At Last, Fall Break!

Where, oh where, does the time go?  It feels like the first day of school was just yesterday!  I can't believe how fast this year is going.  We are lucky enough to get a fall break {thank you dear principal}! I plan on relaxing and catching up on my DVR playlist, laying out the plans for the new cabinets in our laundry room, and planning lessons through December {fingers and toes crossed on that one}.  I haven't had much time to post all of our October activities so here are most of the big things we got through:

My kids LOVE Pete the Cat!  Here are a few of the pictures of Pete they made during free time.


Pumpkins!
{I specifically use these two activities for fine motor growth}




Cut Apart Pumpkin


Big, medium, small...pumpkins 
This activity was completed with our Fourth Grade Reading Buddies.  





It's been a tradition for the Kindergarteners to sing at the Eighth Grade Commissioning Mass.  The 8th grade and kinders form a year long bond as they attend Mass and do other activities throughout the school year together.  It really is heartwarming to hear their little angelic voices singing.



On our way up to Miller Farms in Henderson, CO.  
It was a fantastic day to harvest our own carrots, onions, potatoes, corn, and pumpkins.  This was the first time on a school bus for some of these little kiddos...noisy with excitement! 










They were all tuckered out by the end of the day.  Needless to say the hour long bus ride back to school was pleasantly quiet. Zzzzzzzzz.........


Random Patterning & Sorting Activities 












 I used Shannon Martin's Little Spider Crawls book along with spiders I cut with my CRICUT:


 Time started to run out when we were in for a storm.  Some of you might know that our "unofficial" motto in Colorado is "If you don't like the weather, wait 5 minutes".  

Here is a picture of the view from my classroom door at about noon on 10/25/11 {high around 70}

And 24 hours later {about 7 inches fell throughout the day, high around 32}:

Symmetrical Kinder Monsters:







My husband is just a big kid.  So when we were out shopping for goodies he picked up ghoulish finger pointers and spiders to give to all the kids...they love him almost as much I do!


To end the very busy month of October, my dear friends Sully and Mike stopped by for a visit.  Unfortunately, the kiddos were in art.  But!  They were nice enough to leave us ALL the ingredients and recipe for Monster Floats!






October was a short month for us.  We had P/T conferences, not just 1 but 2 professional development days, and had extra music time to prepare for our big day as choir.  Needless to say, we didn't get through everything I had planned.  But we did have a ghoulishly good time!

HAPPY FALL BREAK BLOGGY FRIENDS!

A Complete Waste of Makeup~Erin Condren Giveaway

Click on the button to go to A Complete Waste of Makeup's blog to get more information! I have my eye on a couple of planners, so my fingers are crossed!




This is a FaN.Tas.TIc giveaway!

"Fall"ing Randomness

Happy Wednesday!  Now that the weather is finally starting to feel like fall here in Denver {down to 75 degrees}, we have been busy doing several fall activities.  

Autumn Leaves are falling down.  
Red, orange, yellow, and brown.  
Falling gently to the ground.




I've been doing this fall project for years.  I think I found it originally on Little Giraffes website.  I love it because the kiddos get to use fine motor skills~NO SCISSORS ARE USED~all tearing.


This is a Kim Jordano Sight Word Book {LUUUUV Kim Jordano}!  I use sticks and glitter foam stickers I get on clearance each year after the holiday from Hobby Lobby and make pointers.





Not a sad reading face in the audience!!!


These are just simple pumpkins that I have added numbers and "seeds" to with a marker before I laminate.  Here they were using counters to match the numeral card to the amount of pumpkin seeds.






Uppercase "momma" pumpkins needed to be matched with lowercase "baby" pumpkins.  
This group worked together and matched all 26 letters!

These apples needed the right amount of seeds.  This group worked at matching and 
putting the cards in numerical order.



Applesauce time!






These are my Target treasures {my kiddos actually call them that, too cute}.  Actually these are plastic fall themed table confetti.  This group used them to sort and to make patterns.



Leaves!  Our 4th Grade Reading Buddies joined us for this activity.  Each one of my kiddos got a Ziploc baggy with a leaf and a half sheet of paper.  I encouraged the 4th graders to assist their kinder buddy to use 4 of the 5 senses as they observed the leaf.


I then use the real leaves as part of the class book.  I tape the leaf to the top of the baggy and put the writing on the bottom.  I use the baggies so they can hold it up and see it through the light.




Rock Pumpkins


We are getting rid of a ton of river rocks that were in our back yard.  So I thought in stead of a pet rock, why not make rock pumpkins!



I hot glued on sticks that I found in my yard for the stem and the littles used a marker to put on the face. 



Here is our pumpkin patch outside of our door.


I LOVE FALL!!!