Pumpkin Carving..

Just one more of many posts like this one all over the internet right now... it is, after all, almost Halloween! My son and I picked out this beautiful round orange pumpkin the other day at a roadside stand. There were so many to choose from!

He enjoyed rolling it around the living room and comparing it to a couple of other smaller pumpkins that we had purchased at different times this week. I showed him pictures of Jack-O-Lanterns in a few story books that we had around and we even explored pictures on Google images. Once he finally understood what we were going to do, he got very excited! The other night after dinner, we put out some newspaper and cut that pumpkin open.

He was a little hesitant to pull the top off....

And although he wasn't very keen on putting his hands inside to get the seeds out, he did end up giving it a try. I did have to pull most of them out myself though.

He helped me to decide how to draw the face by naming the parts that we needed: eyes, nose & mouth:

After we drew it, I worked on cutting the pieces out with a knife. He was very interested in the knife... why is it always the most dangerous part that the little ones are interested in? Once we got it cut out, he spend quite some time putting the pieces back in the holes like a puzzle.

Here it is all finished and lit up!

How did pumpkin carving go at your house??

Ahh... Friday!

It's been a crazy busy week - I almost thought I'd lose my mind this week between my day job at preschool, my night work at the university, my toddler at home AND the addition of a class for my teaching re-certification!!!  There have been more than a few movements where I about threw my hands into the air and walked away... but thankfully, there's always been something to bring me back to earth - my husband, my son, the beautiful fall weather, a university student thanking me for something that I taught them or one of my preschoolers accomplishing something new and exciting. I am thankful for everyone who supports me in ALL of my many endeavors - on this Friday, I'll recap with my a 5 for Friday:

1. Sensory Bin Preparation - My son and I enjoyed putting together the fall themed sensory bin for my preschool students. He tested it out and approved.  Here he is playing in the popcorn - you can find more about this sensory bin here.

2. Re-purposed Sensory Bin -- Then when I took the sensory bin to school, he threw a fit! He insisted that the 'popcorn box' come back - instead I brought home the rainbow pasta from 2 weeks ago. This is how he re-purposed the rainbow pasta for his own enjoyment.

3.  Fall Leaves -- At school, we've been learning about fall and leaves - I really LOVE the fall and all of the beautiful fall leaves. Today, I found myself wandering around the yard, looking for leaves... here's our scissor practice tray with colorful fall leaves.

4.  Paper Bag Pumpkin Craft - today we made a pumpkin out of a paper lunch sack during our language group. Our speech therapist did a great job with this activity! The kids loved stuffing the bag with paper towels, painting and then adding pieces for the face.

5. Fine Motor Friday... well it's really been all week. I have a few students who need lots of adaptations for activities, which has challenged me to think outside of the box many times this week. I'm working on a post of fine motor related modifications that I make so that all of my students can participate in activities during the week. Here are a few of this weeks' ideas - wiki sticks to help students look at their work and to color inside the lines and painted fingernails (hot pink, nail stickers and glitter) to help remind a student to orient hands properly for cutting tasks.

Thanks for visiting! What did you do this week? Feel free to link your post in the comments!