Thursday, March 9, 2017

Flat Stanley - Australia Edition

In January Luke's class read Flat Stanley - a book about a little boy who is "flattened" and makes the most of his situation by doing cool things now that he's only 1/4" thick... like being able to be mailed to friends in other parts of the country.

Luke's teacher had each of the kids color their own Flat Stanley and their assignment was to send him somewhere and get pictures and some information back about where he visited.  

Luke likes to make BIIIIG plans and so he came home talking about wanting to send his Flat Stanley to Australia or Asia.  Ummmm.... okay. :)  

I put my feelers out on Instagram to see who might be willing to show Flat Stanley around their country and the response back was completely overwhelming.  I seriously had offers from all over the world... which BLEW us away!  Luke ultimately decided to send Flat Stanley to the most wonderful family who offered to host him in Sydney and y'all... I can't EVEN get over the pictures she sent us!!

Here's Luke's Flat Stanley at Bondi Beach...








At the War Memorial and Parliment building in Canberra....


.... and a Wildlife park visiting with lots of Australian animals.


(Can you spot him???)



They took him to Luna Park and The Big Merino...




... and even to Sydney Harbor!!!





We got the pictures via Google Drive and Luke was able to put his PowerPoint together for his class.  We googled the locations and had so much fun learning about where Flat Stanley had been.

Just when we thought the whole experience couldn't get any better (I mean! Those pictures!) we received Flat Stanley back in the mail along with a TON of souvenirs!  Brochures, postcards, maps, treats, stickers, flags... and a TON of other incredibly thoughtful and generous little mementos.


This was TOTALLY unexpected and such a sweet surprise.  I wish I had known what was happening because I would have taken a video so you could have heard all the squeals and "ohhhhhhs" coming from my kitchen table :)


We all tried Tim Tams (and yes... we even did the Tim Tam Slam), tasted Vegemite (we think you MIGHT have to be Australian to really appreciate this!)and there are tiny Koalas all over Luke's room :) 


When we mailed Flat Stanley off to Sydney I had no idea what a fun little "trip" it was going to be for our whole family.  While he was gone we researched what we thought he might be doing and then when he got back we had the best time looking at the pictures, reading about what he had done and finding some Texas souvenirs to sent back to Sydney.

Even though Luke's project is complete, we had so many sweet offers to host our little traveler that we're going to send him on to Amsterdam!  We've already started Googling all things Holland (which is fun because that's where my mom's family is from) and can't wait to see what other adventures our Stanley goes on.  We're looking at getting a map for the playroom where we can track his travels and have plans to start a scrapbook for his pictures and souvenirs.  


Finally - HUUUUUUGE shout out to Flat Stanley's extremely gracious and generous hosts!  You went absolutely above and beyond and made this so special for Luke (and the rest of us!).   THANK YOU!!!

PS - If you live somewhere fun (i.e. anywhere outside of Dallas hahaha) and would like to show Flat Stanley around your town/state/Country shoot me an email (momfessionals@gmail.com)!

41 comments :

  1. This is such an amazing lesson idea! I love the book Flat Stanley as a teacher and I loved it as a kid too!

    Thanks for sharing these fantastic pictures! Do you mind if I show them to my class?

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  2. Oh my goodness, I did not know about flat Stanley and your shoutout visit here. I live in Australia too, about 4 hours north of Sydney. I can imagine how excited your kiddos were on getting their Aussie care package. Yes I guess vegenite is an acquired taste.
    I hope that flat Stanley's host family will take him to a couple of places in Netherlands top, that I visited when I was a child. My family is Dutch and we stayed their fir four months when I was a child, so my dad could spend time with his family who were all still there. It was a fantastic experience.
    De Efteling and Madoradam are fantastic places with de Efteling having all these fairytale characters brought to life and the bins talk and say paper here paper here in Dutch. So of course we all were running around picking up rubbish so we could hear the bins talk. And Madoradam is cities in miniature with planes, trains, buildings, your kids would love it. We sure did and I've never forgotten our time there at both those places. I was seven at the time and I'm now 45 so it's does say a lot. Have fun with it, can't wait to see flat Stanley's adventures around the world.

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  3. How fun! Looks like Flat Stanley enjoyed himself on his trip!
    Xo, Elizabeth
    http://stripesandsolitaires.com

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  4. That is so amazing! What a great story!!

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  5. Wow! That was so nice of the family to do that! How fun for your kiddos! :)

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  6. How sweet! Sydney is my favorite place to travel too. Before i even finished reading your entire post i thought to myself, "I hope they got to try Tim Tams!" They are the best! Just know they can be found in Target here locally.

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  7. This is awesome!! How sweet of the hosts to go above and beyond for Luke! I lived in Australia for 6 months when I was in college and these pictures bring back so many memories. I loved tim tams!!

    Amanda @ Cupcake N Dreams

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  8. We recently just moved from Illinois to Tucson, Az and are doing a flat stanley right now for our friends! so fun!

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  9. Such a great idea! I love it! Can't wait to see his travels in Amsterdam!!

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  10. My kids would be happy to show Stanley around Washington, DC. Not quite as exciting as Amsterdam or Sydney, but lots of fun still!

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  11. How exciting! I got excited just reading about ya'lls excitement. Too Cool!

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  12. How much fun is this? Such a great way for your kiddos to connect with another part of the world. I love it;).

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  13. I love this! When I travel for work I take one of my son's Lego men and take pictures. He's got some fun ones from the beach, Las Vegas, lots of airports ;) and even our own Indianapolis 500. But my favorites are when I snapped some photos in a cricket stadium in England then in front of the Arc de Triomphe in Barcelona!! So fun to show what he has been up to and to spread some culture :)

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  14. Oh wow...love this idea!!! What a unique way to learn about different countries and such! I live in North Carolina- Flat Stanley is welcome with us anytime. I know you've said you lived here for awhile when you were younger. So cute!
    Have a blessed day!!

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  15. What a cool project for school, and I love that your whole family is enjoying Flat Stanley's adventures! The Sydney, Australia hosts set the bar really high, and I'm very interested to see what Flat Stanley will see in Amsterdam and anywhere else he visits!

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  16. This is AMAZING! What incredible people who hosted. Love the idea of sending a Texas care package back to them!

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  17. Absolutely INCREDIBLE!! What a sweet family!!! Tim Tams are my favorite treat, so tasty. I am looking forward to seeing Flat Stanley in Amsterdam! Have a good day :)

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  18. What an awesome host family! Too bad he didn't get to swim with some great whites. That would have made for an interesting photo. :)

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  19. That is awesome!! I wanna be Flat Stanley and get mailed to all these amazing places!! What a great learning experience!

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  20. This is so awesome! I bet he had the best one in the whole class!! We have hosted Flat Stanley twice for our two nephews, but unfortunately we live in the same city as them so it probably wasn't all that interesting. Haha.

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  21. This is so cool!!!!! I'm kind of jealous of Flat Stanley!!! I absolutely love this!

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  22. I am a retired elementary teacher and loved using Flat Stanley every year to teach geography, math to figure out how far he traveled, etc. That little fellow traveled near and far and had some mighty adventures year after year. Flat Stanley traveled with an 18-wheel truck driver who took pictures of him every time he crossed a state line, he went on a ski trip to Colorado and came back with a full scrapbook of his journey, he climbed Mt. Rainier in Washington, sunned in Miami, Florida, had a complete "paper doll" wardrobe made for him multiple times, and even brought a gigantic west Texas tumbleweed to school for us to see. But my all time favorite thing that happened to him was when one child received a letter telling him that poor Flat Stanley had gotten too close to the candle on the coffee table and had, unfortunately, not made it. However, they had a funeral for him and surprised us by asking if we knew Flat Stanley had an identical twin brother. This brother volunteered to stand in for Flat Stanley and came to Texas. These kind hosts made a new Flat Stanley and gave him all sorts of sports equipment and clothes. This entire story came back to us in the form of a book, complete with pictures, and it was a big hit in my classroom! Good luck with your Flat Stanley adventures!

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  23. I have to send my triplets' flat Stanley's off. Anyone willing to take one (or three?!?).

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  24. This is so cool! I bet your three kiddos loved looking through what all was sent back and the pictures.

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  25. Cool! I live in Florida. I'd be happy to give Stanley a tour of the beach (send him back with a tan). You should make a little fleet of Stanleys and send them all over.

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  26. This is so awesome ! :)

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  27. This is Epic!!! Love Momfessionals readers, what an awesome gift for the kids. Travel really opens up their world-as adults I think we all agree the places we have been have changed us, and having imagination to see yourself exploring a different place is exactly what this project will "deliver". Shout out for Flat Stanley:))

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  28. The tumbleweed share and tell and the identical twin brother?! Ms. Allen you have some great memories!!

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  29. You are such a great mama. What a wonderful idea! I might do it with my class!

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  30. This is fabulous!!!! What a great idea! Bondi Beach is good but Manly Beach is better! If you want Flat Stanley to revisit Sydney and visit Manly Beach and go on an iconic Ferry ride of Sydney Harbour I'd be happy to host him!

    Ingrid
    http://www.fabulousandfunlife.blogspot.com.au

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  31. How did I miss that post?! You know we LOVE to take Flat Stanley around! Send him our way anytime!

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  32. I teach multi-grade, so my curriculum rotates, and the years we study the regions of the US I do a flat stanley project very similar to this! We send Stanley all over the US to friends, family, and other teachers I meet online and track his travels on a large map in our classroom. It's SO fun! So glad you are guys are doing it as a family! My kiddos love to look back at the scrapbooks we make from years past.

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  33. Flat Stanley was seriously one of my very favorite elementary projects!! So fun

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  34. Flat Stanley is so fun! I love his trip to Australia (I'm a little jealous he didn't have to pay airfare, or I'd be all over that trip myself! Ha!). My parents are missionaries in West Africa (Niger) and I'm sure they would love to receive Flat Stanley and show him around the edge of the Sahara desert! You can email me at thegloriousmundane@gmail.com and I can arrange for his travels :)

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