Happy New Year!

Just another blank entry to fix the template!

McCain and Palin!!!

ok, details!  First off - these 'reports' about the crowd being hand-picked or whatever is just nonsense.  They sent out an email on Saturday, and it was on the news, and then it was first come, first serve Monday morning at the GOP offices to get tickets.  We got our tickets very fortunately.  I called the GOP office on Saturday and talked to the lady and told her we had reserved tickets but that I had 5 kids and wouldn't be able to get there Mon. morning, would there still be tickets left, and she said to call her back on Monday and she'd let me know.  So I called her back on Monday and she said all the tickets were gone, and I almost started crying.  I told her that I had talked to her on Sat, and she thought there would be plenty of tickets, etc.....and then she says 'I remember talking to you!  I set 2 tickets aside for you this morning'.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   I couldn't believe it!   How nice was she?   She did that for a couple of other people too.  So I went in Mon night and had our tickets!


We got there around 3:30 and there was already a really long line. Turned out we were still towards the front half of the line.  Shortly after we got there, the line was really really long, and we were seated for probably an hour and the line was still entering the building.  It was so much fun seeing all the media.  Being a journalist would be so cool.  We saw Carl Cameron from Fox News near the enterance. He paused and smiled for me.  (I still haven't forgotten your terrible treatment of Fred, Carl!)  

The music and the initial speakers were realllllly loud.  Painfully loud.  It seemed somewhat better when Sarah and John came out.  They stayed in the middle, and talked for 10-15 minutes, and then they started taking questions.  It seemed like it was a lot of questions, but the news said they only took 13.  The event had been billed to run until 10:30, so when they said they were done right before 8, I was a little bummed.  10:30 would have made for very long, probably getting boring by then, but I wonder how that got advertised like that.  They got some good questions and gave some good answers for the most part.  Someone asked all the naysayers on her foreign policy and gave her a chance to rebut that, and I thought her answer was kind of shallow, really.  But I saw the lady who asked the question on the news and she said she liked Sarah's answer, so whatever.  Her answer was basically 'I'm ready on Day 1, I know foreign policy, you can ask me about it'  The lady who asked the question was in front of me and she wanted to ask a follow-up question but didn't get a chance. Someone at some point asked Sarah something about oil and she went off saying it was nonsense that Bush went over to Saudi Arabia asking them to increase their production for us.  It was awesome. 

Sarah was really good.  She looked and sounded exactly like she did on TV.  John McCain sounded even more passionate about things in his answers than I usually hear on TV.  They work really well together.  A lot of the questions were for one or the other, and so after they answered it, the other one would jump in and add something, or the other person would say 'do you want to add anything'.   It really seemed like a partnership.  I know I've read things implying that Sarah will make the VP slot a useless one, but that really doesn't seem to be the case.   They worked really well together.

Here are pictures!


My cool t-shirt I made.



The quote is from Nancy Pelosi in a Ladies Home Journal interview she gave a year or so ago.
Article link




The protesters.


Campaign Carl gives me a smile!




Campaign Carl on-air!




The media!!!  That was so cool.   I love watching the media and journalists.


Sarah!!!


John!!!




I ran over chairs and squeezed my way up when it was over to get pictures and autographs!   I'm almost there!  Sarah, wait!  Wait for me!

Come back Sarah, come back!!!!!


Oh well, hey, I'll take you Todd!!!  I got one autograph.  Thanks First Dude!

Ancient Rome projects

So we are moving moving moving through ancient Rome.  They're memorizing the first 11 emperors of Rome, along with Julius Caesar  being the first dictator.  I'm still trying to come up with some sort of weekly lesson planning.  I think I'm going to try a checklist for dd....I think that might help with the 'when can I be done' whining. 





Building a Roman Road




Salt Maps of Italy, and yes, they know Italy isn't an island, LOL.

Ancient Rome

ooh, we're slowing getting it together.  I'm so pleased with myself.  I actually have 2 weeks scheduled and so far it's been working.  We are in week 2 of 4 weeks of Rome, and then we're going to do a couple of weeks on India and a couple of weeks on China.   I'm using this time for the kids to learn, obviously but also to figure out how to get a schedule going and figure out how to plan,  record our work and keep track of all the information/links, etc.....b/c I really have to start doing better with next year.  2nd grade can't be as laid back as this year was...we're really going to have to keep on in spite of toddlers next year.

So - Ancient Rome

Reading
Story of the World, chapters 27, 28, 34, 35, 36, 38-42
Audio book of 50 famous stories -- The Story of Regulus, Cornelia’s Jewels, Julius Caesar,  Androclus and the Lion
Julius Caesar in the book Bravo, Mr. William Shakespeare! –Williams J822.33

City – Macaulay J 711.4

Rome – Barber J945.63

Look what came from Italy – Harvey J945

The Roman Empire J937.06

The Romans J937

and other roman books from the same areas of the library.

Copywork
Rome was not built in a day.

All roads lead to Rome.

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears!
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. – Shakespeare


Geography
mapwork from SOTW activity guide
customized Italy maps
Geosafari
salt map of Italy

Other
PBS DVD's on Ancient Rome
Dover Ancient Rome coloring book
Famous Men of Ancient Rome
Build a roman road
make a timeline
make mini-books - blank templates    country templates 

new baby!

Elias Benaiah was born Friday morning!  6lbs 3 oz, 18 inches.  Such a tiny little guy!  And he had good timing - we've basically finished ancient Greece so now I can take a couple of weeks off before we get started on Rome for the summer!!  Oh, and the name Benaiah is from the Bible - he was one of David's Mighty Men and did some cool stuff - God used him to do some difficult things.  And he got to kill a lion on a snowy day, LOL. 

greek myth craft

Medusa Mask

greek myths

We are going through Ancient Greece right now....hopefully we'll get through it all before the baby is born in May.  Today the kids came up with their own idea to make stick puppets and act out the myths.   For some reason they are fascinated with the creepy stories - the Minotaur and Medusa.  Tomorrow we're making a mask of Medusa that I found.   For the puppets, Alysa drew some of her own people and towns, and then I printed off some coloring sheets - I came across several good websites.   And I also found a great kids book that tells the story of the Iliad and the Odyssey in comic-book format.  It's very well done, and kind of funny, too.  Iliad and the Odyssey

coloring page websites:
greek myths
ancient greece coloring pages
a couple of greek myth coloring sheets
great myth/gods coloring sheets

Spring has Sprung!!!

after a record breaking winter, it is SO NICE to have the windows open and get outside!    This was the kids after our trip to the library today!

2nd day of our new schedule went fairly smoothly again.  I went down and dug out some toys that have been packed away.  I'm going to make a list of what I'm using for Baelin during his 'Blanket Time'.....today he actually stayed occupied for 10 minutes at a time, so that was nice.  This will be a handy list for me to look at so I don't have to think about what to plan for him.

Duplos
Wooden Blocks
Coloring Book
Stickers
Counting Bears
2 felt sets - Thomas and Counting
Busy Bugs
Lacing boards
Flashcards


And for the kids independent schoolwork that isn't 'work' while 2 yo is in Blanket Time:

Geosafari
Math Bingo
Money Flashcards
Culture Flashcards
Boggle Jr
Phonics Flashcards
State worksheets/mini books
Electronic Globe
Nutrition cards
State cards
various worksheets

Trying out a new schedule

We've been limping along for awhile and I've been thinking and praying and reading lots of info, trying to figure out how I want our days to look and what I want to get accomplished.  We have a 2 year old who throws tantrums and is getting out of control, sporadic school stuff getting done with the 7 and 5 yo and they need to improve their concentration and attention span, and I've got to find more ways of doing some subjects with the 7 yo.

Before, we did math right after breakfast.  But that wasn't working b/c the 2 yo was wanting to play and color at the same time, but was making messes while I was trying to stand over the kids and teach them their workbook pages and read the directions to them, and all of us were getting terribly frustrated.  7 yo dd is already hating math, and that has to stop.

So I've come up with a loose schedule that I think will work better.   We already had the first part of the morning worked out.  We just got a clock for the boy's room, and they are not allowed to come out until 8:30.  I usually try to get up at 7/7:30 when dh gets up or leaves.  The boys wake up at 8, so for a half hour I'm usually training the 2 yo to stay in his room.   Eventually he'll get it.  So the kids get up at 8:30, come out and watch PBS and eat at 9, and get dressed, then watch a little more PBS afterwards.

Then today we started Circle Time at 10.   A much much more pleasant way to start the day than with frustrations over math and the 2 yo getting in the way.  Of course, it's only been one day - math started out fine, at the beginning


If you do a google site search of HSB a lot of posts come up talking about Circle Time.  Most of them come from the wonderfully helpful and encouraging blog Preschoolers and Peace

Circle Time is for all 3 kids - this will help teach both boys they need to sit still for something.  And, I want the 2 yo included when it's possible.  The baby sat and ate while we did this.  We sang Jesus Loves Me - the 2yo just says Jesus over and over - so cute!  Then we sang a song from one of their Seeds cd.  We just have a demo cd with 5 songs on it but I love it.  It's just verses set to music, but it's a good beat, and not cheesy or annoying at all.  It seems like a good way to memorize verses.

Then we prayed, and did some obedience training.  That sounds so awful, like I'm training dogs, LOL.   They got out some train pieces and I had them all practice saying 'yes, mommy' when I told them to put them away.  They each did that a couple of times.  Then I read a few poems out of the Child's Book of Verses by Stevenson, and then we learned about another state for their lapbooks that they've been working on.  We started it a couple of months ago and we're only on state 3
Hopefully this will help us get through them a little quicker.  Eventually I'd like to have them start memorizing different things from the Bible as part of it, as well.   Circle Time today took 15 minutes, and everyone pretty much sat and obeyed and participated in it all.   Tremendous victory here!!

Then the older two went into the other room to do various independent schoolwork that really doesn't seem like work to them.  I'm trying to stay out of the 'sit at the table and do workbooks for 3 hours' mentality......b/c I don't like that, that's not really in line with my educational style or goals - but it's amazing how that's instantly the first thing I think of when I picture us doing school, b/c that's what 'school' is.  I need to think of it more as educating and learning instead of 'schooling'.

So they sat and played Boggle Jr, did a couple of phonics worksheets on sight words, did their mini-books on New Jersey for the lapbook, did some money flashcards, and did a couple rounds of 'name the states' on an electronic globe we have.  While they were doing that, I was doing 'Mat Time' with Baelin, the 2 yo.

This is going to be a ton of fun to train him in   I laid out a blanket that they don't use anymore, so it will be the special time blanket, and the goal is for him to be able to stay on the blanket, doing various activities, playing quietly by himself.   And then I will move to adding some non-blankety activities that he can play by himself with.  I would like to get him to at least 30 min, if not an hour.  There are a few different sites I ran across talking about ways to get toddlers to sit still and keep them occupied.   The main things kept saying have different activities that you only pull out during school time, so they are special, and then rotate them every 10-15 minutes, before they lose interest.  HA!   Well for our first day it didn't go too badly.  He was able to last on the blanket for about 20 minutes, with me right there with him the whole time.   He played with the plastic set of 3 bears for about 3 minutes.   Then we played with some cards for another 5 minutes.   Then we colored for 10 minutes, and then he was done.  I have some preschool toys in the basement that I need to bring up and let him play with.

So that got us to about 11:00.....only one hour in and we had accomplished a lot more than we normally do, and the kids weren't fighting and I wasn't yelling or crying

Baelin went and played in his room for a while by himself, and the kids worked on sorting out their nutrition flashcards between foods containing carbs and protein.   Then all 3 of them went outside for a nice long energy break.  I am SO GLAD spring is finally here. 

The afternoon plan is lunch, and then a nap for Baelin, and then more intensive schoolwork with Alysa and Aiden, so I can give them the 1 on 1 they need - we'll do their math workbooks, a couple lessons out of 100 easy lessons, and then some nutrition stuff.   Then they will lay down and rest and we'll listen to a book or story read aloud off the computer.  That should get us to about 2 or 3:00, about the time Baelin will get up .  I'm so excited that we might actually have found a way to educate in a calmer way.......and right about the time the schedule really gets flowing and Baelin starts learning to stop throwing tantrums and obeying, I'll have the baby and it will all go to pieces

Nutrition Science Experiment

We did our first science experiment today.  This is from Janice VanCleave's Biology for Every Kid    (and while I was looking for the link to this book, I saw that she also has a  JVC Food and Nutrition for Every Kid  that looks cool and I bet would be useful for this study). 


Hmmm......well this will be interesting.   I was just rereading the experiment and it says to use an uncooked chicken bone - we used cooked ones.  I don't think it will make a difference, but we'll see.

So you take a chicken bone (apparently uncooked), and wash it and get all the meat off it and let it dry overnight.   Put the bone in a jar and cover it with white vinegar.  Put a lid on it and wait 7 days.  As time passes, the bone will become soft - starting at the edges and working towards the middle.  You can take it out every couple of days and feel how it's changing.   At the end of the 7 days, it should be a soft, rubbery bone that can be twisted.

Minerals in the bone cause it to be strong and rigid.  The vinegar removes the minerals, which makes it soft. 



If you make homemade chicken broth (way preferable to store bought broth b/c of lower sodium and much much much higher nutrition contents), you will want to add a cup or so of vinegar to the broth while it cooks.   This helps leach the minerals out of the bones and into your broth.  And no, you can't taste the vinegar.   This is why I think using cooked bones for the experiment will probably be fine - I always use cooked bones in my broth.  Homemade broth is also why 'Chicken Noodle Soup' is supposed to help you get over a cold - real, homemade soup with homemade broth actually will!   "Stock contains minerals in a form the body can absorb easily—not just calcium but also magnesium, phosphorus, silicon, sulphur and trace minerals. It contains the broken down material from cartilage and tendons--stuff like chondroitin sulphates and glucosamine, now sold as expensive supplements for arthritis and joint pain."    Here's a great article on homemade bone broths - Broth is Beautiful

Nutrition unit study

One of the things I really want our family to know is good nutrition information.  Eating and being healthy is very very important to Dh and I.  Two fantastic books on food and eating are - In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto   and The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals  both by Michael Pollan.  They will change the way you look at food and the way you eat.    Our family has been making the transition over to REAL FOOD and it's been fun.   A slight challenge to do it  on a budget - 4 small kids eat way more than I would have thought          and with a small freezer to not really store much food, makes it tricky.  But, we are feeling so much better, and now when we do eat junk food, it makes us sick.  I found a local farm that sells grass-fed meat, and I'm so excited to hopefully start buying some next month.  We just got a Sam's Membership (free through dh's work) and I went and did a month's worth of shopping there, so now I have to wait for grocery money again for meat, LOL.    I was amazed at how much stuff we eat that Sam's has.   They have a lot of nuts, frozen veggies and cheese and some produce that was a lot cheaper than a regular store.  That and diapers really will save us a lot of money.       

So we've quit eating virtually anything with High-Fructose Corn Syrup in it, and we've cut out a lot of artificial flavorings and colors, msg, soy additives.....no more canned soups, boxed meals, cereal.......I do buy some things like ketchup and mayo and mustard that I'm not picky about - if it's an ingredient that we truly do eat in moderation, then that's fine.   But if you're getting it in every little thing of food you eat, then it's not moderation anymore.   Everyone says eating healthy is a lot more expensive, but I'm finding that now that I've been doing it for a few months and am getting a decent list of foods and recipes, it's not too bad.  It just takes a lot of time and effort.  Which is getting harder to do being nearly 8 months pregnant 


oh and another excellent book on vitamins and minerals and learning how they work and interact and what foods they're in, what deficiencies are caused by a lack of them, etc...is Encyclopedia of Nutritional Supplements and a great website with lots of food and nutrients info is www.whfoods.org


So anyway, since talking about all of this and explaining to the kids why I don't buy yogurt from the store and why we make our own, why we only buy certain breads, why we don't eat hot dogs or boxed macaroni and cheese anymore (altho I found out that they will eat homemade mac 'n cheese if I use Velveeta - so that is their one big splurge meal - they love the cheese so much they don't even notice the whole wheat noodles Maybe that makes up for the truckload of chemicals in the 'cheese loaf'  ) has been such normal part of our life, and the kids are really interested in it, I figured we'll spend some time actually learning about nutrition in depth.    Maybe this will help break up the monotony of reading, writing, and math, that we've found ourselves in.    I've just started looking stuff up, so I'll probably be adding a lot more links and updating this over the next couple of weeks. 

I found a great book at the library that I'm using as our jumping off point.  Good Enough to Eat: A Kid's Guide to Food and Nutrition    It actually gets into nutrients and what they are and what they do and where they can be found, and it's more than just 'follow the FDA pyramid', but yet it's not too deep so as to overwhelm the kids or give them too many little details.



Here are a few links I've found so far.  I also found a few experiments from Janice Van Cleave's Biology book, that I'll type up when we do them.  I also have this Nutrition Pocket Chart Card Set  that the kids have been using to help classify foods by food group, what foods contain protein, what contains carbs, etc.  The only thing I don't like, and I think is fairly typical for most food/nutrition school things - is that it just has a bowl of rice for rice.  And one kind of bread, etc.   So I have to keep saying 'some of this food is bad for you, but some of it can be made good - brown rice instead of white, if you make your own muffins you can put good stuff in and not have chemicals in it, etc...'     It would be so nice if I could find a truly healthy nutritional learning supplements or curriculum or something.  Oh well.


hands-on digestion
Nutrition/Food Pyramid Ideas compilation
food and nutrition lesson plans
plan a meal

kids health - protein
WHFoods - protein
great clipart site
DIGESTIVE SYSTEM LESSON
Digestive System Resources

what we've been up to

It feels so good to be getting school stuff accomplished for once   It has been such a tiring year.  I already know we're going to be going through July or August.  But that's ok.  Learning happens all the time, right?  7 yo dd is in 1st, 5 yo ds is in K, and then 2 yo ds is a busy busy busy boy, and 1 yo dd is getting to be a cute stinker    And I'm due with #5 (should be the final one!) in 2 months.  So I've been sufficiently tired with being pregnant and chasing after the 2 little ones.  But the biggest problem was 2 yo ds who I couldn't leave alone for even 30 seconds for months.  I'd be drinking my coffee at the computer in the morning, and go to the bathroom, and come back and he'd have dumped it all over   Fun stuff like that.  So that made school very difficult. 

So I dropped history and science for the time being, realizing I was just way overwhelmed and burning out in October, LOL!  That was really disappointing b/c I really really like the WTM adaptated plan we've come up with, but I'm realizing that if dd doesn't learn about every little bit of ancient history in 1st grade, it's not the end of the world

So, for the past couple of months we've been concentrating on reading, writing, and math.  And, now that ds is 2, he's become much more of a boy and not so much of a toddler, so I can finally leave him alone to play and he doesn't destroy everything.  And he'll sit and color now, and play in his room by himself, or just sit and watch a movie.  So that's a relief.

We are using Teach Your Child to Read in 100 easy lessons, and that has been working fairly well.   DD is taking longer to get it than ds is - ds 5  is just flying through it.   So I stopped and worked on phonics with dd using flash cards and working on trouble words, and that has really helped her, so they are still both on the same lessons, which helps.     They are not terribly fond of doing reading lessons, so I came up with an incentive for them, since apparently learning to read isn't a big enough one :P  We have a nice set of fake money, and for every lesson they do with a good attitude, do without crying, and finish in a reasonable amount of time, they get 15 cents - a nickel for each one.    And then every 10 lessons, they can take their money to my 'store' and buy things - sticker books, coloring books, etc.....cheap stuff I've gotten from Dover.      And when they hit 100 lessons, they get to rent a movie and have ice cream sundaes - a HUGE treat since we rarely eat ice cream.    So that has really motivated them to do their lessons without whining and arguing.

Math was hit and miss and I realized that she really needs a consistent program to follow, especially to get the basics down really solid. I really don't like following a set curriculum, but I did get some workbooks for them for Math.   I got the Alpha Omega Horizon workbooks, and that has been amazing.   They sit down right after breakfast and do math for a half hour.  They've only been doing it for a couple of weeks, but there has been so much improvement in dd, especially.  She is finally really understanding all the stuff she's been trying to learn for a couple months.  I never thought I'd find so much satisfaction in seeing a child learn to count by 2's and 5's

I'm finding that I'm able to slowly build a bigger schedule with the kids now that I got a short schedule to work.  After breakfast, they do math for a half hour, and then dd usually does writing while ds takes a break.  And then we do a reading lesson or work on phonics flashcards, and the kids play a few different games, do Geosafari, and play with flashcards for awhile while I clean up, rest, and take care of the baby.  Then we eat lunch and after lunch the two younger ones take a nap, and the kids do a Bible coloring page - this week we're doing Easter stuff, but I'm going to start doing a chapter of Proverbs a day with them and picking out one verse to talk about.   Then, for their rest time, they 'll sit down and listen to audiobooks.  I've found two awesome sites that I love.    I hate reading out loud and I kept trying to make myself do it, but usually we'd just end up not doing it at all, and I was getting so discouraged that the kids weren't listening to good literature like I want them to.   So I found these and realized it's ok if I don't do the reading.  That has been such a nice relief.  These are just fantastic sites. 

Librivox
Lit2Go

So that's what we've been doing the last few months.   Now that we're doing more, I'm hoping to get more science and history in this spring and summer.  I think we'll start reading through Story of the World, even if we don't do all the activities like we were doing. 

another Easter/Holy Week game

This one I think is going to be a lot of fun.  This game is about all the events of Easter.  The goal is for the kids to understand the timeline of events, and have visual aids to help them really grasp everything.  I made the spaces on the board bigger - probably too big - so I used 6 pieces of paper that I trimmed down for the base.   Like the previous game, I printed out all the spaces, cut them out and glued them to paper and copied them onto cardstock.    I used the trivia cards from this game - trivia questions and I edited out the ones I didn't want to use.  I also used scripture cards from another website.
 scripture cards

and then I also made up some 'Who is this person' cards.  Who is this person

I printed them all out and copied them onto cardstock.   

I went around my house and gathered up a bunch of little items that go with the Easter story.  You could just print out the game cards and cut out the images and glue them to the game board, too.   Or get a set of Resurrection Eggs and use the items in there.  But those cost $$, LOL.  I try to do things cheap.  At least until the toner on my copy machine wears out   

All of these pdf's should work.  If not, let me know.  I'm all excited I figured out how to save a file as a pdf.    So, you have 3 pages of space cards for the board, 1 page of little pieces, and then the game card.

page1.pdf
page2.pdf
page3.pdf
littlepieces.pdf
gamecard.pdf


The object of the game is to move around the board and 'collect' all 12 pieces of the Easter story.  You start on Palm Sunday, and move around the board to get to all the items.  You have to turn down the little spaces and on the last spot, you answer a trivia question.  If you get it right, you can cross off that item off your list.  Then backtrack and continue moving around the board.  You can keep going around the board until you collect all your items.  For the various types of trivia questions, I only used a couple different images for the large background spaces.   So if you land on a cross image, you have to answer a trivia question.  If you land on a last supper image, you'll answer a 'who is this person' card, and if you land on a crown of thorns image, you'll answer a scripture card.   And all other spaces don't have questions.  If you get the question right, you get to go again.  The kids really like it.  I think having the visual aids really help them to remember both the events, and the sequence of events for Holy Week.    Eventually I would like to get little charms or something to make several sets of items, so they can physically collect all the pieces. 

The items are:
a vial of perfume for when Jesus is anointed
a plastic coin for the 30 pieces of silver
bread and wine buttons for the last supper - they have to answer 2 questions to cross them off
rope for Judas hanging himself
GI Joe for the soldiers mocking Jesus
cross, for crucifixion
dice for casting lots
sword for piercing Jesus' side
linen and a stone for the tomb and burial cloth - again, 2 questions to answer
a vial of spices for the women going to anoint his body

Easter/Holy Week file folder game

Here is one easter game I made. 

I used the trivia questions from this game - holy week game questions
I copied them onto blue cardstock so they'd be sturdier.  I did take out some of the questions that I felt were too detailed or were redundant.  I think I ended up with 40 some questions.

I also created the Holy Week day cards, to be collected in the game.   I figured out how to turn it into a PDF - let's see if I can figure out how to host it    If these PDF's don't work for some reason, let me know - they work fine for me, but that might not mean much   I copied these onto white cardstock.

day1-4.pdf
day4-8.pdf
gameboard.pdf

To make the gameboard - I cut out the gameboard squares and glued them down in the order I wanted them.  I spread out the days of the week and the gain a day/lose a day pieces.  I copied a map of Jerusalem in Jesus' time out of my Bible, enlarged it, and cut that out and glued it onto the board.  Then I copied the whole thing onto 2 pieces cardstock.  (I have had so much fun since we bought a copy machine )  And then taped them together.  Eventually I'll probably laminate it or cover it with contact paper or something.     You could skip all the copying and glue the pieces right into a file folder, if you wanted.

The object of the game is to collect all 8 days of Holy Week.  You start on Palm Sunday - roll the die and move.  If you land on a day of the week, you get a trivia question.  If you get it right, you get that day of the week.  Sometimes you end up circling the board a lot, but it moves pretty quickly.   We did have a rule where you could move in either direction, and that helped, but then realized we were all avoiding the lose a day/lose a turn spots and always landing on the gain a day spot.  Not exactly what I was going for, LOL.