Story Time To Celebrate Our Heroes On Veterans Day
I don’t know about you, but Veterans Day really snuck up on me this year. Things at our house have been a little bit crazy the past several weeks. Part of the reason for the frazzled nature of our home was the death of my grandfather a few weeks ago. I can’t help but think of him even more over the next few days, knowing how proud he was of his time in the service spent building bridges in Korea.
READING THE WALL
We don’t have many books about veterans or the military in our home library (yet), but we do have a few. One of my favorites is The Wall, written by Eve Bunting, and illustrated by Ronald Himler. It happens to be a Reading Rainbow book. I can’t speak for your kids, but to #thebigone, seeing that ‘stamp’ on the front of the book is an automatic endorsement of the book in a big way. The text is simple, and matter of fact. It addresses both the loss of lives during war and the ongoing grief that follows loss, in a non-frightening way for readers of all ages. The illustrations are light, loose, and textural. The book is filled with beautiful watercolor renderings of a father & son’s visit to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C.
I don’t have a lot of memories of how we honored Veterans Day when I was young. From my recent searching and the photos streaming through my news feeds, it appears that the traditional way to acknowledge this day is to make cards of thanks and support for our veterans. We decided to give it a shot. I’m sharing what we created here. It’s a simple project, and very flexible in terms of supplies needed, so it’s great for a last minute activity if you don’t have something planned for tomorrow.
CREATING YOUR VETERANS DAY CARD
I created a printable to help make a token of thanks for the veterans in your life. (Scroll all the way down to grab your copy). In order to create an abstract camouflage base for the card, we used a variety of paint in shades of greens and brown. We used our fingertips to dot the paints all over the card base at random (hello, sensory fun!). You could easily use a brush if you prefer a more structured look, or just don’t like getting your fingers messy! If you’re going for mess free (because honestly, the kids are already home from school for the day, why make it tougher on yourself?!) crayons, colored pencils, markers, etc. would all work just as well to create the base pattern. You can customize colors to match the fatigues your veteran wears too, to make it even more personal.
While we set the base aside and let it dry well, we colored the digital illustration I created. We were happy using crayons, but again, this is a very flexible project. Colored pencils, markers, paints- they’d all work great for this portion of the activity as well. When we were satisfied with the look of the illustration we cut it out, and glued it to the camouflaged base of the card. You can flip the card over to write a personalized note of support and appreciation for the person you’ll be giving it to as well.
> > > Looking For That Free Printable? You Found It! < < <
What are your family’s favorite books to read around Veterans Day & Memorial Day? We need some suggestions for which ones to add to our collection, so let me know in the comments if there are any you’d recommend!
