Happy New Year!

So I had absolutely no intentions of being up past 9 on New Year's Eve, but the kids begged, and I hate to keep saying "no" to things that really don't cost money or add additional animals to the house, so...

I made a quick list of New Year traditions in other countries, and after picking the kids up at Zoo Camp we went through it over lunch at McDonald's (courtesy of gift cards from big sister, so even that was free!) We discarded anything that involved breaking dishes or getting wet, made a quick run through Walmart for supplies, and we were set.

One of my traditions is to start the year with a clean(ish) house. It so happens that Sheridan's science fair project this year requires 6 floors starting off very clean at the exact same time. She helped me with those, and we called it good!

After supper everyone brought blankets to the living room and we watched "Fantastic Beasts: Crimes of Grindlewald" (one of their Christmas gifts).

It started out like this, but by the end of the movie more blankets and pillows had been added, and it was wall to wall bedding and kids. 

So, a Greek tradition is to hang onions from your door. They appear to make pretty ristras with them, but I lacked the motivation, so we just poked a hole in the mesh bag they came in.

In the morning you get to tap an onion on each child's head to wake them. How hard you tap depends on how late they made you stay up the night before.

Not being sure how late they would actually stay awake, we spread out several things you are supposed to do right at midnight. In Russia you are supposed to write a wish for the New Year on paper, burn it in a champagne glass, and then drink champagne out of it. Gross, plus small children with fire. We modified to toss our wishes into the fireplace,

then drank our Shirley Temples.

Wit hthe movie over, we moved on to our never ending game of Alamogordo-opoly.

Which I am apparently playing with Nazgul.

In Turkey, you sprinkle salt on the doorstep,

and in Japan you ring a bell 108 times. (We did it quietly inside - you are welcome, neighbors.)

In Spain you eat 12 grapes.

Not all at once, Grace!

End the year as you mean to continue the next one:

Then jump into the New Year (Denmark), landing on your right foot (Facebook memes).

They actually made it until midnight! All but Daddy, who went to bed after 10, and Logan, who went upstairs at 11:45 telling me to come get him at midnight - and who was sound asleep ten minutes later. I told the others they could sleep in the living room as long as I didn't have to come downstairs and kill anyone. They actually settled in pretty quickly!

And at 6:30 Shane bounced right out of bed (or sleeping bag) and started going a million miles an hour as usual.

Jam-filled donuts for breakfast (Germany)

and we couldn't find marzipan pigs (Austria), so we ate bacon.

Close enough!

We were supposed to communicate with the animals (Romania) yesterday, but we tried this morning instead. 

Food is their love language, I'll say it worked.

We tapped bread against the wall to drive away evil spirits (Ireland), but Sheridan was disappointed to find her little brother was still here.

In Estonia you need to eat at least 7 times New Year's Day, so then we ate the bread with honey butter (left over from Shane's cowboy party).

If I was a good Armenian mother, I would make the bread myself, kneading wishes for the new year into it.

I didn't do that.

I did join the kids on a walk around the block with an empty suitcase (Colombia).

That was actually supposed to happen yesterday, but whatever. I told the one neighbor outside that I was trying to run away, but the kids kept following.

In the Philippines you eat round foods, so we snacked on oranges.

and Sheridan made cheesy meatballs. 

Of course, in the southern US, you have to eat your black-eyed peas. I prefer mine mashed up, though, with a LOT of cheese, sour cream, and salsa! The Pioneer Woman's recipe, found here, is so yummy I make it other times as well. You can switch up the salsa type or jalapenos - sometimes I use my jalapeno jam instead, this year I used some salsa verde.

We are all making goals for the year. Some we are still working on, but two of mine are to read together more, and to teach the kids to cook more. I know people who do things like employee evaluations are fairly rabid about "measurable outcomes", but I know if I say something like "Each child will cook one dish per week throughout the year," I am setting us all up for failure and discouragement. "More?" I can do more. One time counts as more. Success! 

However you chose to celebrate, I hope 2020 is your best year so yet!

Country Study: South Korea

We got out of the swing of country studies somewhere around Chad and the holidays. Santa had plans, though! We all enjoyed trying snacks from Australia so much, he got us a subscription to Snack Crate a few months ago - but he didn't tell the kids! As the box for each country arrived, I packaged it up with books, games, and crafts from that same country, along with recipes for a full meal.

We opened the three boxes so far (South Korea, Germany and the Philippines - Australia is on its way!) on Christmas day and peeked at the contents, but we saved them then for those days when we needed a little structure. South Korea began the Thursday after Christmas, supplemented with a trip to the library and the grocery store.

This book gave us a brief history of North and South Korea (our ancient globe only shows one Korea!) and how the government and culture of each has evolved differently in the past 60-70 years:

978-1590-842065

Available used through Amazon

It is a little old (2003), but served our history needs. We talked a little bit about current events, trying to balance the line between being aware of world tensions and not scaring everyone!

This title is more recent (2012), and more accessible to our age grouping:

978-1600-146244

$22.95

If you are just looking at South Korea, this is perfect, but I did want to contrast it with North Korea and talk about how different factors can influence so many parts of our lives. 

Enough serious stuff! Let's fly kites!

Or, at least decorate some to fly when the weather changes:

You can find these from any number of online sources. We will try flying them around the Lunar New Year - but I don't think I will tell them about kite fighting!

We love cooking together, so the meals were a lot of fun. The first night, Sheridan helped me start the kimchi, then Logan helped me make mandu (pork dumplings, made here with won ton wrappers):

I have chopper that would have worked faster than scissors, but it kept him happily busy.

Just a start - we made a LOT more than this - but I was very pleased that, unlike my varenyiki, these didn't fall apart immediately!

I ended up folding the corners in like won tons, because I didn't trust them to stay together otherwise!

A little fried rice with egg strips,

and some ho bak jon (veggie pancake). I tried to make one big pancake that I could cut into wedges like my favorite restaurant, but I way overestimated both the evenness of my old pan and my flipping abilities. I'll just use a before shot as it started cooking.

Then we dug into the Snack Crate offerings. For tonight we tried the Kancho biscuits, which were little round cookies with fudgy middles. Yum! They had fun little pictures printed on the outside of each. 

We read descriptions of each, and decided to save the pushu pushu for big sister Mykela, because a) she likes raw Ramen, and b) they say they are spicy, and if even Koreans think they are spicy, we probably don't want to touch them.

I bought some plastic stones for a game called Gonggi. Think Jacks without the jacks. Or the ball. It can be played with any old stones, but after seeing how many times they bounced off of Sheridan's head, I am glad I sprang for the plastic!

It's harder than it looks! She was getting really frustrated at first - especially after I caught a couple - but so excited when she finally succeeded!

For a second meal we had tak nalgae t'wigim (a glazed chicken) over rice, and a very mild cabbage kimchi. The chicken was a hit, the kimchi: not so much.

It really wasn't THAT spicy.

Seriously, guys.

Gracie said she liked it, but Gracie likes anything she is allowed to eat.

Logan liked it!

Shane was very diplomatic (and blurry - dangit!). He pronounced it "good but spicy", and when asked if he wanted more, said "No, thank-you."

I like Korean food myself, so we are probably going to continue working in more foods even after we move on to the next country. In the meantime, friends and relatives who have spent time in Korea (and who are there now) are filling us in with all sorts of fun tidbits and photos!

Finally, a little more reading:

978-080-483-5916
$18.95

We are reading a story a day (except for Sheridan who is going ahead), looking at the artwork along with talking about what types of lessons Korean parents want to impart to their children.

Loads if fun, I think it will be a while before we move on to the next country!

Around the World - Bhutan

We got stuck on Australia for a couple weeks, partly because we got busy and partly because we were waiting for snacks to arrive! 

We finally moved over to Bhutan, though, and that was definitely a cultural switch. The family in our book is made up of 13 people living in one home. We had to draw up a family tree to get straight in our heads how everyone was related:

Most Bhutanese have two names, but there are no last, or "family" names, and children are often named by a local monk. Few names are gender specific, hence Sangay being married to Sangay!

We picked up a second book by the same authors of "What the World Eats":

and the kids were excited to recognize 'our' family on the front cover! This book gives a much clearer picture of their home. It sounds reasonable to say 13 people live in a 3 story house - until you see that the house is made of dirt, the top floor is for storing food, and the bottom floor is for the livestock. The family's prayer room is a beautiful, ornately decorated area, but the rest of the living space is bare wood.

There were so many differences in how we live, the kids were almost at a loss to decide what to write down.

While they noted on the poster that there is no fast food (as in, in the whole COUNTRY - as of when the book was written, anyway), what really has Sheridan aghast is, no bacon! Animals are only killed for food for special ceremonies, so the diet is largely vegetarian. For our "Bhutan meal", I accordingly found some red rice and chopped up some carrots and onions we had on hand.

It went over better than I expected, though! I cheated and put salt on mine when they weren't looking, but the kids all ate theirs without it.

The weekly budget for that family of 13 for beverages is 76 cents. So, if you buy a soda from the machine at the library, you have just spent two weeks' budget for drinks for a family of 13. Dwell in that for a minute.

That 76 cents is mainly for butter tea. We had to try it, of course, but with some modifications, as Walmart does not appear to sell yak butter.

1. Boil 4 cups of water and add 4-5 tea bags - the darker the better (we used Earl Grey). Let it steep for a while, then take the tea bags out and add a pinch of salt.

2. Put 1/2 cup of milk and 2T butter in a blender. Reheat the tea, and pour that in. Blend until well mixed, and drink hot.

Again, the kids liked this more than I thought they would - three of the five had seconds! After the first tastes, I let them add a spoonful of sugar. I did that with mine and found I suddenly tasted the salt, whereas I hadn't before.

Once they finished, they asked for dessert as usual, and I told them, "There is no dessert." They reminded me of the ice cream in the fridge and the cookies on the counter, and I reminded them of the weekly budget for the family - were there cookies and ice cream in there anywhere? Besides, no electricity certainly means no frozen food.  

And then they were still hungry, so I told them there was more rice. Christopher ate it all, and then, being Christopher, was still starving. We decided that while this meal was good once, we wouldn't want it every night, and that we have it pretty darn good being able to just find different things to eat until we aren't hungry any more! My pantry suddenly seems like an obscenity.

I don't pretend to think any of that sunk in and made a lasting impression that will cause my kids to stop wasting food and appreciate everything they have, but it's a start - a seed planted in their minds. I think we all respond better to tiny nudges along the way than we do to being brow beaten.

A little more reading,

and then we will be 'traveling' to Bosnia!

Around the World - Australia

So much of my time and energy goes into the summer reading program at work, my own kids sometimes get less of my attention right when they are most at loose ends. Grandma, who has them during the day, does a lot of great activities with them, but I want to have some fun, too!

Several years back, I picked this book up for the library, and liked it so much I got my own copy:

978-158-246-2462

Sitting down to a daily family meal has long been a tradition for billions of people. But in every corner of the world this age-old custom is rapidly changing. From increased trade between countries to the expansion of global food corporations like Kraft and Nestlé, current events are having a tremendous impact on our eating habits. Chances are your supermarket is stocking a variety of international foods, and American fast food chains like McDonald’s and Kentucky Fried Chicken are popping up all over the planet.

For the first time in history, more people are overfed than underfed. And while some people still have barely enough to eat, others overeat to the point of illness. To find out how mealtime is changing in real homes, authors Peter Menzel and Faith D’Aluisio visited families around the world to observe and photograph what they eat during the course of one week. They joined parents while they shopped at mega grocery stores and outdoor markets, and participated in a feast where a single goat was shared among many families. They watched moms making dinner in kitchens and over cooking fires, and they sat down to eat with twenty-five families in twenty-one countries—if you’re keeping track, that’s about 525 meals!

The foods dished up ranged from hunted seal and spit-roasted guinea pig to U.N.-rationed grains and gallons of Coca-Cola. As Peter and Faith ate and talked with families, they learned firsthand about food consumption around the world and its corresponding causes and effects. The resulting family portraits offer a fascinating glimpse into the cultural similarities and differences served on dinner plates around the globe.

This book is an absolutely FABULOUS way to gently introduce some of the differences in culture and living conditions around the world - something I have really needed to do with my kids. Our plan is to spend a week or two through the summer and fall on each country, learning what we can and trying out some of the food, crafts, music, etc.

Since the countries are in alphabetical order throughout the book, we started off with Australia. I brought home:

- an adult travel video (boring, but we got an idea of the landscape, and they recognized the Sydney Opera House from Finding Nemo!)

- two Jeff Corwin videos (MUCH more interesting, and then we went to a reptile show with The Island of Misfit Morphs, and we recognized some of the critters!)

- Crocodile Dundee (ancient, but they loved it, and since we watched it last they were calling out "boomerang!" and "didgeridoo!", so I knew they had picked something up along the way).

- lots of books! Anything on the country or its animals,

and of course you can't do Australia without a healthy dose of Mem Fox!

The Pumpkin Runner is one of my old favorites, so I was pleased when the kids started reading it over and over to each other. They even decided all on their own to act it out!

(Logan is being Yellow Dog)

Fun is absolutely the key, here - for all of us. I don't have a curriculum, we are just exploring as things sound interesting. Today when we came across the term "Down Under", we grabbed the globe and looked at where Australia is in relation to the equator, which led to talking about hemispheres, poles, climates, etc.

What the World Eats includes a recipe for each country, and for Australia we had quandong pie. Not finding quandongs at the local grocery store, we settled for peaches, fresh from a friend's backyard (thanks Lisanne!) We are considering also making Lamingtons, because who doesn't like cake dipped in more sugar?! Vegemite seems to be unavailable here, so we had to order some, and it will be a while - I will update with their reactions.

We have also made a poster with things we have learned about so far:

They are having fun with the slang (although for some reason "G'day mate" has not popped up yet), thrilled that Daddy is cooking on the barbie, and happily calling each other yobbos. Ah well, it could be a LOT worse!

I think Bhutan will have to be put off for another week - that's going to be a shocker for them! We're having too much fun with Oz - and besides, we haven't quite convinced Daddy we need a pet wombat yet.

***Update: Still waiting on Vegemite, but some snacks came in. 

I liked the Crunchies the best:

But the kids favored the Cherry Chews and Freddo Frogs:

Shane chose a Caramel Koala, but had a major meltdown when its head fell off.

Fortunately, there was another in the box (and then Mommy ate the decapitated one.) The kids even agreed to save one of each for a Kiwi friend, who used to get Freddo Frogs as a reward for doing her homework ;)