So our last name is German. Jason can speak (some) German. His first honeymoon was largely in Germany. So, you might say he's a fan of the country.
Well, one day while exploring our newest new library, we came across a book "Cooking the German Way" and an idea was born. We decided we'd surprise Daddy one day soon with a Germany Day. I told my amazing homeschooling friend Jessica and that evening she'd sent me several ideas and links. She's awesome.
First we planned our menu. Only, the German desserts aren't really our thing: lots of custards and puddings and I guess Jason's not THAT German if he's so grossed out by that. :) Even Black Forest Cake does not sound so very delicious. So, I opted for German chocolate cake. You know, at least it claims to be made with German chocolate. If Betty Crocker really goes to all that trouble.
My next issue was that I was wanting to find spaetzle. Well, wouldn't you know it but neither Walmart, Target or our local grocery store (King Soopers) carried it. On a whim I decided to check World Market and bam! it was suddenly Germany day.
So that afternoon I started the sauerbraten in the Crock Pot and the kids and I went to "work" online. We watched a little Star Wars dubbed in German. Yoda speaking German? Funny, it was. We also learned a few words and phrases. Then we listened to some German composers:
Autumn was moved.
Easton says what he does at the end because I guess the picture we saw of the dude in the baroque wig reminds him of a certain founding father.
We then moved onto doing a little conducting:
We had more plans but I was somewhat poorly prepared and the boys got a little bored of my Googling and were all, "Is it quiet time yet?" so they had quiet time and I made our cake.
Then they did some bike riding in the garage. I'm somewhat ashamed to say that it was the first time either boy had been on a bike in 2010. But...this year Dalton can reach the pedals enough to...well... PEDAL!
And Easton has totally outgrown his bike:
Well while we were in the midst of our non-German fun Jason called to say that he was on his way home (early!). He decided to leave right after his physical therapy and come straight home. We were excited but unprepared...so we had to rush to do some more of our German plans like painting flags:
(Psst, that color on the bottom of E's is the one he thought looked the most "gold".)
We were also going to have Easton practice his printing on a menu but we suddenly didn't have time for that either so I made it and E just colored in one of the flag outlines I drew for him:
We had also planned on a traditional potato dumpling but no longer had the time for those either. When Jason walked in the boys wished him a Happy Germany Day and had practiced that they'd greet him with a "Hallo, wie geht's?" but I'm not sure if they did. Maybe they got the "Hallo" out. When he walked in he saw our sad little "menu" and flags and we had Bach and Beethoven playing. He thinks we're fun. :)
So it was the sauerbraten, spaetzle, asparagus and German chocolate cake. The kids tried all of it but liked none of it. Well, Easton liked the cake.
After abendessen we moved on to a round of topfschlagen which is best explained by this:
It's a traditional German game where, you wear a blindfold and carry a spoon and bang it around the room while the rest of us shout heiß (hot--sounds like "heiss") or kalt to guide you on your way to a cooking pot hidden in the room and can tell it's the pot by the sound your spoon makes when it hits it:
Under it was supposed to be a piece of schokolade (say it outloud) but since we'd just had the cake and all we didn't do that part.
Herbst (German for "Autumn" which we called her all night) says, "Yay!"
Then we called it a night. In the bath that evening Easton was being a bit naughty and when he was hearing about the consequences he said, "But I couldn't understand you (my warning prior to the consquence) because you were speaking German!!!" However, I was speaking plain English. Nice try, das Kind. You clever thing, you.
Anyway, that was our fun day of learning about the ol' Fatherland. We have plans (secret ones) for more fun culture days coming up. And I'll try to plan a little better next time.
Auf Wiedersehen!
4 comments:
Looks like a wonderful German day. I am totally impressed with all your German :-) You also have my craving German chocolate cake now. Yummy! I can't wait to hear about your other culture days and if you need any help, you know where to find me.
That is extremely cool!!! What a great idea. I loved that it was sort of "cross-curricular" and integrated and included a game : ) Moo
Ooooh, a theme day. Fun! You and Jessica came up with some great ideas. Looks like it was a great day for ALL of you.
Oh Moo.
That is super fun. Kevin and I will copy you guys as Danna is Deutsch, too. Her last name means white horse. I think it's so hilarious that E said you were speaking German when he was being a rascal.
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