book club

How to Host Your Own ‘Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library’ Party

March 15, 2016 by Amy 2 Comments

My Big Helper has been talking about this month’s Chris Grabenstein book club event for weeks. She’s been counting down the days, then the hours, all while bouncing off the walls and carrying her invitation around with her endlessly.

We love his book

She immediately began planning how we could turn our house into the Alexandriaville Public Library and begged to have an escape game similar the one that Mr. Lemoncello hosted.

So we got to work. I designed labels for Lemonberry Fizz and created a recipe for the drink that Mr. Lemoncello loves to guzzle. I also built the Wonder Dome, decorated the house, and filled in many other book details.

I printed out an anagram game that we could use for a Super Dooper Challenge and planted clues around the house. One of these bonus clues became the prize for the challenge.

Of course, we had to eat, too. Since the main characters attended a fancy gala to celebrate the library’s opening at the beginning of the book, I opted to serve a ‘fancy’ dinner. I made two kinds of fondue and served it with sautéed chicken, steamed veggies, and bread cubes on a color-coordinated table. The girls drank their icy water out of glass goblets and giggled every time they stuck out their pinky fingers.

Dessert had to be fondue, too, since it’s such a fun way to eat – although there are several dessert options in the book. My Big Helper loved the fruit platters and chocolate fondue; judging from the amount of chocolate on the other faces I saw, they liked it, too.

Throughout the course of the event, we played as many Lemoncello games as I could create. I made Indoor-Outdoor Scavenger Hunt cards, and the kids raced around the neighborhood to collect their items first. I created a label for Mr. Lemoncello’s Anagrams, and the girls raced to see who could make the most words with alphabet cookies. They also played our version of Hurry to the Top of the Heap with Lemoncello trivia.

Eventually, late that night, one team pieced together enough clues to escape the house – and they did so with lots of whooping and hollering and running around in the dark.

Their prize was to choose their parts in the next-day’s commercial. I gave them the task of creating a commercial to ‘sell’

I’ve had myriads of technical difficulties in trying to share this. Their commercial plays well on my computer – I had to video that in order to show it to you. I apologize for the issues that remain.

Of course, we ended the party with a birthday cake, and since My Big Helper’s big day is close, we sang to her.

I spent hours designing the games, creating labels, and putting the details of the party together – so I’m happy to share them with you.

You can find everything you need to print your own 68-page Lemoncello party pack here.

Happy escaping!

What are your kids reading now?

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Book Club, Boys’ Edition: “The Lemonade Crime”

February 23, 2016 by Amy 2 Comments

The boys were really excited about this month’s book pick:

I set up chairs on our carport to resemble – roughly – a courtroom. When everyone was ready, we moved outside and took our places. Our Honorable Judge called court to order, listened to the opening statements, and then swore in our first witness.

After listening to the prosecution, the defense attorney stood up and gave a rousing defense on behalf of the Third Pig. He was quite proud of himself!

After closing arguments and some debate, the jury members declared the Third Little Pig to be innocent of murder.

The mock trial was a lot of fun, and the boys are already asking to do it again.

I call that a success.

Want to put on your own mock trial? Find everything you need here and here.

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NEW! Mock Trial Materials from A Nest in the Rocks

February 16, 2016 by Amy Leave a Comment

I plan book club events months in advance.

That’s why I was thrown last month when the boys asked to dig into a book in a way I hadn’t planned. Worse yet, I wasn’t sure exactly how to do what they asked, and I knew that figuring it out would require a lot of time and research.

Still, who wants to say ‘no’ to a bunch of boys asking to learn more?

Research I did, and our book club event ended up being really fun. The boys all got into it, so much so that the girls’ group did a similar project.

What did they want to do?

They asked to hold a mock trial like the one in the book

Book Club, Girls’ Edition: “Stealing Magic”

January 20, 2016 by Amy 5 Comments

This week the girls took their turn at Stealing Magic, the second book in The Sixty-Eight Rooms series by Marianne Malone.

While the boys read this book last week, the girls took a very different approach to it.

After discussing the story, we moved right into painting. Jack and Ruthie traveled to Paris in 1837 during one of their visits to the Sixty-Eight Rooms, and so we focused on Parisian culture during this meeting.

Each girl brought a canvas to the party. We covered our kitchen table with a bright purple tablecloth and got to work. We painted Eiffel Tower backlit with a sunset. I loved listening to the girls compliment each other’s work throughout this process. They also all chose to put their own unique spin on it. Some went for heavy texture while others worked for smooth, realistic colors. Their paintings turned out great!

By the time we finished painting, everyone was hungry. We broke out the crepe supplies and mixed up a batch of Creative Crepes. Everyone chose to make two, and they all made their own. These girls have skills – they flipped wonderful, thin, round crepes!

It’s hard to top strawberries, chocolate, and whipped cream – and so that’s how we topped our crepes.

Afterwards, we headed outside since the weather was pretty warm. I showed the girls how to roll newspaper into short, medium, and long tubes, then asked them to build a kid-sized Eiffel Tower. Although they rolled lots of tubes, they ran out of time before they were able to finish. Judging from the huge amount of rolled newspaper still in my house, however, this project was a hit – and My Big Helper continues to plan new structures.

There are many opportunities for learning within the pages of Stealing Magic. We tapped only one avenue of this – there’s so much more to explore. Give Stealing Magic a try – it’s definitely worth the read.

What are your kids reading this month?

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Book Club, Boys’ Edition: “Stealing Magic”

January 13, 2016 by Amy Leave a Comment

I was really excited about this month’s book pick. I love when the kids love a particular book enough to request the next in the series, and that’s how we ended up reading Stealing Magic. The second in The Sixty-Eight Rooms series by Marianne Malone, this story continues Ruthie and Jack’s adventures in this famous museum exhibit.

We started out by summarizing and discussing the story, and this one is ripe for great discussion. We talked about heroes, idols, and what happens when those people fall off pedestals. We talked about what trustworthy means and how we can tell who is. Lastly, we talked about what the Bible has to say about the goodness of people and who He finds to be trustworthy.

Deep stuff, right?

Then we got our hands dirty. We headed to the kitchen and made crepes since one of the places Ruthie and Jack visited through the Rooms was Paris in 1837. We mixed up the crepe batter together and the boys cleaned and capped strawberries. Each kid made his own crepe and topped it with his choice of fresh strawberries, chocolate ganache, and whipped cream.

The boys made small crepes, but apparently they had big flavor – every boy had seconds (also made himself).

Sticking with the Parisian theme, I challenged the boys to build the Eiffel Tower – out of mini marshmallows and spaghetti noodles. They were pretty excited about this, and each team tackled the challenge a different way. Some tried to stay very true to the shape of the Tower, while others just attempted to build structures. It was fun to watch the excitement on the boys’ faces, and I love seeing how their spatial skills came into play with this activity.

Stealing Magic is a great book, and in the end the boys requested the third one in in the series, so we’ll be tackling that one soon. In the meantime, come back next week to find out how the girls interacted with this same book!

Book Club, Boys’ Edition: “The Map Trap”

December 8, 2015 by Amy 2 Comments

This month’s book has my son studying his atlas and planning for a cross-country trip.

Why?

We read The Map Trap by Andrew Clements. It’s about a boy who adores maps and is being blackmailed by someone after making all sorts of really creative ones.

Of course, we had to do that.

After summarizing and discussing the book at length, we dove right in – with human body maps. We talked about caricatures and the boys drew themselves with either enlarged heads or torsos. Then they filled in that space with pictures – with either the things they think about or the foods they like to eat. Although drawing is not always their favorite activity, they were excited to create a new kind of map and got busy drawing right away.

Of course, they were even more excited to go geocaching like Alton from The Map Trap.

Each boy brought six pieces of swag that represented himself. We talked about signatures and labels and they marked each piece of their swag with their mark. Then we talked about bike safety and broke up into pairs.

The boys put on their helmets and packed their swag into bags and pockets and headed outside.

Earlier that day, I hid 6 bags containing simple swag items around our neighborhood. I also made maps of the neighborhood and overlaid a grid on top. Since we did not have enough GPS units for each group, we needed another way to simulate a geocaching activity, and this was it. I gave each team of boys a set of coordinates to mimic the latitude and longitude of a regular geocache target, and then each team examined a map to figure out where that was. They headed to their specific target to search for the swag bags.

Each bag was labeled with another set of coordinates. When the boys found a bag, they swapped out their swag for the swag inside and then memorized the new coordinates. They studied the map to find the new coordinates and took off again.

The boys loved this activity! They chased down caches for two hours – until they had found every single one. They worked well together in their teams and were generous with their swag. It was a super fun book, and there are many learning activities available to accompany it.

They’re also interested in reading more of Andrew Clements’ work. We’ll definitely be trying out more of them.

What are your kids reading this month?

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Book Club, Boys’ Edition: “Nick and Tesla’s High-Voltage Danger Lab”

November 10, 2015 by Amy Leave a Comment

This month we ventured where we’ve never gone before – into the field of hard-core science. We read

Then we started building. We started out building this electromagnet. Each boy tested it to see how many big paperclips he could lift, and our top number was five.

When we started building an anti-intruder door alarm. This gadget was definitely trickier, and as science and circuits are not my thing, it took us a while to get it figured out. By the time we got it, our time was running short, and everyone was excited about our last project, so we moved on quickly – to build a rocket car.

Like the intruder alarm, the rocket car was a bit more complicated than expected. We repeated the experiment several times, modifying it each time, each with greater success than the last. (We’ve now figured out how to correct these issues before the girls’ club meets this week.)

While we didn’t get the amazing results we hoped for with the experiments, at least some of the kids went home and did research to figure out how to improve the projects. They loved

Book Club, Boys’ Edition: “George Washington’s Socks”

October 28, 2015 by Amy 2 Comments

I have been so excited about this month’s book club event, and I can’t wait to tell you all about it!

We’re studying the American Revolution right now, and so the boys read

They set up camp first. There were three dads, six book club boys, and one little brother. They pitched four tents and gathered firewood, and then we settled down to discuss the story. The boys had lots to say about who the villains were in the story. Woodruff does an excellent job of portraying the humanity of the soldiers in each army, and the boys caught that information. They chose sticks to whittle for roasting their hot dogs for dinner and went on a long hike.

They spent a lot of time at the water – throwing in sticks, rocks, and whatever else they could find. One mom rented a canoe and a kayak, and the boys took turns paddling around this part of the lake.

There was a lot of running around and yelling and playing-with-sticks and general boyish craziness, too. It all resulted in lots of fun.

I think this is one book club event that will be remembered for a very long time.

What are your kids reading right now?

Book Club, Girls’ Edition: “Toliver’s Secret”

October 23, 2015 by Amy Leave a Comment

We’re studying the Revolutionary War era right now, and so this month our girls read

After reading the story, we jumped right into it. I taught the girls a new code, and they used their books to write out their own messages. The girls got really into it and spent a long time writing out detailed messages. Then I divided two big batches of bread dough between all of the kids, and they formed their own loaves of bread around the messages, just like Ellen’s grandfather did in the story.

After the bread came out of the oven, we headed out into the yard to experience Ellen’s rough spy journey. First, we played “Keep Away” with a few loaves of bread to simulate Ellen’s fight with and subsequent flight from the bullies who stole her bread. The girls laughed really hard during this game and tried hard to hold their bread tightly – they were all so excited about eating their bread that they didn’t want to risk dirtying it!

After taking the boat across the bay, Ellen had to dodge many obstacles in her effort to deliver the secret message. We simulated that with an obstacle course and races. The girls ran through the yard, circling trees, climbing play equipment, and heading up and down hills in an effort to cross the finish line first.

Weren’t they cute?

The girls really enjoyed Toliver’s Secret. I liked the fact that they were so excited to dive into the 1770s – and they had fun learning, too.

What are your kids reading right now?

Book Club: “The Sign of the Beaver”

September 28, 2015 by Amy Leave a Comment

We kicked off our new year of book club events with a fantastic story: