The Return of the Twelves

One of our favorite read-aloud books is The Return of the Twelves by Pauline Clark.  It is about a young boy who happens to find the set of small wooden soldiers which turn out to have been owned by the Bronte children.  Of course, there is much more to the story than that, but I don't want to ruin it for you.  It's a great opening to learning about a famous family as well, because the Bronte children did have a set of soldiers which they wrote stories about.

Why I am bringing this up?  Well, if you're like me, you suddenly realized that the gift-giving season is bearing down hard upon us and are starting to panic think about what your plan is.  I make a lot of the gifts I give my children, but there is a fine balance to be achieved between budget and the realities of time.  Since I have been trolling the internet these days searching for interesting ideas, I thought I would share one of my past ideas with you.  

I made these for B. about 11 years ago when he was five.  We had just finished reading the Return of the Twelves and he loved it.  So, I made him his own set of 12 soldiers.


These are about 2 1/2 inches high and are painted wooden soldier blanks.  (The most difficult part of this project was finding the blanks!)


The soldiers in the book all have distinct personalities, so I had to give each soldier his own face.


They line up and march around very nicely.


And to store them, a lion box from Africa... because that was where many of their original adventures took place.
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My next article is up at Heart of the Matter about homeschooling high school.  Take a look.

Comments

Anonymous said…
So please tell us where you found the blanks!
2/01/2015 6:35 PM
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