Papel picado and cempasúchil flowers

Paper cempasúchil

Today we worked on decorating our skulls and set them in an "altar". Our "sugar glue" worked out quite well, I thought, and most of the cracked skulls got mended handsomely. Give them time to dry and they may stay whole for a long time. I saw lots of wonderful work.

Enjoy the picture below and watch the video on how to make "papel picado", one of our two projects for our next class.

Our other project will consist on making paper flowers similar to the cempasúchil, or flor de muertos ("flower of the dead"), depicted to the left. These flowers are named like that in Mexico because they are traditionally used during All Saints' Day, the day most families in the Hispanic world visit their cemeteries with flower arrengements.

Our skulls on display.

VIDEO: Happythought- How to make papel picado calaveras: Sugar skull decorations to make for Día de los Muertos!

Martes, 8 de octubre: Las flores son bonitas, grandes y rojas.

calaveritas de azúcar

Today we continued working on our gender and number agreement (noun-adjectives) and started working on our first project for our Day of the Dead display: flores de papel (paper flowers).

Next day in class (and if the kitchen is available) we will start building our calaveras de azúcar (sugar skulls) with sugar and egg whites (or for a vegan alternative: sugar and corn starch) so they have time to dry out and be decorated by November. We will also continue working on our paper flowers and papel picado projects.

I really hope our "ofrenda" will look both colorful and beautiful as we set it up on October 29 or November 5 for everyone to admire during lunch time.

Please for next class, watch the three videos below.

Los números



Día de los muertos.





 ¡Gracias y hasta el martes! (Thanks and see you on Tuesday!)

20 de mayo: Papel Picado y Piñatas.

one broken piñata

Yesterday we worked on present tense conjugations and made some papel picado decorations. During lunch we got to whack three piñatas.

If you wish, finish the assignment provided in class: conjugate any three -ar ending verbs of your choosing in the construction paper chart that you built for the verb hablar (to speak). As promised, there will be some extra candy for those of  you who bring their finished assignment to class on June 3

Enjoy the pictures below, have a great Memorial Day weekend and see you in a couple of weeks!

 ¡Hasta junio!

piñata whacking, very junior division

several samples of papel picado

trébol/shamrock

rombos/diamonds

corazones/hearts

29 de abril: Piñatas y Fiesta

Almost finished!

Today we got to "finish" the basic structure of our piñatas. Some students even started decorating them with tissue paper. For those of you who took them home, have fun finishing them! If you can bring them back next Monday for our fiesta great! If you don't get to finish them, don't worry, we will get a chance to finish them later in the session.

Preparations for our celebration are taking shape and we will have different families bringing ingredients for salsa and guacamole. I will bring ingredients for our tostadas,  churros con chocolate and sangría. Also we may have some raspados or granizados (snow cones).

We will have some green, white and red balloons (Mexican flag) papel picado (please watch embedded video below or click on this link) and lights to decorate our "cantina". If we have enough time we will hit some piñatas filled with candy, if not, some other time.

Enjoy the pictures below and see you next Monday. ¡Hasta el lunes!

Making the body of a snake...

... & covering it with "papel verde"

A  four point star (estrella)?

The Taj Mahal?

A sun (sol)?