Pumpkins & More

I can't believe that October is almost over! Where did the time go?? It's hard to believe that in two days it will be November (that's when the count down to Christmas begins in my house. And, yes, I might have listened to Christmas music yesterday.) But, back to October & all things autumn...

I love how these cute pumpkins turned out. The kids drew their pumpkin shape onto orange paper & painted them with orange, yellow, and red paint. The next day they cut them out & "carved" funny & fierce faces on them using black & white paper. These Jack-o-Lanterns are as unique as their makers.

I always go to the pumpkin patch with my daughters & granddaughters. There was no shortage of pumpkins around here!

Yay! Halloween is back at my school! We have a new principal and are finally allowed to dress up for Halloween! In the past we've used loopholes like 50th Day, Red Ribbon Week, and Favorite Character Day to wear costumes, but were never allowed to do a real Halloween party. I think the PTO moms were as excited as the teachers & kids about the party. We celebrated on Friday with a costume parade & party. It was so much fun!

My sweet team ~ we dressed up as M&Ms!

Not just for October ~ bat & owl comparison. This Venn diagram is part of my Night Fliers Science & Writing set. Click HERE to purchase. We usually study bats in October, but really they can be a part of your study of nocturnal animals and even hibernation.

I was so excited by our writing this week! Of course, some kiddos are still just drawing pictures, and some are beginning to add labels. But, a few are really working on writing sentences! Check out these sentences!

The next few pictures have nothing to do with education at all. My youngest daughter recently embarked on a crafty adventure. In addition to her job in marketing, she has created some beautiful items for sale. She's done a few markets, and has an etsy store. (Click HERE to visit her store.) You can also find her on Facebook HERE. I have to say that I am very proud of her beautiful work!

And, finally this REALLY isn't education related, but does bring us back to pumpkins. We recently had our Third Annual Pumpkin Beer Taste Test! There were 14+ bottles of different pumpkin beers to taste as we enjoyed delicious chili made by my hubby. Shot glasses made the perfect tasting glasses, and we marked our reactions to each beer on a record sheet. Such a fun day ~ good food, good beer, and most importantly, good company!

Pumpkin STEM

We had fun today creating some "gates" to hold our little pumpkins. The Kinders worked in pairs, so there were only two little pumpkins sitting on each gate, which was probably a good thing. This was our first STEM challenge of the school year, and it was a challenge. But, I have to say I am very proud of the perseverance of my little cuties. They worked diligently for nearly an hour to create a structure to hold their little pumpkins (that, by the way I grew in my garden! This summer's garden was my best ever & I was so excited to be able to bring in enough pumpkins for all 15 kids to get one).  Here are some pictures of our fun.

These little guys worked off a plan they had drawn up yesterday. (It didn't work out how they planned, but they didn't get discouraged.

The first structure is the result of all the work done by the boys in the first picture. After all of their efforts they were thrilled that they were able to support their pumpkins. They cheered, "We have a gate!"

No Excuses

It's been nearly two months since I've posted anything. I really don't have any excuses (reasons, maybe, but no real excuses). So, anyway I thought I'd take this lazy day to get caught up. We had a fun and festive Christmas. But, our house is super quiet today. It's a perfect time for getting caught up on my blog.

We spent a lot of time in the fall talking about characters and had fun dressing up as our favorite story book characters on Halloween. I am Lilly ~ complete with a purple plastic purse I made by covering a granola bar box with purple craft foam. It held three shiny quarters, but sadly didn't play music when I opened it. My teaching partners dressed up as George & Harold. (I didn't really need to tell you that, did I?)  The following pictures are of our fun at-home project. This is the first year we asked families to decorate pumpkins to look like their Kinders' favorite characters. It was optional ~ most of my kiddos brought in a pumpkin.

Here comes the bride! This is one reason I haven't blogged in a while. My youngest daughter got married in November. Needless to say we were busy. But, as you can see from the pictures our Cinderella themed wedding was a beautiful success!

 This has got to be one of my favorite photos of the day. It is truly magical.

 Gabrielle was a beautiful bride.

 More magical pics.

 My pretty family. My other girls were matrons of honor, their hubbies were groomsmen, and their darling daughters were adorable flower girls. I felt so glamorous in my black dress. (I did wonder if black was appropriate for the MOB, but Gabrielle approved it!)

 My pretty girls. Emily was very pregnant ~ she made it through the wedding! We were all very happy about that. :-)

 Adorable flower girls. The two older girls are Sarah's girls. The cutie in the middle is Emily's first.

 We had an usually warm November day. (It snowed the following weekend.) The little girls had fun frolicking around the backyard before heading to the church. I like the fancy dresses in front of horse fencing. Too bad the horses weren't in the pictures.

 OK ~ reason # 2 for me not posting. Not only did Madelyn not make her appearance during the wedding, she let us eat Thanksgiving dinner. But, she decided that we really didn't have to sleep off all of that turkey ~ Emily called us at 2:50 Friday morning to say that they were on the way to the hospital. We didn't mind missing a few hours of sleep. Amelia loves her baby sister!

These little girls LOVE each other! As a child all of my cousins were in West Virginia (we moved to Indiana when I was one), so I never got to see them. I always felt a little jealous of friends who got to hang out with their cousins. It is so wonderful seeing my little darling granddaughters have so much fun together. Everyone usually comes over Friday evenings. The craziness is so much fun!

OK ~ back to a little school stuff. We made these Rudolfs to hang on our hallway tree. My brilliant teaching assistant hot glued clothespins to the wall so changing out the art work is now a super simple task. I think these little guys turned out super cute!

 We participated in a school-wide hallway decorating theme. Each class chose a country and decorated their bulletin board in a way that represented Christmas traditions from that country. (I teach in a small rural school in a not very diverse area. As far as I know everyone celebrates Christmas.) We had USA and after some thought I decided that Charlie Brown Christmas is a beloved tradition so we made friends for Charlie Brown & Snoopy. (My amazing teaching assistant made the characters & doghouse.)

 Our December family craft was decorating little paper trees. I love them!

A parent of one of my teaching partners is a former teacher. She offered us the use of her amazing Polar Express decoration that her mother had made. The kids drew pictures of themselves for the windows. We have our Polar Express day on the last day before break. It's also the same day as our Christmas party. We wear PJs and have lots of Yuletide fun!

OK, I think I'm more or less caught up. I hope that I can do a better job of blogging in 2016!