Donut Dates to Krispy Kreme

Friday’s Grand Connection Fun
by Mary May Larmoyeux

A fun thing that Pops and I have done with all of our grands is to take them on a “donut date”—right to the donut factory itself—Krispy Kreme.

There’s a Krispy Kreme not too far from where we live. I think the grandkids and I enjoy watching the donuts being made even more than eating them. Well … almost.

What could be better than a piping hot glazed donut—especially one with all of the calories removed? Of course, there are not just plain donuts at Krispy Kreme. There’s a counter-display filled with donuts of different sizes and shapes—chocolate covered with sprinkles, strawberry filled, cinnamon apple, ...

On a recent trip to Krispy Kreme, did our grands just want glazed donuts? No, they wanted pumpkin donuts. Guess what? They got pumpkin donuts.

Pops and I bring the camera when we take grands on donut dates. We’ve snapped some great pictures and captured some great memories.

Perhaps one day, when Pops and I are no longer on this earth, our grands will be eating donuts with their kids and they’ll say, “I remember when our grandparents took us to the donut shop.” And later they might even take out a tattered scrapbook and point to an old picture—a picture of Pops and me enjoying a Saturday morning with our legacy at Krispy Kreme.

Is it time for you to take your grands on a donut date?

If they live out of town, you could send them a gift card to a donut store and ask the kids' parents to e-mail you a picture of the grands eating donuts. You might respond by e-mailing your own memories of your "donut days."

He is able,
Mary
www.marymaywrites.com
http://grandconnection.blogspot.com

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© 2008 by Mary May Larmoyeux.
Photo © 2008 by Mary May Larmoyeux.

Alphabet and Story Fun

Friday’s Grand Connection Fun
by Mary May Larmoyeux

Would you like to encourage your grandchildren to stretch their imaginations and increase their writing "muscles"?

I was looking at some online articles and read one by Doris Schuchard in the Home Education Magazine that had some great ideas. If you’d like to provide hours of fun for the grands with newspapers and magazines, read on.

Doris suggested:

ABCs—Give each child a page from a newspaper or magazine. Assign them an alphabet letter and see how many words they can circle starting with that letter within a minute. Variation: Can he find a word for each letter of the alphabet?

Pops and I can use this idea with our grands who are just 3 and 4. Although they really don’t know how to spell, they could circle individual letters or highlight each letter of the alphabet.

End It – Give your child a short newspaper or magazine story, but cut off the ending. Have her write her own ending and then compare it to the real one. Variations: Give her endings from three different stories; can she choose the correct one? 2. Match headlines with the correct stories.

Although our small grandkids won’t be able to write endings to articles and stories, Pops or I could read them an article about something that would interest them (such as a story about an animal) and let them tell us the ending.

Older grands could stretch their imaginations as they write their own endings to various articles. It might even be fun to ask several grands to write the ending to the same article. Perhaps they could read them to one another if they all live nearby. Maybe long-distance grands could read them over the phone on a group call, or e-mail them to one another.

I don’t know about you, but I need to get a few newspapers and magazines out of the recycling bin—for the grandkids.

Have a great weekend,
Mary
http://www.marymaywrites.com/
http://grandconnection.blogspot.com/

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© 2008 by Mary May Larmoyeux. All rights reserved.
Photo © Stanko Mravljak | Dreastime.com

Friday's Grand Connection Fun
by Mary May Larmoyeux

A cold front moved through Arkansas last night and fall is in the air! So today, I thought we'd visit some websites that have printable fall coloring pages, words searches, mazes, and more.

The websites below have coloring pages and mazes that are perfect for the younger crowd (I printed off some for Pops' and my grandkids):

BOZ

Kaboose

Homeschool Helper

Here are a couple of mazes:

Pumpkin Maze

Spider Maze

And we may want to bookmark the following website with its array of puzzles for ages 3 - 12:

Puzzles4Kids

For those of us with out-of-town grands, we could print off some coloring sheets or puzzles and send them by e-mail or snail mail. Or, we could just forward this blog post to their parents.

Have fun,
Mary
http://www.marymaywrites.com/
http://grandconnection.blogspot.com/

P.S. If you live in the Little Rock area, you may want to check out the Pinnacle Mountain Rendezvous and Fall Festival this weekend (October 17-18).

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© 2009 by Mary May Larmoyeux. All rights reserved.

Sharing Family Stories

Tuesday's Grand Connection Thought
by Mary May Larmoyeux

As a friend and I ate lunch together, we talked about passing down family stories. She referred to a passage in Psalms 78 that tells about the importance of sharing spiritual stories.

Psalm 78:4 (NIV) says: “We will tell the next generation the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, his power, and the wonders he has done.”

The Bible paraphrase The Message says it this way (verses 1-4): “ … I'll let you in on the sweet old truths, stories we heard from our fathers, counsel we learned at our mother's knee. We're not keeping this to ourselves, we're passing it along to the next generation—God's fame and fortune, the marvelous things he has done.”

It is up to us to pass on family stories—especially ones about God intervening in our lives and homes. We can share these stories with the grands while washing dishes together, taking a relaxing walk, or going on a drive. We can record our stories and burn them on CDs, or write them down in notebooks. We can even do something really simple—jot them down in our Bibles.

For years I've written down things I want to remember in my Bible—births, weddings, deaths. Memories such as,“God protected Chris from a terrible wreck when he did a 360 degree turn on a wet freeway and ended up in a ditch,” “God protected Jim when a car burst into flames 3-4 feet from a propane tank by his office,” “God protected John and Bre when they had a gas leak in their house,” and on, and on, and on.

As I’ve once again read the countless ways God has protected and led our family, I’m reminded that He can be trusted for the future.

I have to agree with the Psalmist, “He has done marvelous things!” Things that I want to remember. Things I want my grandchildren to remember.

What are some things that you hope your grandchildren will remember?

Have a great week,
Mary
http://www.marymaywrites.com/
http://grandconnection.blogspot.com/

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© 2008 by Mary May Larmoyeux. All rights reserved.

Family Guess Who?

Friday's Grand Connection Fun
by Mary May Larmoyeux

If you've been visiting The Grand Connection for a while, you probably know that I love the magazine Family Fun; it's filled with so many great ideas!
This month's issue is no exception; it has a creative tip that Rebecca Beachy shared. Since Rebecca does not live near her family, she has turned an old Guess Who? game a into a Family Guess Who? game.

In the original Guess Who? game, the board is made of cards that flip up to reveal the faces of different people. The object is to "guess" the identity of an opponent's "Mystery Person." Players ask questions to deduce the identity.

For example, if Susie asks Billy, "Does your person have glasses?" and his answer is "No," then Susie would turn down all of the cards of people wearing glasses. As you can tell, this is a really easy game and Pops' and my grandkids love it. The manufacturer recommends Guess Who? for ages 6-12, but two of my grandkids taught me how to play when they were just 3 and 5.

For Rebecca's Family Guess Who? game, she cropped and printed pictures of grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, ... and taped them over the pictures that came with the game. Isn't that creative?

I did something similar to this once and printed off two duplicate stacks of photos of relatives. Then I laminated the pictures and mailed them to long-distance grands, explaining that it was a matching game. On the back of each photo I shared not only the name, but also something about the relative shown.
Hope that you have a great weekend! I may try to make a few garage sales and see if there are any old Guess Who? games out their just begging to be turned into Family Guess Who?

One final note ... the October, November, December issue of Encouraging Women with Hearts for Their Homes is now online. You may want to check it out.

Have a great weekend,
Mary
http://www.marymaywrites.com/
http://grandconnection.blogspot.com/

P.S. How do you help your grands get to know relatives they seldom see?

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© 2009 by Mary May Larmoyeux. All rights reserved.