Great News... We just got word; our Rafiki Amani's (Peace Friend's) name is Virginia. She attends the Kids for Peace school in Kenya. We can't wait to correspond with her! If you would like to sponsor an adorable student, like Virginia, for just $35 a year, go to KidsforPeaceglobal.org

I pledge to join together as we unite the big and small...

STEM

Today we made our big announcement. Next year we will be expanding our meetings to include STEM. The favorite activities of our members have always been those rooted in hands-on science. STEM (Science,Technology, Engineering, and Math) is innovation, invention, and creativity at its best. Members will learn how the design process helps them with creative problem solving and what inventing is all about. As kids learn to think like inventors, they’ll grow confident in their abilities, and have tons of FUN :) To kick off this new direction the kids had a sweet competition. We built towers using candy and toothpicks.

I pledge to respect people in each and every land...

Flip-Flops for Friends

As a close to our Global Friends Unit we decorated flip-flops to send to our friends in Kenya. For some of them we used Sharpies to draw designs. We drew peace signs, flowers, stars, smiley faces, and some bugs. For others, we tied fabric strips along the top and got adorable results. We will finish the flip-flops at an upcoming meeting and then send them off with love. On a special note, our youngest member turned 7. Happy Birthday Mia!

Philippines

 Today at our Kids for Peace meeting, we learned a lot about the fascinating culture of the Philippines. First, we reviewed some interesting facts about the Philippines. Afterwards, we got to taste some delicious Filipino cuisine like lumpia and a rice noodle dish with shrimp and pork. We also played some games with our homemade Sipas and read some popular folktales. To top it all off, we made our own kites! It was a very busy day, and it was a lot of fun.

Australia

Global friends-Australia! We learned about Australian culture and sampled some of their tasty treats like chocolate crackles, fairy bread, and Vegemite. We also made some origami boomerangs and decorated a didgeridoo. Mr. Moriyama, who has spent time with the Aborigines, even taught us how to play.

San Diego Chinese Historical Museum

To learn to respect people in each and every land, we need to explore the different cultures of our world. Today, we drove down to the grand city of San Diego to experience the culture of early Chinese immigrants. We learned all about the immigrants who took a dangerous journey for money and opportunities. We also learned about important Chinese symbols. We even got to create a paper cutting of a dragon!

Kenya

To honor this pledge line we are learning about our Global Friends. We are starting with Kenya. In Kenya there is a Kids for Peace school.  Both of our groups filled out an All About Me form so we could compare answers. We learned about each others favorite foods, hobbies, school subject, and daily life. It was fascinating!  We played Mancala, ate Kenyan pancakes, Ugali, and fried plantains. We drank passion fruit juice, made masks and listened to a wonderful Kenyan story. For our garden, we have started out seeds that will soon take root and grow up our trellises.

I pledge to care for our earth

with my healing heart and hands... 

Recycled Water Rockets

To wrap our pledge line and our focus on water, we built water rockets out of recycled materials. It was so much fun. We also made trellises for our garden we will be planting on Monday.

Beach Cleanup

We had a great turn out for our beach cleanup. Many of our friends from the Oak Circle Community School Meetup group joined in to help. Jemma, from I Love a Clean San Diego came out and gave a wonderful talk about our watershed and the importance of keeping it clean. After, we used our heart bags for our cleanup. The fire pit area was the dirtiest. The kids filled all their bags and then sorted the trash by category (plastic, paper, glass, metal, and misc.). Following all of that hard work we had an epic game of tug-o-war and s’mores. Finally, the kids wrapped up their day sledding-San Diego style!

Rain Gutter Regatta

We had our rain gutter regatta today, in the rain! The kids still had fun. The boats were decorated with either a Kids for Peace or Valentine's Day theme. We had many great designs and the majority of kids preferred blowing into the sail directly over the use of a straw. We also painted bird feeders, to hold our Valentine’s, and our bags for our beach cleanup.

RCWD Wastewater Tour

We had a blast at the RCWD’s wastewater treatment plant. Some parts were stinky but all parts were enjoyable and informative.  David was a great tour guide and was full interesting facts.  This was a great addition to our study of water!

Pollution Bubbles

For fun, we built walk-in pollution bubbles. The kids pretended to be fish and hunt for food. One bubble was dark, murky, and polluted making the hunt difficult. The other bubble was clear making it much easier.  We brainstormed ways to keep our water clean. And how do we clean the water that is already polluted?  We experimented with filters for ideas. The kids worked diligently to find a combination of items to create an effective filter to clean out glitter, oil, food color, and dirt.

Dripping Springs

To start or pledge to care for our eearth, we joined the Sierra Club for a Dripping Springs Campground visit with Ranger Ken Colburn.  We hiked to the adjacent Agua Tibia Wilderness, which is part of Cleveland National Forest.  The endangered Arroyo toad is protected there. We learned about Mountain Lions, their scat, and how to identify their tracks. Tomorrow we are heading down to the San Diego River to help clean it up.

Awards Ceremony

The Temecula Planning Commission invited us to their meeting to present us with first place in our division for the Temecula Christmas Parade. The parade was a wonderful way to spread holiday cheer and we are looking forward to next year. You can view our award on our Facebook page.

I pledge to help others

as I go throughout my day...

Christmas Caroling

Oak Circle Community School invited us to join in an afternoon of spreading holiday cheer. We visited the Anne Sullivan Nursery School and shared our songs with their adorable students. They loved seeing Jasper, the alpaca, who hummed along with our songs. Then, we walked to a nearby retirement community, sang our carols, and delivered some holiday cards. It was a joyful experience and we are so happy to share the day with such wonderful people, and, of course, Jasper too.

Senior Center Visit

What a wonderful visit we had. We delivered the ornaments we've been working on to the Murrieta Senior Center. The people there were so nice and we made a lot of friends, We assisted in their holiday raffle and helped to hand out prizes. As a special treat, we were invited to sing along with their choir!! We are really looking forward to our next visit. Check out the video on our Facebook page!

Food Drive/Hats

We held our annual holiday food drive at Albertson’s. Our community members were very generous and helped us to collect about 4 full shopping baskets of canned goods. We donated the food to the Murrieta Community Food Pantry. They do a wonderful job helping those in need. We also donated all of the hats we have been working so hard on. All together, we made 47 hats. Hopefully, they will help keep some people warm, as the nights get colder.

Ornaments

We have been working on our ornaments for our friends at the Murrieta Community Senior Center. Our visit is coming up after our food drive.

Christmas Parade!

It was really cold and it took a lot of hard work (and glitter) but we had so much fun! It was wonderful celebrating the holiday season with our community. The parade’s theme was Miracle on Front Street. We based our entry off of the 1947 movie and created our “Letter’s to Santa from around the World” entry. We had the kids dressed as envelopes addressed to Santa from kids all over the world. Also, we had a giant snowy earth lit up, gingerbread men, dancing postboxes, elves, and lots of bubbles! We are proud to say the majority of the materials used to make our costumes and decorations were recycled. We were even written up in the local paper! You can read the article here or on Facebook. There is even a You Tube clip. A big thank-you to all of our participants and supporters who braved the long wait and freezing weather to support us. Happy Holidays!

Hat Looming

To kick off our focus on the next pledge line, I pledge to help others as I go throughout my day, we decided to use a loom to knit some hats for our fellow community members who may be without a home this winter.  We will finish this by December 10^th, the day of our food drive, and donate them to the Murrieta Food Pantry.

I pledge to use my words

  to speak in a kind way...

Happy Halloween!

We had a blast; literally, celebrating the end of our unit "I pledge to use my words to speak in a kind way". We launched our kind-word peace pods out into nature with our perpetual peace pod popper! And, for a sweet treat, we made ice cream and ate some yummy cake! Peace challenge: use your kind words and say thank you while trick or treating, of course! Have fun and be safe tonight!

Pack-o-Rama!

 A big Thank You to the Temecula Rescue Mission! What a wonderful and welcoming group of dedicated volunteers. We are thankful to them for letting us come and help. We pitched in to sort out food donations to make sure each box receives a balanced variety. There was a lot of food to sort. It really shows what a generous community we live in. We also helped to prepare bags that will be sent home at a local school for their food drive. The kids really enjoyed packing up the boxes of food that will be distributed to our neighbors that could use the help. If you are interested in donating food, money, or your time please contact rescuemissiontm.org

Worm farms, Geocaching, and Orienteering

Or worm friends made it back safely to our garden. And now we have some rich soil to add, and our veggies will love it. Maybe now the other plants will catch up to those radishes.

To prepare for our upcoming campout, we began our geocaching adventure. We located 2 caches in the park and signed our names to the logs, what fun. We also went on a treasure to sharpen our compass skills. We don’t want to lose anyone on our hike!

Peace Pods and Launchers

First, we checked on our garden. The radishes are coming up nicely. Then, to prepare them for the launch, we painted our peace pods and added a kind word. We will be launching them with our “cannon” at our upcoming Halloween party. In the meantime, we decided to make some marshmallow shooters and have a little friendly competition.

Peace Challenge for the week: Write and decorate the heart notes for the pack-o-rama

Amy’s Farm

What a blast we had at Amy’s Farm! A big thank-you to Ms. Heidi for showing us around. She introduced us to lots of animals like Lucy the duck and Tina, the 16-year-old cow, (that is actually 80 in cow years). We fed rainbow swiss chard to some chickens and to Wilbur, the 6-month-old pig. Our favorite was being able to milk Honey Bun. She is a jersey cow and produces about 3 gallons of milk per day! At the end we took home a pumpkin and some great memories too.

Peace Challenge of the week: Say to Hello to Five New People

Planting seeds of kindness….

Our very own Tabitha was the first member to memorize the pledge! She learned it in one day! Good job Tabby! Today, we were happy to welcome some new members. As all of our friends arrived, we traced ourselves onto giant paper and, using our kind words, filled in our “arm” with one thing we are grateful for. After our opening circle, we got to work on our garden. We planted swiss chard, spinach, lettuce, and radishes using the pencil method we learned when we volunteered at a local community garden. In a few weeks, we will be adding all the great soil our worms have been making for us. We also began work on our peace pods. In a couple weeks, we will paint them and build them launchers for a proper send off.

   Peace Challenge for the week: Memorize our pledge!

Worm Farming!

What an amazing first meeting! We really enjoyed meeting all of our wonderful new members. After our game of super silly introductions, each family made a worm farm to take home and cultivate. We got our hands nice and dirty to build our farms with layers of rocks, coarse sand, soil, and moist shredded newspaper. Just before we introduced our worms to their beautiful new homes, we measured to see who has the longest worm! In a few weeks, when we are ready to add all of that nutritious soil to our garden, we will re-measure to see how our worm friends have grown.

To practice using our words to speak in a kind way, one of members adapted the game Red Light, Green Light. Then, on a sweeter note, we each chose a kind word to decorate a cookie with. They all looked delicious but some of my favorites were help(ful), love, and friend.

Peace Challenge for the week: Using your kind words, compliment 5 people.

Packing Party

We gathered together to pack up Peace Packs for our friends who have been left homeless because of hurricane Irene. It was quite an afternoon, filled with games and activities. We made a card, filled it with our kind words, and painted a frame to include with our picture. We loaded up our Peace Packs with basic toiletries, lots of toys, coloring books, treats, and school stuff. We hope, when it’s delivered, it will carry all of our wishes of friendship and kindness to those who receive it.

Let There Be Peace...Yeah!