Culture swap - North Carolina and Oregon

We explored two more of our culture swap packages this week. I thought we would do them together as they were both from the US - from the states of North Carolina and Oregon. It has been a while since we looked at Mexico, but I wanted to make sure we did the packages justice by having a long time slot for it, as I know how long we spent putting ours together! These boxes have really given Harry a feel for the USA in terms of it being made up of different states.

Here was our package from North Carolina. There was a lot here to interest Harry! He loved the pirate connection and we played a few games pretending to be Blackbeard sheltering in the North Carolina inlets. The photos of crops growing were interesting, especially the peanuts as we have been using peanuts for Five in a Row recently. The cookie cutters are great and we can't wait to use them - there is a USA map shape and a foot shape to represent the 'tar heel' State. I will use the USA map shape every time we cover something US related :-)

I chose some of the State facts that I thought would interest Harry. We talked about the first airplane flights a lot (which took place in North Carolina), emerald mining and lighthouses.

Harry and Peter both loved the USA flag and it has even been taken out to the park to show a friend who is originally from the US. We talked about the stars representing the States. He said that he remembered seeing the flag on the Olympics!

Peter loves stickers at the moment and he enjoyed decorating his beloved penguins with some of the stickers.

We followed a recipe for sweet tea, which is popular in North Carolina. Here is the tea steeping.

And our finished article. Harry tasted it 3 times but couldn't be persuaded. Peter kept coming back for more! I wasn't sure I liked it at first but it grew on me.

We did some crayon rubbings of the shells.

We made a giant collage of North Carolina, including lighthouse pictures, the North Carolina State flag, stencils of airplanes with the stencils from the package and Harry's sponge paint version of the State flower. This is still on the wall in the playroom.

The flag in the Oregon package was very popular too (the State flag this time). The sweets were called salt water taffy. I really liked this but Harry was not keen! We looked it up on wikipedia and found it had quite an interesting beginning.

He enjoyed doing the Oregon jigsaw

We then matched up the pictures on the postcards to the landmarks shown on the jigsaw. He really liked Mount Hood and was amazed that it is always covered in snow. He actually built a soft play tower this week and called it Mount Hood!

The printables included in the package were good for Harry and Peter's ages and they enjoyed colouring and looking at the birds especially. We have talked a lot about the fact that US States are different and can almost be like different countries, even with their own laws. As they are represented by different flags, we have talked about what is shown in the flags and that images on flags are symbols to represent things characteristic of that area/State/Country.

The family included a book about the history of their town, which had been written by members of their family. There were some fabulous photos in here and Harry was really interested in the old farming photos showing the hop yards. We talked about hops and beer brewing.

These packages have been so interesting and have really given us an insight into North Carolina and Oregon. We have a package from New Zealand still to look at, which we will do soon.

Culture box - Mexico

We have really enjoyed looking through the first culture package we had received from a Mexican family. There was quite a lot to talk about so I covered it in two sittings. First of all we looked at the flag and there is a lovely story behind the eagle image which appears on the flag and the coins. The story goes that the ancient Mexicans were told by the Gods to build their capital in the place where they had seen an eagle eating a snake while perched on a cactus in a lake. It took 200 years to find this! 

We also did the paper craft, which involved folding and cutting tissue paper squares to make colourful segments of bunting, which are used to decorate homes and streets for festivals.

The family had sent a 1 peso coin with a printed sheet showing the other Mexican coins. We looked up the exchange rate to see how much it was worth and it was around 5p. We compared it to our 5p coin and looked at what is on the back. Our coin shows the Queen and the Mexican coin showed the eagle eating the snake. We talked about how both of these pictures are different but show something important to that country.

We looked at the rest of the contents at the weekend so that Stuart could join us. We did the 'God's Eye' craft, which is started when a child is born. More yarn is added each year until the child is 5 and then it is hung up. We have been using some Spanish greeting words and phrases from a sheet included in the box.

We decorated the kitchen with our bunting, a large Mexico flag, postcards and the God's Eye for our Mexican themed dinner of fajitas. 

Harry coloured a Dahlia picture, the national flower of Mexico.

There was a small Mexican football shirt included and some stickers, so Harry stuck one of the stickers on his 'Olympic Harry' to make himself a Mexican footballer!

He tried his first chewing gum, which is made with gum from trees in Mexico - he was not impressed!

We also found this book at the library, which we have read lots of times and it is lovely. It also includes some Spanish words and a map at the back so it was really useful to support the package.

We have really enjoyed these activities and have all learnt from them. I think Harry will always remember the story behind the flag and he actually spent a lot of time during the Olympics closing ceremony looking for the Mexican flag! I love the God's Eye craft and I think it is a really nice thing to do for a young child. It has also been fun using a new language at home.

Our culture box

The packages we have been preparing for our worldwide culture swap were posted today. We have really enjoyed putting them together but have found it trickier than expected to decide what to include and to try and find free or inexpensive items.


We included a map of Newcastle together with leaflets from our favourite places to visit, a bookmark showing the Millennium Bridge and a fact sheet about the Angel of the North. I printed recipes for scones and bread and butter pudding and put these in together with union jack cupcake cases. I bought Team GB flags and tattoos from the Olympic product offerings available at the moment and a pack of playing cards showing images from the North East. I made a schedule of a usual day in our family, so the swappers can compare it to their own. I printed Newcastle United colouring sheets as football is such a big part of this country and city. 

We found a good sheet showing pictures of UK coins so I sent that together with a 10p and 20p coin. I made notes on the sheet too showing what a variety of things cost here - milk, a bus journey, magazines and chocolate bars.

I made a craft kit with instructions for the children to make felt daffodils (although they are the official flower of Wales that still counts as part of the UK!) as I love the appearance of swathes of daffodils everywhere at the start of spring.

I am happy with our box and excited now about receiving the overseas ones so that we can explore them.

Worldwide culture swap

We have signed up for a worldwide culture swap here and are really looking forward to it! We are in a group with 4 other families and will be exchanging packages which include items relating to our country/culture. We are planning to look at worldwide countries during the Olympics so this will be a great activity to do alongside that.


We have been assigned a group which includes families in Mexico, New Zealand, North Carolina, USA and Oregon, USA. I have started to think of ideas for our packages and will update when I have some more firm plans.