It's beginning to look a lot like...

Christmas! On the last day of the term, our Home School Co-op threw a Christmas Party! We had lunch, played games, iced cookies and exchanged presents.

We played a game called, Right Left Story. Despite its unimaginative name, it was a lot of fun. Every kid was handed a present. I read a Christmas story about the Right Family, where every time I said the words "right" or "left," they were to hand their present to the person on their right or left. It was a good thing there were five mothers to keep things going smoothly or else I think some kids would have ended up with five presents while others had none. It got a little confusing to say the least, but the kids loved it. When the story finished, the kids opened the present they ended up with. I highly recommend this game.

The other part of the party that my kids loved was the present exchange. What kid wouldn't? The week before, all the kids were assigned someone for gift-giving. We, as mothers, decided that we would have a book exchange. So we went out and found books for our specific people. It was a great way to learn about new books because most people gifted ones they already knew to be good. Tank got an especially cute one titled, Animals should definitely not wear clothing. Scoochy received James and the Giant Peach, and coincidently just finished reading it tonight! I'm so proud of her, she's becoming such a great reader. Dodge's friend gave him The Adventures of Tintin: The Blue Lotus. We had never seen the Tintin series before and Dodge just ate it up. He had the entire story read by the next day. I love it when we discover things like that right before Christmas! Princess Cutie Pops was the most difficult little sweetheart at The Book Bin. In trying to find a book for her friend, she would turn up her nose at everything offered to her. "I want a princess book for Bella!" We scoured that little store, searching for anything that might possibly look princess-y. Finally, in the "mini-books" section we found this cute little hardback named, Knights are Brave. It had two or three little stories about knights but there were princesses in them. We read it through and she finally agreed. Now here's the kicker, when she opened her present from Bella, she found a book called Princesses are Pretty. The is a book from the same series as the Knights are Brave book! Bella and Princess Cutie Pops were so excited. They had "matching" books. (When I saw Princess Cutie Pops' gift, I thought Bella might be upset that she got a "boy" book. You can imagine my relief when they just rejoiced in their camaraderie!)
Here's the whole group with their books. I love it that we came home with great books instead of toys. Toys typically last a season, but good books last a lifetime. I still enjoy reading well-written children's books. You gotta love a gift that lasts longer than the ride home...