Monster School: Halloween Projects

Halloween Projects

Lately, it may have seemed like we haven’t been keeping up with Monster School, or at least that I wasn’t keeping up with this blog. Neither is true.

Okay, the second part might be a little true.

But, back to the first part. We have been moving forward through the alphabet – this week we are working on Little e. Interspersed throughout the letter work and regular “school” projects, we have been working on a lot of Halloween projects.

I love Halloween and it is pretty clear that Grace really likes it, too.

Gel Window Clings

For about a week (after we first got them), these kept her busy for 20 minutes at a time. They are great!

 

 

Baggie Jack-o-Lantern Painting

The eyes, nose, and smile are taped to the back of the baggie.

Black Cat

I remember making these cats when I was little. Grace enjoyed helping me glue the parts together and singing a song to go along with it. I added the eyes, pink in the ears, nose and mouth, and whiskers with chalk after the glue was dried.

Contact Paper Bat

The week prior to this project, Grace worked on her cutting skills by cutting strips of black construction paper into smaller bits. I cut a bat-shape out of contact paper and used painters tape to stick it (with contact paper sticky side out) to the window.

After we filled the shape, I used another piece of contact paper to seal the pieces in and added googly eyes with glue.

Cotton Ball Ghost

 

 

In preparation, I free-handed a ghost shape onto construction paper and cut cotton balls in half. I gave Grace a paper plate of Mod Podge. We dipped the cotton balls into the glue and then stuck them to the paper inside the line drawing. I added black eyes and a mouth after the cotton balls had dried on the paper.

Sandy Fall Sensory Play

 

I rarely let Grace play with sand in the house because of the expected mess, but she caught me at a weak moment recently. I gave her acrylic pumpkins, acorns, and fall leaves to play with in the sand.

 

She was so excited every time that she found one of the pieces that she put in the sand.

Yep, the mess on the counter that you can see is equaled on the floor and her step stool.

Mirror Play

After the mess from the sand, I switched the station to this:

 

Don’t mind her out-of-it look – she found this as soon as she woke up. We didn’t even have breakfast before she was well on to playing with this.

 

Fall Sensory Bucket

This was a very random bucket of fall things – mini-pumpkins, real acorns that Grace had found in our front yard, and felt leaf table scatter. The acorns and leaves only kept her attention for a day or so, the pumpkins are still a huge hit.

Pumpkins vs. Markers

Grace made up this project on her own. One morning she asked if she could use her markers on her pumpkins. I told her that she could. They are dry erase markers, so I knew that I could clean off anything that I needed to, but her artwork is pretty cute.

Ghost Bowling

I found this project idea on Pinterest and was excited to try it out, because Grace loves kicking and throwing balls.

It QUICKLY (she never actually rolled the pumpkin) became a game of just stacking the ghosts and knocking them down.

Hand-print Spider

This is a project that happened because I literally had everything on hand.I painted a spare canvas (that I had from a failed projects months ago) orange. After the hand-print dress from Forth of July, Grace really enjoys hand-print projects. She is really good about holding still while I paint her hand and then smushing it where I tell her to. She helped me add the eyes later and I added the string when everything was dried.

Pumpkin Watercolors

I found this project through a blog… but, now, I don’t remember which one. They mixed black acrylic paint with glue to form the outlines and then used watercolor paint after it was dried to create a stained-glass effect.

Grace loves painting. She also loves mixing the paints on her palette. The pictures don’t show it well at all, but you can actually see all five different colors that she was using, even though they are pretty well blended.