Activity Days: Journal Writing With M&Ms

We had an activity on the importance of writing in journals. We talked about how it can help us remember things, help our ancestors understand how we lived, and how it can help us think through what is going on in our lives.

Writing in a journal can be difficult to do so I wanted to help give the girls some motivation for what to write about. I found something similar on Pinterest and adapted it for my group. The one I saw only had about six colors of M&Ms; each color represented something you could write about in a journal. I didn't think that was enough. I came up with 11 general things that 8 year old girls could write about in their journals.

To get a total of 11 different colors of plain M&Ms, I bought a pack at Costco with the usuals then went to Zurchers and got some individual colors (which, by the way, are a lot more expensive than I thought they'd be).

Here's the list of things I thought the girls could write about.

1. Something interesting that happened today (or since the last entry).
2. Something you do well or did well today.
3. Something interesting or fun you remembered today and what made you think of it.
4. Something about school.
5. Something you learned today/recently.
6. Something you are grateful for.
7. Something you did for someone else or something nice someone did for you.
8. Something you have a question about or want to understand better or an answer you received.
9. Something you want for the future.
10. Something about your family/friends.

For the activity, I gave each girl a small pad of paper, a colored pen (they thought colored pens were the greatest), and a bag full of M&Ms. I had the girls choose an M&M, use their guide to figure out what they were supposed to write about for that color, then gave them some time to write (which was pretty difficult for some of them). Then they ate their M&M and chose another one.

Recipe: Shredded Meatballs

Meatball sandwiches are amazing. CJ and I have them semi-regularly for dinner. The biggest problem is keeping the meatballs on the sandwich. I devised a remedy for this: Shredded Meatballs.

The inspiration for this recipe came from a slow cooker chicken Parmesan sandwich recipe that we tried but weren't impressed with (found it on Pinterest but apparently I didn't keep the pin - that's how uninterested I was in it after trying it). My first thought upon eating the sandwich was - this would be better with beef. So I tried my own version with beef.

Ingredients
1 beef roast - about 3 pounds
1 can/jar spaghetti sauce
1/2 cup water
Italian Seasoning

Put everything in the crockpot and cook on low for 8 hours or high for 4 hours. Using two forks, shred the meat as soon as you can to help get the flavors on ever possible beefy surface.

Serve on buns with mozzarella and/or Parmesan or add to spaghetti or put on pizza or put in a casserole. Anywhere you can use meatballs, you can use shredded meatballs.

Enjoy!

Activity Days: String Art Temple

A while ago we had an activity on temples. Since 8 year old girls don't sit still or listen for very long, I decided to do a craft along with the lesson. I had seen string art all over Pinterest and thought it could work for a temple.

One of the issues, however, was that the tutorials I saw all involved nails on wood boards. I was very much uninterested it handing nails and a hammer to the girls and I was also uninterested in doing all the hammering before the activity since I was never sure how many girls were going to show up (I think 2 showed up for this activity).

While walking around Jo-Ann for ideas, I came across these small, square cork boards and figured they, with push pins, would be perfect for 8 year olds. (I bought the clear push pins at Walmart because they were significantly cheaper there than Jo-Ann.)

Unfortunately the push pins didn't fit really well, they were longer than the cork board was thick. This means that the pointy end of the push pins would hang out the back or we had to be careful not to push the pins all the way through.

For the shape of the temple I drew out a few different designs on paper. The girls chose their design and cut it out. Then we placed the design on the cork board and put the push pins in around the edges of the design. Taking the paper out afterword was not as easy as I thought it would be so we ended up leaving a few scraps in there figuring the string would hide it. I had pre-cut long pieces of string and let the girls go to town filling in the shape.

Overall, it was an ok activity. I probably wouldn't do it again with this age group - maybe 11 year old girls - and I would definitely make sure the cork board was thick enough for the pins.