Sunday, January 18, 2009

David takes Saul's jug and spear craft

We're working our way through the book of Samuel in our elementary age Sunday School class. Today's craft, to go with the story about David sparing Saul's life, went well, so I wanted to share it. See earlier posts for Samuel's calling and Abigail.

"Stained glass" jug with spear
Here's what you need.
  • Wax paper
  • Crayons
  • Cheese grater or manual pencil sharpener
  • Small ziploc bags
  • Black sharpie marker
  • Coloring sheet with jug picture (I found a good one here, but I omitted the handle to make cutting easier)
  • Coloring page with spear picture (I made one using this image.)
  • Scissors
  • Glue
  • Iron
  • Ironing board
  • Newspaper

Do ahead:
Grate or sharpen crayons, saving shavings in individual bags, sorted by color. 3-5 bright colors should be plenty. With black marker, trace the jug on the right half of a piece of wax paper, making one for each child.
In class:
Cover tables with newspaper to prevent scatter. Give each child a piece of wax paper and have them sprinkle crayon shavings onto the jug drawing. Use sparingly, a little goes a long way. Fold wax paper in half, sandwiching shavings between the layers.
Heat iron to medium. Have kids bring their jug one at a time to the ironing board (also covered in newspaper) and place on surface. cover with another piece of newspaper and have an adult iron briefly. Crayons will melt and colors will spread, making a glazed-looking effect on the paper jug. Remove wax paper and let cool, then have the kids cut out their jug. They can then color and cut out their spear and glue it on.
This is adaptable for any story involving a pot or jar, such as Rebekah watering Isaac's camels or the woman at the well.

Thursday, January 15, 2009

Sausage and white bean soup

A hearty bean soup for winter. I recently made this with the vegetable stock and the sausage cooked separately when taking a meal to a family of mixed vegetarian/omnivores.
  • 1.5 pounds dried navy beans
  • 1.5 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1.5 pounds smoked sausage
  • 1 large onion, chopped
  • 3 stalks celery, chopped
  • 1.5 tablespoons minced garlic
  • 12 cups vegetable or chicken stock
  • 5 cups water
  • 3 bay leaves
  • 1 teaspoon thyme
  • 1 tablespoon salt
  • 1 tablespoon black pepper
  • 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Soak beans overnight. Cook and slice sausage, set aside.  In bottom of soup pot, heat oil, then saute onion, celery and garlic.  Add beans, stock, water, salt and spices.  Bring to boil, cover partially, reduce heat and simmer 3 hours. Mash about half the beans with potato masher. Add sausage and heat through.  Top with shredded cheese, if desired and serve with bread.

Sunday, January 11, 2009

Abigail and David craft

Then Abigail made haste and took two hundred loaves of bread, two skins of wine, five sheep already dressed, five seahs of roasted grain, one hundred clusters of raisins and two hundred cakes of figs and loaded them on donkeys.  I Samuel 25:18. I've discovered during all my years of teaching Sunday School that kids like almost any activity involving food. Today they had the chance to pack up their own donkey, Abigail style.  You need, for each child:
  • 1 coloring book picture of a donkey (I found a great Abigail one here.)
  • 1 piece of cardboard or posterboard, cut slightly larger than picture
  • glue
  • sandwich-size baggie with twist tie
  • hole punch or scissors
  • beef jerky (represents the sheep meat)
  • puffed wheat cereal (I used plain, kids would probably like Honey Smacks style better)
  • rolls or bagels
  • raisins
  • fig newtons
  • crayons or markers
  • masking tape
Trim the picture and glue it to posterboard. With hole punch or scissors, cut a small hole at the top of the donkey's back, where the saddlebag would go.
Cut bread, jerky and fig newtons into small pieces. Have the kids fill the baggie with an assortment of the foods, making a total volume about egg-sized. Close the bag with the twist tie, then stuff the end through the hole in the cardboard so that the food hangs where the donkey's saddlebag should be. Secure on the back with masking tape. Kids can color the picture, take it home and eat the bagged food later as a trail-mix style snack. I also roasted a couple of lamb shanks and took them in so the kids could taste real sheep meat, and served grape juice in a bota bag canteen ($6 at Wal-mart).