Candlemas and Groundhog Day.

I had created a special Candlmas/Groundhog day themed circle and story for Playgarden on Monday, but sadly it was cancelled due to a severe ice storm.  The next day was 72 degrees and we are expecting snow tonight!  It has been such a strange week for weather I really have no idea what the groundhog will see on Saturday.

Me and the littles have been doing our special Candlemas and Groundhog Circle all week, I took ideas from our Earth Schooling curriculum and from some really great sources on the web such as, Seasons of Joy  and The Mystical Kingdom to come up with some fun content for our circle and I made up a little story  to tell.

Once, upon a time brother and sister woke up one morning and they could feel excitement in the air.  They knew it was a special day but they did not yet know why.  They went into the woods to ask their woodland friends.  First they came to Bee's hive, and Bee was busy at working buzzing around.  They asked,"Bee why so busy today?"  Bee replied,  "Today is Candlemas!  I must make sure that I have plenty of wax to share, so that everyone has candles this year."

  Oh okay the children thought, that explains why Bee is busy but what is going on with all of our other friends?  They spotted Gnome, and went to inquire, "Gnome, what is going on today?  Why is everyone so excited?"  Gnome said, "Oh well today is Groundhog day, we must go see Groundhog to see if Winter shall be done."  "Oh the children replied, "Can we come with you to see Groundhog too?'.

 Gnome and the Children continued into the woods, where they ran into their friend Bear, "Hello Bear.  What are you doing out of your cave today?"  Bear replied "I am off to see Groundhog so I shall know when to wake up from my long Winter's nap."  "We are going to see Groundhog too, you should follow us."  I sing "Follow, follow follow, follow me." while the bear, the gnome, and the children make their way to the clearing to find Groundhog. 

 Once everyone has arrived Groundhog pops out of his mound and says, 

"If Candlemas Day be fair and bright,

Winter will have another fight.

If Candlemas Day brings cloud and rain,

Winter won't come again"

(taken from a verse found on The Mystical Kingdom's blog)

We have done a few different scenarios with the weather, the children's favorite is the snow, I give them a basket of wool roving to drop over our story as we sing, 

"Dance Like Snowflakes, Dance Like Snowflakes, 

Whirling Twirling Snowflakes, Whirling Twirling Snowflakes, 

Everywhere, Everywhere."

(our version of a song, in Little Acorn Learning's January 5 day guide)

A special Thank you to The Wool Food Mama for gifting us with this sweet little Groundhog as she was working out some prototypes and was not yet pleased with this little fellow.  We love him very much here and have been enjoying out stories with him.

We will do our Special Candlemas Circle with our Playgarden children on Monday and we are going to make little acorn cap candles for everyone to take home.  So it has been nice to have a week to practice the circle with my own children and to really let them "breath into the story".

We also have a Candlemas breakfast we will be attending with friends that I am really looking forward too,  the hostess is a Waldorf grades teacher and she has prepared a puppet play for us and we will be dipping beeswax candles and then that evening our homeschool group is doing a spiralwalk that we hope to attend but it is right at "Pumpkin Time" I will have to see if it is just too much festivity for the littles in one day.

Also don't forget to enter the Gnome Giveaway, tomorrow is the last day and our winner will be announced on Candlemas Day.  

Circle Time

We have really been enjoying our circle times, the little ones have even started asking to do it again during the day.  We currently do ours after breakfast.  We keep it pretty short  as to keep two toddlers' attention,  We begin every circle, all year long, with:

 Good Morning Dear Earth, 

Good Morning Dear Sun,

Good Morning to the Trees,

And the Flowers Everyone.

Good Morning Dear Beast,

and the Birds in the Trees,

Good Morning to You,

and Good Morning to Me.

Then we change up our body with one song, one verse and one finger play weekly.  I use Little Acorn Learning's Monthly guides.  Last week's had a sheep theme, so we sang Mary Had a Little Lamb. then recited Ba Ba Black Sheep, then did a little finger play from Little Acorn Learning's January guide about sheep.

We end with this sweet little verse again not switching it out all year:

RUFTY AND TUFTY

Rufty and Tufty were two little elves
Who lived in a hollow oak tree
They did all the cooking and cleaning themselves
And often asked friends in to tea.

Rufty wore blue, and Tufty wore red,
And each had a hat with a feather,
Their best Sunday shoes they kept under the bed -
They were made of magic green leather.

Rufty was clever and kept the accounts,
But Tufty preferred to do cooking.
He could make a fine cake without weighing amounts -
And eat it when no one was looking!

Isabell Hempseed

Then we either go on a little walk or set up a walk in our living room, by draping a green silk over the table to be a bush to climb under, laying a blue silk on the floor as a stream to jump over or something fun like "Jack be Nimble, Jack be Quick" by making a pile of red orange and yellow silks to be the flame of the candle stick.  

Oh and here is a little pocket I made for our weather gnomes to keep by the front door so the children can check the weather and choose the correct gnome for the day to be placed on our nature table.  We are still working on learning the correct symbols.  I think I will needle felt something onto the pocket as soon as I think of a design.