Halloween 2020 Ideas

Halloween is one of our favorite holidays!  We go all out with decorations, we usually have a party and invite the girls' friends, we have our favorite Halloween movies that we watch throughout October -- from Boo to You, Winnie the Pooh to Hocus Pocus!  We make it a month-long celebration.  Fall is my favorite time of year, the house is cozy, the weather is cozy, it's the start of the holiday season.  Our little New England town sets 2 hours for trick-or-treating on Halloween -- usually 5:00 to 7:00pm.  We have the kids come early, we have pizza and munchies, then head out for trick-or-treating.  We have no sidewalks on our street, and our town basically has 2 big streets that kids trick-or-treat on.  One is around the corner from us and there are some houses that give out candy along the way.  The 2 main streets go ALL OUT.  I mean, haunted houses, fire pits out front, hot cider, donuts, hay bale mazes, ghosts that fly out from the top of someone's barn, one man even adjusts all of his shutters on his 2 story home to make it look haunted and he dresses as Dracula.  It's so much fun for the kids -- and adults!  

Things are a little up in the air, to say the least this year.  It would not be a surprise if towns did not have trick-or-treating.  Or, if parents decided it was just safer to skip it this year.  There certainly are safety measures that can be taken - wearing face masks, hand sanitizer after each house, kids opening bags for homeowners to drop candy into with no contact. 

 

Last year's brownies!

Our plan for this year is what I'm calling "Reverse Trick-or-Treating."  The girls are still going to get dressed up but instead of trick-or-treating in town, we are going to put together goody bags and drive to friends' and family and drop our treats off to them.  The girls are excited and it will be something fun and different to do.  And we are still decorating, we'll still carve pumpkins, we'll still watch our Halloween shows all month.  The girls want to reverse trick-or-treat and then come home and have the party foods we would usually have.  My youngest, an avid baker, wants to have a cookie decorating contest, and she wants to watch her first "scary" movie.  My eldest is on board with all of that but also wants to watch Rocky Horror Picture Show.  Good thing it's on a Saturday this year -- it's going to be a BUSY day!!

Whatever you do, try to make the best of these crazy times we are living in and try to make it festive for your kids but also yourself - these are stressful times - have some fun!

Back to School During a Pandemic

We are coming into my favorite time of year - fall!  I always feel a little sad that summer is ending and the kids will have to go back to school and we will have to get back into a more structured routine.  But then the nights get cooler, the leaves start to change a little, I remember all of my favorite fall decor that I get to put up, and the crockpot comes out of hiding.  All comfortable, wonderful things!  I don't mind a little structured routine - I always end up embracing it right around this time and we get excited about new school clothes, fresh school supplies, catching up with friends!  And then there is this year...

As most people did, we ended last school year remotely.  My eldest was home on a college break in March when Coronavirus hit.  Thankfully, she was home safe and sound and had been for 2 weeks, because she'd been going to school in Boston, MA which was HIT HARD.  To say the least!  The only difficulty was that a lot of her stuff was still at school, as she'd planned to finish up the school year there before transferring this year.  She was given a day and time to come and get her stuff and then she spent March-May finishing her freshman year of college in her bedroom.  While her sister finished 8th grade in her bedroom.  We were one of the lucky families, for sure -- I have heard a quote that aptly describes this whole situation.  "We are all in the same storm, but we are not in the same boat!"  Honestly, we have had our share of tough times - lost jobs, accidents, unexpected surgery, financial hardships - so I understand going through difficult times.  This time, we were somehow blessed -- my husband was considered an essential worker so he has continued to go out and work consistently.  I work out of my home office for a human service agency.  Initially I worried that I might not have a job during this time, but we support seniors living at home and we were able to shift some of what we do to continue to provide crucial services.  We also are lucky to have good internet in our rural area, quiet spaces for each of us to do our school or work without interruptions, and two girls who get along incredibly well even under stressful situations.  It got long and it got tiring but we trudged along, occasionally hopping in the car to just drive around and see something other than our house.  We managed, just as we have managed this summer which was not at all the summer we had planned or hoped for.  We still tried to have some fun when and where we could.

And now summer is over and school is starting.  My eldest is a sophomore, a transfer student at a new school.  She agonized for weeks (months?) and finally made the tough decision to cancel her housing assignment and do her classes remotely from home.  Most of her friends are back at their schools, but as we hear stories about this party, or that school switching to remote after 2 weeks, or how isolated some people are feeling because of the necessary safety precautions -- she knows she made the right choice for her.  Knowing that doesn't make it easier.  Although she's comfortable and safe and happy at home, she's missing socializing and meeting new friends, and remote classes are tough - professors with sketchy internet, trying to do group projects on Zoom, not having real face time with people - it will be a long semester, maybe year!  Week one of sophomore year is done and she looks at each class, assignment, test, as one step closer to hopefully having a more normal college experience next year and to reaching her future goals. 

And my youngest - starting high school!  Cannot believe it...  We waited to see what the plan would be for this year, me silently hoping (for both girls, actually) that the school would decide to start totally remotely to be safe.  Again, we are blessed that our situation makes remote learning not a bad option.  But I get that not everyone is in the same boat in this storm -- I know families with 4 or more kids, I know families that don't have the best internet simply because of where they live in our rural area.  I know people who have to work out of the home and who have younger kids that would not be able to be on their own.  There are no easy, one size fits all answers in the middle of a pandemic.  Our school district worked hard to try to please as many people as possible keeping student safety at the forefront (from what I understand).  I appreciate that.  I would not want to work in education this year - not as an administrator, not as a teacher.  It is a tireless, thankless job for the most part this year -- at least, the people who are thankful are maybe not as vocal as the people who are not.  In our district we have an in-person option and a remote option.  For the in-person, they are splitting the students (at least at the high school - the plan was a 54 page document so I really only could get through what was relevant to us!) in half and alternating weeks either in-person one week and remote the next, or vice versa.  Then they are all remote from Thanksgiving break to Martin Luther King Jr. Day.  So, really my girl would only be IN school for 20 days before going remote through the holidays.  But also, she's not technically "in" school...  She'll be in a tent for 3 out of 4 classes a day.  She REALLY wants to go and see her friends and I REALLY wanted her to stay home.  She finally won.  I think the plan the district has is about as safe as they can make it, provided that people follow it - doing the at home health screen, wear masks, etc.  Even this "in-person" option does not make it that easy on working parents, so I empathize with people's stress and frustration.  I also have friends that are teachers who have their own families and are panicked about working in-person and bringing something home to their loved ones.  Again, it is not an easy year, to say the least!  

I think the best thing that any of us can do right now, is to be as patient and as kind as we can be -- to everyone -- teachers, administrators, other parents, our children, and ourselves.  And kindness and patience is important in person, but it is also SO important on social media.  Regardless of the state of our "boat", this storm is affecting all of us in one way or another.  Be kind.

Trampoline

Back in March, we heard that my youngest's school year was switching to remote learning and all of her end of year activities were cancelled.  No 8th grade trip to Washington DC, band competition & trip to Six Flags, softball tryouts, end of year concert, 8th grade graduation, and likely the summer musical that she's enjoyed being in the past two summers.  We anticipated that a "bummer summer" was looming ahead with no visitors, no trips, no sleepovers with friends, no annual '80's party, no beloved cousins coming to stay and the town pool closed for the season.  I gathered the girls and we made a summer wish list and a summer to-do list -- all things that we thought we could still do, in spite of the pandemic sweeping the globe.  The top of the list for my youngest - something she's been asking for for ages - a trampoline!  I took some of the money that we were refunded from the Washington trip and I found a trampoline on Amazon - searched all around but in addition to a run on toilet paper and sanitizing wipes, TRAMPOLINES and actually KIDDIE POOLS were also pretty darn hard to find!  I placed an order for both items in April and they arrived around Memorial Day weekend!  The pool was not a big success, some fun was had but it was a hard summer to keep a kiddie pool going - a run of cool days led to little use and a need for a lot of scrubbing and chlorine shock - and with so little rainfall (we must be in a drought this summer!) it was hard to justify constantly emptying and filling the pool.  But the trampoline...  BIG hit!  My youngest is out there a ton (pictured above) and my eldest enjoys it too - to bounce on but also she has spent quite a bit of time just lying on it and reading this summer!  And my husband, the biggest kid of all, loves to jump on it!  Summer is winding down, this will be enjoyed into the fall and then we'll tackle how to store it this winter - yikes.  But much loved and used this summer - well worth it!

"Wall of Fame"

With all of this time spent at home, I have been in project mode!  Some cleaning and organizing, some de-cluttering, some makeovers...  While cleaning out my big storage closet and coming across high school band concert posters and play programs I got an idea -- why let them collect dust in the closet, why not hang them?  My two girls have been involved in a lot of things in school - bands, honors ensembles, plays, musicals, film fests, etc.  We are always proud of their hard work, effort and achievements so why not show them?  We have a staircase with bare walls and I have not known what to decorate that with.  We purchased very inexpensive black frames from Walmart and we used the Command strips to hang everything -- so my husband didn't have to hammer a ton of nails into the wall (he was thrilled!!)!  This is one of my favorite projects that we have done in the house - I love seeing it everyday and these important moments are on display to be remembered instead of cluttered in a closet.  But the best part of all is that the girls love seeing their hard work on display!

Summer Garden

We tried our second garden this summer!  This was a trial and error year which was prompted by the Coronavirus global pandemic.  Back in April, supermarkets seemed to be clearing out - in addition to toilet paper, sanitizing supplies and even bread and baking supplies running out, locally we were low on things like eggs.  We know lots of people in our town that have chickens or ducks for eggs and I was deeply regretting not having our own chickens!  (Although, truthfully, I've heard some stories that make me think YIKES... the term "egg bound" springs to mind...)  But a conversation with my bestie about the value of being more self-sufficient got me motivated to start our first garden here!  And, with a long "pandemic summer" looming ahead of us I thought a summer garden would be a great project to keep the girls entertained.  (I was half right...)  My friend told me that seeds were also hard to come by this year, but we had a canister of (old) heirloom seeds that I had been holding on to for years.  We decided to build raised garden beds on the sunniest side of our house.  That side of the has a light layer of gravel on the ground (the former homeowner kept a camper over there) so this was an easy way to plant a garden without having to use a roto-tiller.  My husband built two simple wood framed boxes and we had a load of dirt delivered to fill them.  All of the time and effort to prep this year is done and next year will be a piece of cake!  We planted our seeds after doing some internet research about what each plant would need (amount of space, sun, etc.).  We also tried planting a few cut up potatoes with eyes, some green onions that we had used and started in a jar of water until roots had grown again.  

And we planted some already started mint and tomato plants.  The girls were able to watch the plants from their bedroom windows this summer which was fun for them and my eldest turned out to be quite the farmer!  The garden ended up being HER project this summer - her younger sister did a lot of cooking, which she enjoys, but she is not terribly interested in gardening.  But differences make life interesting!  Anyway, our old seeds were...too old.  But we got a few little potatoes, lots of mint, TONS of tomatoes, some basil...  All in all, not a bad harvest!  Of course our family farmer, happens to be a vegetarian who does not like tomatoes.  So I tried some new recipes that transformed tomatoes into things she would eat.  We tried fried green tomatoes which were delicious, Half Baked Harvest Easy Sheet Pan Tomato Herb Pizza which was a big hit (my husband liked it better than take-out!), roasted tomato pasta sauce, and tomorrow I will try my hand at fresh salsa.  We look forward to next year's garden, trying some new things (getting new seeds!) and learning from this year's experience.