Australia Day - Activities, Baking, Crafts & Fun

~~~ Happy Australia Day ~~~

This week we've been using our Australia Day Unit, which briefly covers the history of Australia Day.

We had a large party organised for today, with lots of Australian themed activities but the SE area has had massive downpours of rain this week, so we made the decision to cancel our outdoor party.

All of us were very disappointed, considering that we have only had one brief shower here all afternoon :(

Hubby attempted his first ever chocolate creation, that was to be the cake topper for today. Yes the entire flag is chocolate.

We spent a little time every day working through the various aspects of the printable Australia Day unit. I was reading The First Fleet section from The Australian History Collection by Bryce Courtney, whilst the kids coloured our Coat of Arms. They were so particular with the colours chose for this.

This collection of short narratives are easy to read and full of eye catching illustrations.  Topics included are Captain Cook, The First Fleet, Bass and Flinders, Buckley's Chance, Crossing The Blue Mountains, Gold, Burke and Wills & Ned Kelly.

Definitely a great overview of Australian History, a good place to start with, the section on the First Fleet really had the kids imagining what it would have been like back then.

Lego Lover sorted all of the 3 part cards (with descriptions) and glued them to place in his notebook.

Little Surfer Dude loved the Do A Dot ABC pages from the Australia Day printable. 

Because today was supposed to be all about fun and add in that it was my lovely husbands Birthday, we decided to have our Australia Day celebration, after all.

Just the five of us instead of the forty odd that were originally planned.

We made silly Red, White & Blue headwear. I simply laid out the supplies and gave no real instructions.

 

Ok, so not a great photo I know, but, what do they say, no shame no game.....they do say that don't they ?! 

I asked Lego Lover to prepare a map for me using our Wooden Australian Montessori map. He traced each state carefully.

Then labelled each of the capital cities. Meanwhile I printed out a sheet of labels for all of the captial cities and placed them in our math treasure box.

It was time for Pin The Capital City On The Map!

The kids had so much fun with this. Way more than I ever expected. They were giggling themselves silly and they didn't even realise they were learning. Granted the 'educational component' of this was more for Fairy Princess, it was fun for Lego Lover to brush up a little too.

They thought it was absolutely hilarious when dad got one of his city labels way off in the Pacifc Ocean somewhere. It probably didn't help that he had been spun way more than the average 3 times before he had his turn.

The completed map. Overall, they didn't do too badly.

We made a batch of basic sugar cookie dough.

And pressed out little Aussie cookies.

And set about icing them, Red, White & Blue!

The icing was a little runny so we ended up with some pretty funky designs.

Of course we had the obligatory BBQ and a birthday cake for dad.

My parents called in to wish hubby a Happy Birthday. Little Surfer Dude enjoyed some pool time with Pop.

There is simply no Australia Celebration without a game of cricket. Lego Lover has really gotten into the game this season. Not so much watching it on the telly, but having a hit in the backyard with dad.

So even though I know we would have had a fabulous time celebrating today with all of our friends and family, we didn't do too badly on our own.

What about you? How did you spend this Australia Day?

Linked up at Enchanted Thursday's blog hop.