Turkey Pinecone Craft and Thanksgiving Books

Happy Thanksgiving!
I am so grateful for books and crafts in my family's life. This little pinecone turkey is one of our favorite Thanksgiving crafts we use as a table decoration.


To make these you’ll need:

• Pinecones (we grabbed ours from our backyard)
• Craft feathers
• Yellow, 1 inch pom poms (for the head)
• Google Eyes (2)
• Red construction paper (cut little squiggle to attach to beak)
• Orange Pipe Cleaner, we used about 1 inch for the beak then folded in half
• Orange foam mat ( really makes 1 huge foot for stability but cut it to look like 2)

I used a hot glue gun to make it last longer. The kids can set  the feathers in place without touching the glue area. The same with the pop pom head and placing the pinecone onto the foam feet. You can always let the kids use craft glue and let them try to put it together themselves – depending on their age.



We made these a few years ago and they’ve held up nicely. You can stick little name cards in the pinecones for a place marker at the Thanksgiving table.

Here are a few of our favorite Thanksgiving picture books:
I love the colorful graphics and the easy to understand text in Thanksgiving Day by Gail Gibbons.
 
Thanksgiving Is for Giving Thanks, by Margaret Sutherland, reminds kids about the simple things they can be grateful for.


And this was the first year we read 'Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving, by Dav Pilkey.
I’ll admit I don’t think I was ready to introduce vegetarianism to my kids the night before Thanksgiving. My daughter said “Oh, that’s the turkey we eat at Thanksgiving?” Great, now I’m going to have her picturing a live turkey on the table gobbling (groveling) for its life. A little like the Simpson episode where Lisa Simpson pictures the lamb on the table bleating “Don’t eat me.”  Nothing against vegetarians. My sister-in-law pulls out her tofurkey every year. Everyone can eat what they want but I just didn’t want to introduce that concept to my kids at this stage.
 
Anyway the book was still cute and had fun illustrations and a silly rhyme to tell the story of saving turkeys for Thanksgiving.

Happy Thanksgiving! Enjoy some turkey! And some books!
I'd love to know what you are thankful for this year. Leave a comment below.

Dr. Seuss Cat in the Hat Game Review and Giveaway

---Contest Ended--- The Winner was #14, Coupon Person, for their comment about following Wonderforge on Facebook.  They said they would hide "lincoln logs, duplo blocks, trios, cars, and a tinkerbell" inside the hat.  Have fun playing the game! Thanks to Wonder Forge for giving it away. They'll send the game to Coupon Person.

Our family has played several of the Dr. Seuss games by Wonder Forge geared for preschool and grade school ages. We just tried “What’s in the Cat’s Hat” this month and my kids have had a blast finding things around our house to hide inside the hat.

The hat is about 12 inches tall. We hide small toys, crayons, silverwear and more inside.

When I first saw this game on the shelf at ToysRus I thought it was just like our mystery bag we used in preschool. We had a simple drawstring bag the kids would hide a secret item. Then we played twenty questions and sometimes it would take forever for the kids to guess what was inside.

What’s in the Cat’s Hat game really gets the kids more involved and prompts them to ask more helpful questions by using a deck of question cards.  It has a specially designed hat, with a flap on top, to hide objects from view and other secret flaps toward the bottom used for special purposes in the game (peeking, smelling and feeling).

I really loved the combination of using the unique question cards (Does it have a face? Would it float in a bathtub?) along with the action cards (smell it, feel the hat with your elbows). This stepped the mystery bag game up to a whole new level, plus it is Dr. Seuss themed and the kids are drawn to that. Who wouldn’t want to guess what is in the Cat’s hat?

GAME GIVEAWAY:
Wonder Forge will send a copy of this game to one lucky reader. Just in time for Christmas! This would be a fun gift under the tree.
Official entry:  To enter this giveaway please leave a comment below telling me what you would hide in the hat.
This giveaway runs Nov. 17 – Nov. 27. A winner will be randomly chosen at midnight MST on Nov. 27, 2011. If you do not have an email linked to your comment account, please leave your email address in your comment. Open to valid U.S. addresses only.
For extra entries, pick any of the following to do and leave a separate comment for each one below:

• Follow ObSEUSSed on Google Friend Connect found in the right column.
• Follow ObSEUSSed on Facebook
• Follow ObSEUSSed on Twitter
• Follow Wonder Forge on Twitter
• Follow Wonder Forge on Facebook

 
See more about the Dr. Seuss What's in the Cat's Hat? Game part of a series of ‘I Can Do That” Dr. Seuss games by the Wonder Forge.
Here are some of the other Dr. Seuss games we’ve owned for a few years now that the kids love to play:

• Horton Hears a Who - You to the Rescue
• Green Eggs and Ham Speedy Diner Game,
• Dr. Seuss Super Stretchy ABC's
• Oh The Places You'll Go Board Game
• and our favorite, Cat in the Hat I Can Do That! Game

“Cat in the Hat, I Can Do That!” game.  We’ve had ours a few years and the original “Trick-a-ma-stick” was very tricky to set up and fell over easily.  Wonder Forge has amazing customer service. See how they responded when they saw the negative reviews about the stick on Amazon. If you have this game and want the new-improved stick, click here to find out how to get a free replacement.  They sent us a replacement  and the kids easily set it up.

My son loves skipping around the trick-a-ma-stick with the Seuss toy man in his shirt. In this game they pick an action card, an item card and a how-to hold item card. Below my daughter has to crawl under the trick-a-ma-stick with the Dr. Seuss cake on her back.

Disclosure: I received a free copy of the 'What's in the Cat's Hat' game from Wonder Forge for review. All opinions and experiences are my own.

GIVEAWAY: Remember to enter the giveaway for a chance to win a copy of "What's in the Cat's Hat." (See rules above)

Thanks for visiting ObSEUSSed!
 

The Lorax Movie, Free App and Book Ideas

Great News: The Lorax has been made into a computer animated film coming to theaters March 2012. With voices from Danny DeVito, Zac Efron and Betty White, I’m curious to see how it will turn out.
Here are some additional ways to explore the story of The Lorax:



We love reading The Lorax book by Dr. Seuss at our house.  I made this felt board for the kids to play with while I read to them. I cut out different colors of felt, glued on googley eyes, put an 8x10 piece of felt in a fun frame for the background and let them play.


I came across the Free App for the Lorax movie this past week.  My 5 year old son has been loving it.  You hold up your Apple device sideways and talk then the mouth and mustache move as you talk. It is pretty silly and makes my son laugh. The movement is pretty jumpy, even after we adjusted the microphone sensitivity, but my son doesn’t care (and hey, it’s FREE!). This is fun to use while reading the book, or just to talk to each other and pretend you’re the Lorax.



This video is only 5 seconds. See how it works. Get The Lorax Free App here.

“I am the Lorax, I Speak for the Trees.”

Check out The Lorax Garden, game app for kids created by Oceanhouse Media. This game is only 99 cents and is another great one to play while you explore the story.


I’ve always loved the original cartoon of The Lorax. You can find it on the Seuss Celebration DVD that has a great compilation of Dr. Seuss cartoons on it.



Do any of you remember what special word the Onceler said was most important? I’ll give you a clue, it starts with an ‘U’.

Leave your comment below and share your ideas of how you like to explore this story.

Thanks for visiting,