The kids were pretty solid in their choices of Halloween
costumes and activities this year. V
wanted to be Elsa from Frozen (perfect-have the costume, her cousin was Elsa
last year so we have a wig available) H
wanted to be a stickman (doable due to his still fitting in his skeleton
pajamas from last year or the year before and the fact that I have the rest of
a 100 pack of glow sticks from V wanting them as a handout for her classmates
for her birthday last spring). C wanted
to be the Headless Horseman. I have no
idea what inspired this, but we have the cape my mom made my nephew several
years ago that he’s used for a few costumes I just needed to figure out the
head. After thinking about the pinterest
posts that have popped up about making ghosts using cheesecloth (available at
our Bulk Barn & dollar stores) and liquid starch (this was a little
trickier, I tracked some down at Walmart.com and had it mailed to a friend in
the US) over a balloon (dollar store).
My first attempt did work, but painting it orange was taking all my
paint and time. So I used the other ½ of
the package of cheese cloth and found orange paint at the dollar store and
smashed the cloth into the paint until it was saturated, squeezed out the
excess, put it over the first attempt then sprayed the starch over it and
voila! Pumpkin head! Added some black paint for the face, cut out
with scissors and added some fabric leaves I had in my scrapbook stash and we
were in business.
The school was having a “work to rule” strike meaning the
teachers are only working to their job descriptions, no extras until their
negotiations for their contracts were secure.
Among other things, this meant no field trips, including no field trips
to the Pumpkin patch. On the last
Saturday before Halloween I told the kids that if we were going to do pumpkins,
this was our last chance. They all
looked up from playing and unanimously decided to skip the carving this
year. Yes, it was a little sad, but we
really didn’t miss the mess and time, etc.
our small front entry way is
where most of our Halloween decorations go and it was full and festive
even without them. Incidentally, shortly
after Halloween, the teachers quit doing after school activities and 2 days later
the contract was hammered out and the partial strike over.
Before Halloween we had a very lovely Thanksgiving over at
my in-laws with plenty of food and cheer.
While having Thanksgiving and Halloween in the same month seems a little
rushed, I enjoy having almost a full 2 months between Halloween and
Christmas. Remembrance Day (Canadian
version of Veteran’s Day) is given it’s solemnity in November, but the only
preparation is for assemblies and to make sure to get your poppy pin.
Now that we have gotten into our fall routine it’s time for
me to take a girl’s weekend away for scrapbooking convention in Seattle. I was also able to have a weekend away
shortly after school started in NY for scrapbooking where I was able to catch
up through the late spring with the kids’ and our family photo books. I have
summer and fall pictures to scrapbook, but this weekend is mostly classes and
enjoying being myself with friends.
Honestly, I just didn’t get around to packing up what it would take to
actually work on my current pictures and I made my Christmas cards between the
kids going back to school and curling starting up. I know I’ll be bringing
plenty of luggage back between the latest scrapbook supplies from the vendor
fair, my class projects, Christmas goodies for the kids from my parents and all
our U.S. Mail that has arrived since our summer trip. With a busy household, it takes a legion of
post-its, an understanding husband (I hold down the fort while he’s curling
long weekends and he holds down the fort when I need to have a weekend away)
and in-laws on call for this to happen.
It’s worth the prep though to remind myself who I am outside of my daily
life and my family gets back a happy, refreshed Mom.
We also went to the free first day at the local pumpkin farm
They also got haircuts. V wanted hers cut even shorter but I told her if she still wants it cut shorter in Spring I'll let her do it...
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