Thursday Thirteen - Lots and Lots Of Holiday Games For My Mom - The Great-Grandmother Of Our Family !

Thursday Thirteen.com

1. Free Christmas Games.com
jigsaw puzzles, mah jong, card games

2. Christmas Games - BillyBear4Kids.com
Online Christmas games and puzzles for kids. Includes coloring games, word search, and tic tac toe. ...

3. Merry-Christmas.com
This one has some pretty tough trivia games!

4. DLTK's Christmas Games for Kids
Offers online and printable Christmas games and puzzles, coloring pages

5.Christmas games for Moms, Grandmoms and Kids at Kaboose.com

6. The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis offers Jolly Days Winter Wonderland –
Fun Winter Activities for the younger set (Pre-K through grade school)

7. CR Puzzles
Your on-line puzzle magazine
Okay, they aren’t Christmas puzzles, but if you’re a word puzzle fanatic (like my mom) this site is packed!

8. Family Fun’s Classic Games Index

9. A Christmas Cat Jigsaw Puzzle – very pretty!

10. Christmas Concentration, Holiday Word Searches, Math puzzles at Coolmath Christmas

11. Make a Christmas Snow Globe with Holly Hobbie and email it to your friends!

12. Snowflake Fun And Games – lots, some online, some printable

13. And finally, a page of Christmas Jokes and Riddles

Merry Christmas!

Countdown To Christmas!

We had an ice storm today, glistening and beautiful and taking down a power line this afternoon. I came to my desk tonight planning to seek out a good selection of Advent and Christmas countdown activities for the children to enjoy.
And to keep the children busy so the grandmothers can get something accomplished during the day!

It turns out that Beverly Hernandez, Your Guide to Homeschooling at About.com has already done the job for me. In fact, she's done a far more thorough job than I planned on doing!

I'll be visiting Beverly's Christmas Countdown Calendar Pages every day from now until Christmas to use her great ideas. ( and I still won't have time to do them all!)
Thank you and Three Cheers for Beverly!
Merry Christmas!

Winter For The Canada Goose

In spite of being called the Canada goose, these geese are one of the most common type of water birds, living or at least migrating through all of North America. There are really over a dozen kinds of geese that belong to the species called Canada Goose. Almost all of them migrate, but a few kinds do not, preferring to stay in the same location year round.

The Canada Goose enjoys the young shoots of plants such as cattails, pondweed, grasses, clover, most of plants that can be found growing near water. Seen in ponds with their head submerged underwater and tail sticking up high, they also eat insects and their larvae, snails, small clams and mussels.

In the winter, when the ponds and lakes begin to freeze and their food becomes scarce, the Canada geese begin to migrate to a place that is warmer with plenty of food. Scientists still aren't sure just how migration works or how the geese know what to do and where to go. They do know that most Canada geese travel the same routes or paths each year and arrive at the same place to spend the winter.
The geese migrate both by day and by night, stopping often for rest, food, and water. They make their migration in family groups and are led by experienced adults who have made the trip before. It is believed that they find their way by watching for familiar landmarks, such as mountains, cities, rivers, and lakes. It is also likely that the position of the sun, moon, and stars in the sky as well as the earth’s magnetic field helps them to find their way.
However they do it, we all have to agree that it is a very impressive accomplishment!

For some fun with the Canada Goose, visit these pages:

Canada Goose Coloring Page (from coloring.ws)

Canada Goose Coloring Page (with information)

Canada Goose Coloring Page with Labels (with information)

"What I've learned about the Canada Goose" Coloring Worksheet

Help the Canada Goose find the pond Maze

How many words can you make from CANADA GOOSE Word Worksheet

Our Family Word Search

Think of all of the wonderful words to describe your family. Think of the silly words that describe your family. Make a list of your family's hobbies, favorite songs, streets in your neighborhood.
Now have some fun making Family Wordsearch Games.
Like this one, for example -

Halloween And More At Thrifty Fun.com

I found a great new site this morning - Thrifty Fun! I stumbled onto their Halloween Page with it's Frugal Costume Ideas, lots of crafts, and even some ideas for Halloween Alternatives for families who don't celebrate Halloween.
From there I discovered that the site is really a community - a site where regular folks can share their knowledge and ideas.
There are also free newsletters to sign up for - if you're like me, your email box is already bursting with all the great newsletters out there - but there is always room for a few more!

Ten Weeks of Fun Fall Activities to Enjoy With Your Kids

Here's a great offer from Jennifer Wolf, Your Guide to Single Parents at About.com.

She has added a new (free!) E-course to her site called "Ten Weeks of Fun Fall Activities."

You can either sign up to receive a different fall activity in your E-mail each week, or read through the list of suggestions online. The idea is to plan one weekly outing or activity with your kids throughout the fall season.

Related: Free, Printable Pumpkin Carving Templates

October Fun From HighlightsKids.com

The October Newsletter from HighlightsKids.com was in my email box this morning and it's a good one!
Here are a few samples :
They have two Fall games - Build A Scarecrow and John's Leafy Puzzler. Hidden Pictures with a Fall theme - Acorn Collectors and Pumpkin Pickers , a Halloween craft - Ghost House for Halloween Treats and this month's story player - Monster Me.
Follow the links for some real October fun from HighlightsKids.com

Games Kids Play

Here's a great link for a Friday!
Games Kids Play
There are rules and directions for over 250 indoor, outdoor, active, quiet - you name it! - games on this site. The web owners describe their site this way:

The purpose of this page is two-fold;

- One, to let you remember some of those odd games we used to play and bring a smile to your face.
- Two, to try to catalog a fascinating piece of oral tradition, and make sure none of these games are ever lost forever.

There are hundreds of these games, and no one person has played them all. Plus there are undoubtedly hundreds more variations depending on where you grew up.

It's a fabulous list - Remember this one?

Red Light/Green Light
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In this game, one person plays the "stop light" and the rest try to touch him/her.

At the start, all the children form a line about 15 feet away from the stop light.

The stop light faces away from the line of kids and says "green light". At this point the kids are allowed to move towards the stoplight.

At any point, the stop light may say "red light!" and turn around. If any of the kids are caught moving after this has occurred, they are out.

Play resumes when the stop light turns back around and says "green light".

The stop light wins if all the kids are out before anyone is able to touch him/her.

Otherwise, the first player to touch the stop light wins the game and earns the right to be "stop light" for the next game.

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I have one more link to share.
I moved my Grandmother blog to this site when fall began (and the title Summer With Grandmother Wren proved to be a bit short-sighted). I really haven't fully "moved in" here yet - one of the things I have left to do is a Link List of my favorite blogs.
I'm starting the list today.
Please visit mommysecrets.
The mommy there says "Moms, Don't you wish there was an instructions manual for becoming a mom? I use this forum as a way to collect tricks of the trade for moms. I'll share my secrets, spotlight secrets I've learned from friends, and I hope you will share what works for your family. I will focus on tips that help families stay balanced, healthy, frugal, creative, and closely knit. Who knows - maybe one day we'll turn our collection into a real handbook to help moms do their job fantastically!"
mommysecrets