Last Friday's Halloween Fun

For lack of anything exciting ('cause we all know just how EXCITING my life is...) to post about, I am going to do a recap of last Friday's Halloween Fun.

Friday morning, I got the kids all packed up and ready to go to TC Miller Elementary School of Innovation, for Harrison's fun day of pumpkin patch learning. The two 1st grade teachers purchased pumpkins for the two classes and set them up in the fields and had games and fun things set up to do with them. They were on a rotation and all 5 activities had something to do with what they had learned about (line them up smallest-biggest, weighing them, measuring how big, sorting, adding & subtracting), pretty cool way to learn this stuff I am sure for a kid. Then they had a pumpkin roll at the end. Jack and Jenna enjoyed getting out in the sun and watching all the big kids. Here are some photos from the morning.

The two first grade classes at TCM with the "pumpkin patch" in the background.

Jack and Jenna had a blast watching the big kids run all over.

Harrison found the perfect pumpkin.

Station one, lining pumpkins up smallest - largest, etc. Harrison is kneeling to the very right.

Word problems with pumpkins. The kids loved it!

Pumpkin rolling. I am really surprised that these pumpkins made it home in one piece. Some of them weighed as much as 30+ pounds.

After Harrison's class did their thing, I brought the babies home for lunch and naps. My mother in law came to sit with them and I went back to TCM (it is literally 3 minutes away from my house) for Maia's fall party. It was a lot of fun and I was mesmerized by her teacher and how she was able to turn ANYTHING at all into a lesson. Pretty amazing. The kids really seem to love her and respond to her. I was VERY impressed. Good to know they are getting quality education in a public school setting. Here are some photos from her party.

Mrs. Webb's Kindergarten class. Maia is barely visible in this photo.

Mrs. Webb teaching them about ABABAB patterns on the pencil in the goodie bags I made for the class. (the pencils were purple/green striped).

Maia with her popcorn filled glove. You would have thought it was filled with gold...

Maia playing pin the nose on the pumpkin. Since it was close to election day, the class had to vote on each aspect of the pumpkins face. (round vs. triangle eyes, scary mouth or happy mouth, etc.)

Maia in the middle of two of her buddies from class, Paola and Chloe.

That evening it was, of course, time to trick or treat!! I didn't even bother with a camera because mine DOES NOT do night photos worth a darn. Here are a few before we went. Since I already posted about trunk or treating, there is really no need to beat a dead horse. I thought these were funny.

Hannah Montana aka Bailey. I kept this child from the time she was about 1 1/2 and she is now 5 and goes to school with Maia and rides the bus to my house.

Maia as the roaring 20's flapper.

Harrison being scary. Don't worry, the sword is all foam.

He cracked us up running up and down the sidewalk like this.

My little cuties all dressed up and ready to go. By the end of the night, the mask was off, the bandanna was off and I was carrying the sword. Maia had shed her headpiece, and the feather boa. Chris got the honor of carrying those.

And there ya have it folks. Another page out of my exciting life. Come back for more tomorrow!

The Week in Review - posted Sunday Nov. 2, 2008

I have been a slacker posting my photos and blogging about our activities of late. So, here ya go. The week in review, one week behind, one day at a time. (Hey, i gotta have something to blog about if i am going to post a blog a day.) Maybe by the end of the month I will be on real time.

Sunday, Oct. 26 Trunk or Treating - Seems to be popular with churches all over. Pretty fun and safe for the kids. Our church has made it a tradition every year now for several years and this year, we got in on the action. Per Harrison's request, we decorated our trunk as a "Dungeon". Imagine that... a tricked out mini van. Funny. Seems like others had similar ideas as us. Maybe it is because we all shopped at the dollar tree for our decorative items? I may have to step it up a notch next year. Some were very basic, and some were very cool. Regardless, all the kids and adults had a great time.

Our Spooked Out Mini-Van. I could have just opened up the side doors and let people see the "real" inside. That probably would have been scary too!!

Mr. Bones and a little black crow. I LOVE the Dollar Tree for this type of thing!!

Church friend dressed as Sharpae from High School Musical, and my little flapper girl.

Harrison dressed as the Captain Jack Sparrow, Pirate Skeleton. Pretty scary!

The prettiest Flapper I have ever seen. Her granddad taught her the "flapper" dance, but she wouldn't perform it. I wish I had granddad on video doing it though!

Witches Potions at one of the other Cars. Pretty cool. She had a table full and all sorts of food with a spooky theme to it.

Eyeball grapes, chocolate body part, bone candles and a witches brew complete with dry ice making it look extra spooky.

Harrison and his dad. He had shed the mask at this point. Can't say that I blame him. It looked awfully hot.

The spider on my shirt was a sticker. I had them stuck all over the outside of the van.

I have no idea what is up with the looks on the faces in this photo.
Maybe they didn't get enough candy???

At one point, Maia climbed in the car because she was cold. I kept hearing wrappers being torn open, so I snuck up on her and opened the door and this is what I saw. She looks SOOOOOO busted in this photo. Of course, I didn't care she was eating her candy for dinner, I just thought it was funny. The girl is a candy freak. Halloween is definitely her thing.