carnage

Hubs and I came home to this...

Heavy, wet snow had broken huge branches down all over town.
We were like, Holy Moly!
The big branch in the center is actually the top of that tree on the right.
I certainly felt sad, but I do love a good snow-adventure!



In other news:

You can't see it in the crazy tree photo, but there was a box on the porch addressed to yours truly.

The box carried precious cargo all the way from Illinois, through a blizzard, to our little ol' home sweet home.
{Precious because it contained the most crucial element of my Halloween costume.}

Hmmm... what could it be?

You're right! 2 1/2 pounds of vintage, fake fruit!

Any guesses on who or what I'm going to be?

apple graphing

A concrete first-experience in bar graphing:
APPLES!!!

Earlier in the day, I had gathered an assortment of apples.
Some were from the store,
and some were picked from the trees on the playground
{A few even had bites taken out of them by worms and birds!}
I gave each child an apple,
and asked them to think of different ways we could sort them.
When a child thought of a way,
I wrote it down on strips of paper.
Then, each child put his or her apple on the chart
above the appropriate label.
We counted and made lots of observations...
it was really fun!

Some of the ways we sorted the apples:
color {red, green, red and green}
sticker or no sticker
size {small, medium, large}
stem or no stem
shape {sphere-shaped, ovoid-shaped}
bites or no bites

Here's a photo of the blank bar graph I made.
It worked so well, I think I'm going to make a more permanent version
out of poster board or laminated paper.
I wrote the numbers on the left side
and drew lines across to separate the rows.
I cut up several strips of paper to write the labels on;
if you had a laminated graph,
you could write the labels with an erasable marker
and wipe them off when you were done.
Actually, you could to that with the numbers, too,
depending on what scale you wanted to use - 1's, 5's, 10's, etc!

Hmmm... I wonder what we'll graph next?

it's beginning to look...

SPOOKY
around here...

I stayed home today because
I thought I had pink eye.
YIKES!
{Can you see the redness?}
It turned out to be something else;
something that starts with an "e."
{I can't quite remember.}
Since I can only wear a contact in my good eye,
everything feels a little strange.
{and dangerous!}
The good thing about staying home from school
was that I was able to get a start on my
Halloween decor.
{Hubs & I had pinky sworn that I would wait until October,
and today just so happened to be October 1st.}
I was feeling rather inspired
because my neighbor girls had stopped by yesterday
to ask if I we were going to do Halloween this year.
{and to sell magazines and cookie dough for their soccer team}
That means I officially have a neighborhood
Halloween reputation
to uphold.
{It's going to be awesome.}

snow?

Ummm... I can't quite believe it,
but the cold white stuff fell all day here.
{It was 82 degrees F and sunny yesterday, btw.}
All I can say is,

Yee haw!
Keep it coming!

hand washing

In a classroom filled with kids and teachers,
it is imperative that we wash our hands
A LOT.
Usually, it's 30 seconds at the sink
with that orange antibacterial goop,
but every once and awhile it's nice to slow down,
bring out the french-milled soap,
and turn it into an elegant affair. ;)

What you'll need:

• soap (the fancier the better) & a fingernail brush in a dish
• pitcher for warm water (Do you remember what the red line says?)
• hand towel
• mat (to organize materials and to catch any stray splashes of water)
• basin
  
• delicious hand cream

As I observed this child washing her hands,
I realized that she was having a special experience.
Not only did her body relax as she concentrated on her task,
but she took the time admire all the tiny details on her hands.
Taking a moment to care for herself became meditative and intimate.

I can't say exactly how this child felt
as she dried her hands and rubbed cream into her skin,
but I can tell you that after I took my turn,
my fingers were literally tingling with joy...
okay, you're probably thinking
cheesy!
but seriously, people,

it was like a Montessori spa!