Halloween

Well, I'm thankful that Halloween is over. It's a big celebration here. On Friday we had a costume contest a little after lunch. The kids came back dressed up in their costumes; most of them were the same as others...poor. I guess that is what you get from living in a small village.

I probably should back up. My class read three Halloween Stories: Froggy's Halloween, The Little Old Lady Who Wasn't Afraid of Anything, and There Was An Old Women Who Swallowed a Bat. We also carved a pumpkin and that was a lot harder to do than I remember my dad doing. The pumpkin broke a tooth in the process. The kids had a ball exploring and using their senses to feel the pulp and sort it from the seeds. It was a small pumpkin and I couldn't believe we didn't get more seeds out of it. I asked the kids to make a prediction on how many seeds they thought were in there. Some had good guesses...100, 30, 40, 50, 60, 2, 3. Can you tell we have been counting by 10's? Well we put the seeds on these counting mats to make it easier to see 5's and 10's. We had a lot left over when we got to 100 so one suggested we put two in each box of the ten frame. Then we still had left overs and then they decided to put three in each box. Great ideas. We had 367 seeds and it filled a tiny tupaware container. I had a bad guess as well.

We went into the bathroom, which is the darkest place when you close the door and lit the pumpkin. They were amazed that the pumpkin face shadow could be seen on the wall. IT was so neat to be excited about things, I would have been when I was that age.

We also traced pumpkins and cut them out. Then they decorated them however they wanted. Pretty creative faces! We made pattern chains with orange and black paper, and cut out picture patterns of cats, witches, and ghosts. They got a kick out of the puppet spider dangling from the classroom door as they came in in the morning.

I finally thought of an idea while talking with Myra. The idea of a dog toy popped into my head. So I tied Berry's and Juno's dog toys all over myself and made a sign that said dog toy. A lot of kids asked if I was going to be that grandma again. I guess that was a huge hit. Maybe I can think of something to do with that next year.

The costume contest was fun. It's a nice way to get the community in the school. We have judges and 1st, 2nd, and 3rd prizes for each age category including the Pre-School and babies. Wow, one baby was eyore. So adorable.

After the contest, we got to break a pinata. They took some great swings but the leader of this activity just dumped it out for the kids. I was a little disappointed about that. It wasn't as fun! Then we had a classroom party. The kids and I made boo cups earlier that day. Chocolate pudding with oreos, whip cream as the ghost and choc chips as the ghost eyes. They didn't eat them all so note to self don't fill them too full. We got cupcakes and cookies from other kids and their families, along with the candy from the pinata. I didn't do well with eating that day. Come to think of it....over eating is an issue with me now these days. Yikes! That's a random though, huh?

I ran out of candy as trick or treaters came. I bought six bags and still did. Next, time one candy for each kid or give out cheap pens or pencils. I was so exhausted with my monthly fatiqueness that I didn't even want to hand it out, but did and got my dishes done that night also, along with cleaning up dog puke again.

So there is Halloween in a nutshell.