Halloween

Look who was up at 6:30 and ready to go trick-or-treating!  How cute is that? 

The witch fingers are ready.  These are simple to make- just melt some white almond bark, add a couple of drops of green food coloring, and coat some pretzel logs.  **Important** Don't add more than a couple of drops of that liquid food coloring- it changed the consistency of the chocolate and makes it impossible to use. I am sure the Wilton food coloring gel would've worked, but i wasn't going for bold color here.  Just a pale green.  Add an almond slice fingernail and pipe on knuckles if you desire. YUM!

The table is set!

The orange lit tunnel is in place!

Note: Over the weekend we learned that YES, in fact, tonic water DOES glow when near a black light!  It was the hit of Stephanies Halloween party.

Our daughter was ready to go to school this morning in her Catwoman costume- and I in my clown costume.  Completely opposite of my character?  I think so.  I felt silly walking home ALONE from the bus stop this morning..  I did see a buck and a doe right next to our house and I'm sure my brightly colored costume frightened them.  Happy Halloween! Be safe tonight! ♥♥♥ 
PS.. Aiden said this morning, "Are you having another baby?"  "No.." I answered. "Why do you ask that?"  I asked.  "Well because you and dad are marrying and stuff."  He replied. LOL!!

Jack-O-Lanterns

It was time to carve our pumpkins yesterday.  We made the mistake last year of carving them too early, resulting in rotten piles of slimy pumpkins instead of jack-o-lanterns.  The photo above is my jack-o-lantern-  I love how it turned out!

 It was an ooey gooey mess!  Almost everyone was willing to dig in.  We carved six!

I had a group of dedicated girls who were very helpful by separating seeds for us to bake for snack.

They were ready to go into the oven.  We sprinkled them with salt and baked at 475 degrees for 10 minutes. 

 Perfect!  They didn't last very long.

Scoop, scoop, scoop...

That is soo gross.  "Awesome!"

Ethan carved his own jack-o-lantern for the first time this year.  He came up with his own design. (Photo below.)

Here is Ethans spider! We took each of the jack-o-lanterns into the bathroom to see all lit up.

Aidens jack-o-lantern.  He requested a scary one!

Stephanie loves her cat bat jack-o-lantern!

This guy was pretty silly!

It's a fuzzy shot, but doesn't he look like he's laughing?  Happy Friday!♥♥♥

Fan Bat And Cat Fun

We created bats out of construction paper folded into a fan.  These are so cute!  I love when the kids glue the features on where THEY want them to go instead of where everyone else does.

Seriously- adorable!

I am going to have to remember this project, for sure.  Here is where I found the idea.  We changed it just a little.

This photo is a new favorite of mine... they are all GENUINLY laughing.  Here is why.. if you look at the little red table you will see some blue and white "evidence".  Chloe, our cat, has been sleeping on the red table when it isn't being used by the kids.  She won't even move if someone sits down to play.  We decided to take a small blue and white tutu and just lift Chloe up and put the tutu on her.  She looked beautiful!  She stayed.  I ran for the camera, but the roaring laughter from the kids made her promptly escape her beautiful outfit, and this photo is immediately after that.  We vowed to try again today. This time I will have my camera ready!♥♥♥

Plugging Along

We're plugging along as far as preschool goes!  We've been working on the letter Dd, the number 4, the colors orange, black and red, circles, and the square.  This flannel board is helpful during group time.  It folds in half for easy storage.

The kids have been enjoying this fun twist on one of our favorite action songs!♫♪

♫♪Four glowing wheels go round and round, round and round, round and round..♪♫   The bones on the bus go rattle and shake, rattle and shake, rattle and shake..♫♪  Happy Wednesday everyone!  It is 'Pumpkin Night' at AWANA tonight.  Pumpkin games, stickers, treats.. 6:30 at Machias Community Church- 1615 Virginia, Snohomish. ♥♥♥

Shape Art

Time for shape art again!  We have been working on circle and square recognition.  We killed two birds with one stone by using the colors we have been working on, too.  I cut out the shapes ahead of time, trying to make different sizes.

The kids get to create whatever their imagination desires, but they must use some of the shapes.

I love free art.  They generally spend more time working on it if they are choosing what to create.

She drew all of the exciting stuff to look at for her store!

I loved the use of circles as stars.

Can you tell what our colors are for this month?

Meet Peanut

Peanut is our new friend.  He lives in the group time basket and usually comes out to see what everyone is doing.  Peanut is a flying squirrel who came to us all of the way from the Olympic National Forest. 

He likes to glide onto the kids' shoulders and scurry up onto the tops of their heads.  Some of them really believe he is real.  I love child like imagination!

Fly, Peanut, FLY!

Aren't puppets the best?  Happy Monday!♥♥♥

Halloween Fun

I think it is so much fun to Halloweenify our place in October.  Equally wonderful is the taking down of it all afterward, it makes the house feel so clean and open.  After years of screaming and jumping in fear away from fake plastic spiders that my husband has tortured me with, I think I have finally overcome my fear.  I put spiders up EVERYWHERE to prove my point.  It feels pretty good, actually. ☺

Aiden played "spooky door" last night before dinner.  He likes the extra decorations.

 I like this web!  I have some big plans for the kitchen area on Halloween.  I hope the kids will like it!  I don't want to give away the surprise, but I will say that for Halloween I am dressing up as something completely opposite of what I normally choose.   We have a little party planned for preschool.

Scarecrow looks happy in my garden chair! I love that he is out of the rain.  We use him year after year.

Watch out for this guy though- sometimes Adam turns him ON and he drops down as noise will activate him. 

 Look what my niece is wearing today!  In fact, I love every outfit she chooses- she is very stylish for a four year old.  I always think I should blog ONLY on what she wears.  Maybe I'll start posting her outfit photos.  She got her costume last night  and was so excited she had to call me and tell me about it.

Happy Friday everyone!♥♥♥

Always Be Grateful

This morning was a tough one!  Everyone arrived at the same time.  Hungry.  Luckily, Adam was scrambling eggs, I had already pulled some chocolate chunk muffins out of the oven and had oranges ready to go before the house exploded with children.  I was also trying to be Superwoman and was quickly slicing and cinnamon sugaring sliced apples for batch #2 of dehydrated apples from our tree.  The kitchen was a mess, full of my hubby, our sons who were trying to help, ME, making my own mess, and hungry kids who were all begging for food as though they had not eaten a meal in their entire lives.  It was loud.

See that mess?  That is exactly How I felt!!   A MESS.   I suppose the thought of Superwoman did not help me today.. I had still not had my first cup of coffee.  Precious seconds it would take to pour it...

I was thinking it might be nice to be drifting away in the sky right about then!  That's desperate for me, I am scared of heights.

Then I saw the sign in our kitchen posted above the sink.  I knew upon hanging it that at some point I would need the reminder.  Yesterday my licensor came for a visit and I learned that several childcare businesses in our area are near empty.  I am incredibly blessed to be FULL.  I should be shouting joyful praises for the noise and mess and that God has provided us with all of this food to feed these kids!  I felt pretty bad for whining in my head about the mess and noise of it all this morning.

Thank you Lord for this childcare business!  It is my prayer that those childcare centers around me will flourish with children as well, in Jesus' name, Amen!   ALWAYS be grateful!♥♥♥

Indian Summer

This October has been the most beautiful October in Washington that I can remember.  It has been sunny, dry, the air is crisp and the birds are very active.  We have been taking advantage of these last couple of days where after running around outside the kids are warm enough to shed their coats.  (I usually have to FIND those coats later...) 

The sunflowers are drooping, allowing their seeds to dry out for the birds.

The leaves are changing! I love when my eyes catch a leaf slowly drifting to the ground.

Glorious Fall!  It is 'running and breathing in the fresh air' weather.  

 It is tree climbing weather! We tried to shake some more leaves off of the tree.  Happy Fall!♥♥♥