Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Countdown to Halloween - A New Family Tradition

This year we are doing a Countdown to Halloween. It will start tomorrow - the 18th of October - 13 days before Halloween.

I've seen the idea for a Countdown to Halloween on the internet, Flickr, and Pinterest. However, what caught my eye out of all the variations was one from The Home Teacher that focuses only on the 13 days leading up to Halloween.

Not only does the site have a variety of different educational and fun activities, there are also ideas for including a daily service project component which gives this holiday a different focus. It's just not all about fun, costumes, and trick-or-treating...it's about making a positive difference in the community.

So, looking at the 13 themes on The Home Teacher, I rearranged them to fit our schedule. I also picked out activities that I thought looked fun and/or meaningful for each day.

The themes we are doing are below. There are links to the posts that include the activities we did plus photos, instructions for activities, and recipes:

Thursday, October 18 => Witch
Friday, October 19 => Black Cat
Saturday, October 20 => Monster
Sunday, October 21 => Vampire
Monday, October 22 => Skeleton
Tuesday, October 23 => Spider
Wednesday, October 24 Ghost
Thursday, October 25 => Owl
Friday, October 26 => Mummy
Saturday, October 27 => Haunted House
Sunday, October 28 => Candy Corn
Monday, October 29 => Bat
Tuesday, October 30 => Pumpkin

On Wednesday, October 31, we'll have special Halloween-themed meals, the girls will dress up in costumes, and we'll go trick-or-treating.

As we did last year, we'll visit the senior cottages (1-level homes where seniors live in our community). The girls made sure that with senior they visited they wished her/him a Happy Halloween and gave them a compliment (e.g., the way they decorated their home with Halloween decor, a pretty display they had out by the front door).

I'm excited about this year's Countdown to Halloween, and hope Sophia and Olivia enjoy the activities that we'll be doing each day.

Whey Beyond the Naked Truth

5 comments:

What I Want My Kids To Know said...

I love traditions like this that are fun, educational, and help build a kids spirit and integrity.

Hilary said...

What a great idea and tradition


sweepingmama.com

Anonymous said...

What a cool tradition... I will have to do something like this with my son!

Were Parents said...

Such a cool tradition to start!

Lauren Ivy Chiong said...

What a great idea and so much fun. Kids love traditions like this. It's so memorable for them!