little dance party and then relaxed by watching Mulan 2.  Which, by the way, has some great messages for young girls.  Here's the most hilarious part of our day:

Gong Hey Fat Choy!

xoxo,

Carolyn