Today we switched things up and made the craft before reading the Scripture passage. We kept the craft simple enough that Carissa could join us, so all three kids worked together.
I let them pick what color of yarn they wanted to use for the hair. Despite my reminders that they were not creating a self-portrait–this was Zechariah–Mara predictably chose red, Micah yellow, and Carissa “on-gee” (orange seems to be her favorite color these days, as she chases the “on-gee” ball at the Little Gym and asks for “on-gee” bath toys).
For this craft we used: a plastic lid (yogurt containers), yarn for hair, wiggly eyes, a piece of shell pasta for the nose, and since I couldn’t find any bubble wrap for the mouth, we just didn’t put on a mouth. (I figured Zechariah couldn’t speak, so we would emphasize that by not giving him a mouth at all! The simpler the better, when you’re coaching three preschoolers by yourself and one of them is 21-months old!)
Of course, Mara was watching over her shoulder the whole time to see if Carissa needed “help.”
I was amused that each child put the pasta nose on a different way: Mara (vertically); Micah (backwards); and Carissa (horizontally)!
We talked about Zechariah and Elizabeth and how they were very old and not able to have children, but the angel Gabriel came to Zechariah and told him they were having a baby! Zechariah didn’t believe the angel and the angel made it so Zechariah was unable to speak again until the baby’s birth.
Mara, of course, piped up: “If an angel ever tells me that I’m going to have a baby, I’m going to believe him!”
I told her that God sent Gabriel to give Zechariah a message, and he should have believed it because it was a message from God. God tells us things through His Word, the Bible. So the lesson for us is that God’s words are always true and if He tells us something in the Bible, we should believe what He says–even when it is so miraculous it is almost unbelievable–and we should do what He asks us to do.
The other lesson was: Wait till the glue dries before you hold up your ornament–or the nose will fall off! Of course, that lesson is much easier to put into practice.