This little volume’s a slam-dunk: educational and amusing, all in one cute package.ĭoes the child in your life love picking up interesting shells or rocks at the beach or park? Then he or she will love this Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Junior Explorer Geology and Fossils Activity Book (US $7.00 includes FREE shipping) that includes fun facts, a crossword puzzle, and activities about rocks and fossils for explorers ages 8 to 12, along with a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Junior Explorer Certificate that proves the child is a true budding “rock star.” Most schools now include this information in their curriculum, so the book is a good reinforcement of that learning-and it’s also a coloring book. There’s a list of important things for kids to remember in a fire. Marty and Jett’s Activity Book: Let’s Have Fun with Fire Safety (US $5.00 includes FREE shipping) activity book comes with cutouts for junior fire badges and finger puppets, coloring pages, a maze, and a fill-in-the-blanks puzzle. Fire trucks nearly always captivate the pre-K set: show them a picture of a fire truck, complete with cute Dalmatian, and their attention is rapt. You need to get something small to give your little ones as well as the big presents, and it encourages your kids to read more if you give books as gifts. That said, here are 12 solid suggestions for your holiday gift-giving, no matter what holiday you’re celebrating at this time of year! For help with this goal, turn to GPO’S US Government Bookstore, especially the wallet-friendly Bargains Under $20 page-it’ll help you wipe out your stocking stuffer list in a red-hot minute. You need to get some creative gifts, stat. On Cyber Monday, as I write this, it’s time to get ready for some serious shopping: we’re in the middle of Hanukkah, and we’ve got a mere twenty-three days before Christmas and twenty-four days before Kwanzaa. So by now we’ve worn the stretchy pants for Thanksgiving, and powered through the mall on Black Friday. It seems that few Americans, despite their religious convictions, can resist the ritual of end-of year gift-giving and the ties the practice strengthens among us. And although Kwanzaa isn’t supposed to include gifts, some parents give their children gifts on Kwanzaa days. American Jews in the late nineteenth century started to promote Hanukkah-a minor Jewish festival-as a time for Jewish parents to give their own children gifts, so that American Jewish children wouldn’t feel left out when their peers got gifts. Giving gifts at Christmastime eventually became de rigueur, even for secular and non-Christian people. Although the pilgrims at Massachusetts formally outlawed public celebrations of Christmas for twenty-two years, the whole Christmas juggernaut eventually won out in the United States. Gift-giving became a celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ, just as pagan Yule branches became “Christmas trees”. The pagans may have given gifts at the Yule celebration as well.Ĭhristianity later took over much of Europe, and the Christians, like the Romans, learned that the best way to truly conquer was not to divide, but to incorporate. Any visitors to the Irish Neolithic pagan monument Brú na Bóinne** are left in no doubt of that. Pagans and Druids celebrated the winter solstice festival, Yule, and although by many accounts it was not the most important pagan festival, it was celebrated quite a bit. When the Romans conquered Britain, they incorporated pagan religious practices into their festivals, so that the locals felt more integrated into the Roman Empire. The Romans gave gifts or money for gift-giving at Saturnalia, a winter festival that lasted seven days according to some sources, the gift-giving occurred on the last day of Saturnalia (December 23). The practice dates to the pagan and druid peoples of Rome, the British Isles and Scandinavian countries. Source: From the bottom of the barrel blog. Image: Ancient Britons carrying a Yule log and holly branches. For centuries, Europeans and North Americans have been giving gifts around Christmastime.
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