http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/ en-us Homeschool Blogger Tue, 1 Apr 2008 04:35:00 -0500 Tue, 1 Apr 2008 04:35:00 -0500 What a fun day we had working on our cake badges! Once the girls all arrived we did our song, our verse and had a sharing time for things they had been working on at home and acts of compassion they had done as well as a little story time about compassion. Each girl brought one baked cake and one batch of butter cream frosting. They spent a little time practicing with their tips on a foil mat. They dusted their cakes with a thin layer of frosting to keep the crumbs from getting on the finish. They colored their frosting. They designed their cakes and then decorated them. It was a very busy afternoon!   All of the cakes looked simply great!! Good job girls! We hope you had fun learning how to decorate with frosting. You will be making some great looking cakes, cupcakes and cookies as you grow in your skill! Enjoy this craft and have fun with it! Below are close ups of the cakes for your enjoyment! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/508409/ Tue, 1 Apr 2008 04:35:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/508409/   We are working our way through the Keepers Compassion Bible study each meeting. "Compassion is not a feeling. It only exists through action. Jesus put actions with His feelings. Thus He had compassion." Here is a spot to share the acts of compassion you have been working on at home. Shoot me an email to let me know what YOU have been moved to do! ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ Addison shares: " Francesca and Lorenzy couldn't come to Keepers today because their whole family was sick. After our meeting I asked mom if I could make them dinner. We went to the store and got all the things to make them chicken noodle soup along with a nice loaf of bread and Dad drove me over to deliver it to them along with some get well cards that I made for all the kids.” Renz & Fran share:  How they each made a cake and were practicing with their cake decorating skills. They blessed a neighbor and a friend with their handmade creations & one was a birthday gift!  Great job girls reaching out to neighbors and friends! Lovely!   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500719/ Tue, 18 Mar 2008 16:47:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500719/   Last year we worked on knitting some baby sweaters and sent a whole heap of them to our old house helper in Uzbekistan. Gulya delivered the sweaters to the orphanage that I used to work at. What a blessing those warm sweaters are to the kids! Smile girls and know that you did a great thing! Here are  a few pictures of some of the kids wearing the sweaters. (Thanks to all the others that heard about our cause and sent sweaters to me!) Blessings!     The end. Ü http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500315/ Mon, 25 Feb 2008 04:18:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500315/   Today we celebrated the end of our first year of Keepers with a tea party. We enjoyed each others company and talking about the things we did this year. Everyone had a favorite activity to rave about. We went over some Bible memory games and each girl circled the ten things they would most like to work on for next year. It has been a blessing getting to know each and every girl in this group- and watching the friendships grow. Looking forward to seeing you back next year. A few of our girls are moving away or moving on. Thanks for being a part of our group! Blessings to you! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500312/ Tue, 4 Dec 2007 03:11:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500312/   At the start of each meeting the girls share what they have been working on at home the last fortnight. Brianna brought along her scrapbook this week to share what she'd been doing. Great job Brianna!   We also had Indi tell us the books of the Old Testament. Way to go Indi! What a great time we had with weaving! Our girls, as young as 5, were able to accomplish this skill with no problems.  We learned a little history of weaving, saw a few different types of looms, went over the terminology and then we started.   The girls first worked on a small paper weaving- just so they had the idea of over/under. I found that to be very helpful for their learning. Next they were each given a loop loom. What a busy afternoon they had! All of the girls finished a pot holder by that evening and many have now finished several!   The loop looms were purchased from Rainbow Resources. We also had examples of other types of weaving for the girls. I liked this site for directions- http://www.montessoriworld.org/Handwork/weave/weaving3.html  The round one is great!  We also had an example of a bead weaving bracelet kit.   I have heard from many moms how excited the girls were with this project- simple and easy and something they can use to keep hands busy. Many of the pot holders have been given away as gifts already! By the end of the meeting they were near finished. Way to go girls!!   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500309/ Tue, 4 Mar 2008 02:42:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500309/   Our club starts at the end of summer so a trip to the pool was a welcome activity! All of our girls know how to swim so the time was spent going over the skills listed in the handbook so we could check each girl off.  The girls enjoyed the afternoon and learned a few new skills as well! Thanks to Rachel for opening her pool for us! There was a lot of playing and I understand everyone had a good time. Later that week a few of the girls got togteher and did their treading water and other skills. Great job girls! ( I was away for this meeting-- any pictures anyone?) http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500308/ Tue, 19 Feb 2008 02:40:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500308/   Each girl brought along 6-10 pictures of one event, but before they could use their pictures, we had some things to go over. I put together some projects for the girls before they arrived. They each had a piece of white paper and some different, basic elements that can be used to jazz up the page.  (white paper, a triangle, a strip and some matting papers along with a die cut.) (I slipped it all in a page protector so the girls could take home their finished project and it made sorting everything ahead of time so much easier.)   I ran through a basic 101 scrapbooking with them. I demonstrated and then they made their pages- using triangle pieces and strips along with some die cuts. We did about 3 of these examples- pointing out different ways to journal, and matting using plain and patterned papers. (just adding the strip and triangle brings a white piece of paper to life. )  (Add in the die cuts and you have a themed page all ready for pictures and journalling.)  (chuck down some mats for the pictures or for journaling and you have gone from a simple plain white piece of paper to one full of color, bright and cheerful. simple eh?! )     It was good basics for the girls since only two of them had done any scrapbooking before. Once we had gone over the basics and all the tools and elements that had been used – the girls spent the rest of the afternoon creating their pages.  Hopefully, they will keep up with this skill and the history they are making. (Hard at work)  ( mum's little darling ~ working together)   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500307/ Tue, 5 Feb 2008 02:37:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500307/   Our lovely mom with the wonderful garden (Mrs. Janette) brought in basketfuls of different types of flowers. Each girl brought along phone books and Rainbow Resource catalogs to use for pressing. The girls were shown how to lay the flowers between the pages and then they spent some time pressing all the flowers into the books. She had made up papers with pictures of each flower, its seed and the girls wrote in the information about the care of each flower and its uses.   We had pictures of the flowers and the girls added those to their garden books.   At our next meeting, the girls opened the pages to find our flowers all dried and ready for use. They used different papers to make lovely keepsakes. Some made bookmarks, some made pictures to place in a frame, some made placemats and others coasters. The girls loved having the finished project to take home with them and all were excited with the results. http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500305/ Tue, 2 Oct 2007 02:33:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500305/   One of our moms (Mrs. Janette!) has a lovely garden and she invited us for a tour. She explained about each type of flower and plant as we walked along the path. Telling us the name, the conditions it needs and how to prune it as well. She let each girl have a go with the shears (a brave woman!)    The girls really enjoyed the hands-on and seeing, smelling and feeling of the garden. It was a great way to get them excited about their own little patches of earth!  We took some pictures of the different plants and trees and printed those off. Each girl then made a booklet identifying all the ones they had learned.   We also ended up with some seed packets that were made from her flowers! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500303/ Tue, 18 Sep 2007 02:30:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500303/ Today we had our first cake decorating class. We found Mrs. Georgia, a lovely lady that makes cakes on the side and she agreed to come over and give us a demonstration. She did a wonderful job!   Our lesson started off with her explaining the tips and tools of the trade. She brought a lot of things to show us and explained how they all worked.   Next, we watched as she explained about leveling a cake (by cutting the top off) and turning it out onto a cake board.  Then we watched how she: cut the cake and filled it with yummy goodness, how she dusted the cake with a light coat of frosting so the crumbs wouldn’t ruin the finish and how to prepare the frosting for use. Next, came the fun bits- decorating the cake. She made a simple but oh so cute cake!   She had brought enough frosting and tips for nearly all the girls to have one for a quick play and they were able to decorate two cupcakes to take home.   It was nice to have someone that does this for a living come along to show us how it all works.  It was nice to see how quickly a nice looking dessert could be made for our families and also a way that a wife and mother could help supplement her families income.  the plain cake  piping the icing to fence in the filling   adding the white chocolate and strawberry filling (yum) Putting the two halves together again  Ready for a dusting  all dusted and ready for a frosting piping on the sides smoothing out the frosting. adding the stems time for some grass The girls were all ears and eyes Great Easter colors! Checking out some tips  Our simple and yummy cake all ready for tea time! Thanks Mrs. Georgia for showing us what you do! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500302/ Tue, 18 Mar 2008 02:19:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/canberrakeepers/500302/