We took two days of our Christmas unit to read, watch and listen to various Nutcracker stories.  We read the classic:  The Story of the Nutcracker Ballet.  Turkey and Bunny were really amused by this story, and I like it because it’s one of the few secular Christmas stories that has nothing to do with Santa.  We also watched the Nutcracker ballet–two different versions.  First we watched the classic Baryshnikov, which my father actually bought for me when I was a little girl, after we had seen a performance of the ballet in downtown Chicago.  Turkey and Bunny loved that, and it would have been enough, except that I stumbled across the San Francisco Ballet performance of the Nutcracker on PBS, and I was so impressed by the costumes, sets, and general interpretation that we watched that one, too, and the children liked it just as much, if not more.  We, of course, had to watch the Nutcracker segment on Walt Disney’s Fantasia after learning about the ballet, and they thought that was equally entertaining.  I also have a beautiful recording of the Nutcracker that Ryan bought me one Christmas, so we listened to that music while doing our school activities one day.  I think Turkey and Bunny have successfully ingrained the sounds in their brains–they won’t be forgetting that score any time soon!