Trunk or Treat: Alice in Wonderland

My new calling in our ward is my dream calling: ward activities coordinator. I love doing ward parties and once I got called, the ideas started coming. One trunk or treat idea that I have had for a few years that I have been saving in case I ever got this calling was doing Alice in Wonderland. I have been painting and creating for the past two months, and it was truly magical to see it all come to life! I first watched the movie (I went with the original movie) and just wrote idea after idea as I watched. I love to capture moments in time from a movie or a theme and see what I can create. It is one of my favorite things to have this vision in my head and see it come to life.

Before we get to the trunk or treat, we have to take a moment for these cute girls and the costumes they wore to the trunk or treat.

McCall: Chase from Paw Patrol

Baylor: A Purple Crayon (Thanks to Celina for creating the shirt! It turned out so good!) Once the costume was on, Baylor was so happy with it and I loved seeing the joy in her having this idea and we brought it to life.

Paige: A Pretty Princess

Baylor woke up with a sore throat Friday morning, so she got to join in for a bit helping decorate. She loved it and even brought her roller blades and was zooming around the church gym and was our errand girl. McCall brought her strider bike which kept her entertained until Dad was able to take them both home after work. I was at the church at 8:45 and left around 3. It turned out perfect! I had so many people help out, and I am so grateful for them.

The vision: The large doorknob that Alice goes through to go into Wonderland was on the outside door, so people had to "go through" it to get into our very own Wonderland.

I love this hallway when you first walked in! I saw the idea on Pinterest. I cut out lots of clocks and glued them on paper plates. Some smaller ones were hanging from balloons from the ceiling (I used Velcro sticky dots to connect the balloons) and then the rest of the clocks were taped to the wall. I wanted red and white balloons and then I had one single blue balloon hanging without a clock to represent Alice.

Then this sign turned out so good. Down the rabbit hole to enter Wonderland (the gym).

This sign was on the wall right as you walked in. I used AI to create it and I love how it turned out. I created the mushrooms using toilet paper and paper towel rolls. I painted them white and then painted the underside of some bowls red that I hot glued together. Then I used a dot paint brush to put the white dots on the bowls. I then painted some cardboard pieces green and hot glued them to that and added moss and bark from my backyard.

Then I took different scenes from the movie to put on each wall. The wall by the food was the scene where Tweedledee and Tweedledum tell the story of the walrus and the carpenter. The opposite that wall is when Alice meets the Cheshire Cat in the trees with all the signs pointing different ways.

Then the back walls, one side was the flower scene when Alice sings with all the different flowers and then the other wall is when Alice is lost in the woods and lots of these bird characters that look like objects come to comfort her.

On the stage side of the gym, was the Queen of Hearts scene when they are playing croquet. I had the main characters plus card guards, and we found large playing cards to tape on the stage. Then the other wall near this was the painting the roses red scene.

This is an idea I had from the beginning, and it was fun to incorporate. I made 6 white rabbits from different scenes in the movie and then "hid" them within the scenes around the gym. It was a picture scavenger hunt where kids could take pictures or selfies with each of the white rabbits throughout the night. Once they found all six, they showed me their pictures which was so fun and they got a prize. I got some snap bracelets and temporary tattoos that were all Alice in Wonderland themed for the prizes.

At the back of the gym was the unbirthday party. It was a fun scene to do! I provided cupcakes for the dessert for the dinner with my budget and so the tables were just covered in cupcakes for the unbirthday party. I had fun with characters and put a couple of stands. Nate found some teacups and saucers from the Goodwill Outlet that I used, and the paper lanterns were a last minute decision and I'm so glad I did them. I again only did 1 blue lantern to represent Alice.

A few more characters and table centerpieces- Joyce Shumway did the tables and they turned out so fun.

We had a full gym which was amazing for our ward! Celina came with her kids, which was so fun and I'm so glad that she accepted the invitation. There were quite a few families that I didn't know, and one family even saw the invitation online when they googled events near them and showed up, not evening knowing anyone. So many people invited friends and family, and we had a wonderful turnout! We had plenty of food, which is also why I did main dish and appetizer potluck and provided dessert so there was more food to eat for dinner.

There were so many trunks that were decorated amazingly! We had a great trunk or treat, and the girls got lots of great candy.

Anna and Scott always do the most amazing trunk and this year they did Pike's Place Market. They "threw" fish (Swedish fish and goldfish) to the kids and had a fish that would move around in their trunk. It was so fun!

So many people helped take down and the big bonus was that a couple of weeks ago, I found out that Paige's school's homecoming's theme was Alice in Wonderland. So, I contacted the school, and they took all the decorations. It was so nice to be able to have all this work and time I put into these decorations and that they got to be used again. It was nice to hand them all off and not have to throw them away.

What an amazing trunk or treat!

 

Preschool: Farm

This week's preschool theme was all about the farm.

Here's what McCall did:

• She wrote uppercase and lowercase letter F's and the word FARM.
• She did a cow paper plate craft.
• She drank some chocolate milk for a snack.
• We looked at a chart of fam animals: She names them, said what sound each made, and I would ask fur or feather, and I would point to an animal, and she would tell me if that animal had fur or feathers.
• She created a pig playing in the mud.
• We talked about the shapes in a barn and then she glued one together.
• She made a painted handprint horse.
• She played with farm animal little people. We sorted the animals and counted how many of each animal we had and then she just played with the farm.
• We talked about how different farm animals live either in the barn, in the pasture, or in the pond and she would point to each one when I said and animal and asked where they lived.
• She made a sheep craft with cotton balls.
• She pretended to be different animals- rolled around for a pig, bucked like a horse, and flapped her wings like a chicken.

Preschool: Pumpkins

Another fun fall themed preschool week! This week was all about pumpkins.

Here is what McCall did for the week

• Matched uppercase and lowercase pumpkins
• Looked out at our pumpkins in our yard to see the flowers and pumpkins
• Counted the pumpkins on our front porch
• Painted a pumpkin patch using an apple as the stamp
• Practiced writing the letter P and the word pumpkin in lowercase and uppercase letters
• Gutted a small pumpkin- felt the guts, counted the seeds, and learned what a pumpkin smells like
• Made a pumpkin volcano with baking soda and vinegar with some pumpkin seeds inside
• Learned the life cycle of a pumpkin and she drew her own
• Created a pumpkin sun catcher
• Listened to a Pete the Cat Pumpkin story online
• Measured some large, small, and medium pumpkins
• Painted a pumpkin with a sponge stamp
• Created a pumpkin wagon with her name on the pumpkins
• Made some colorful coffee filter jack-o-lanterns

Day in the Life

There is a trend on social media where people send a pictures to each other every hour of their day to see what a day in their life looks like. Nate was joking with me that he doesn't actually know what I do all day, so we decided to try out the trend. So here is what the average Tuesday looks like in the Smith household. I tried to text about each hour and then Nate would send me his picture.

5:30-6:30 am: I get up at 5:15 to make Paige breakfast and then Nate takes her to seminary and then to work at 6 am.

6:30-7:30 am: I usually try to go back to sleep for an hour once they leave, but today I was trying to catch up on my scripture study and took advantage of the quiet hour I had before the other two girls got up and Nate was fueling his truck and getting ready to go out for the day.

7:30-8:30 am: I make Baylor, McCall, and myself breakfast and then I do a 20-30 minute workout. Nate was getting his mower ready for the day because he had to mow a lot of the parks today.

8:30-9:30 am: I took Baylor to school and Nate was mowing.

9:30-10:30 am: I cleaned the kitchen and got the house picked up and did preschool with McCall and Nate was still mowing.

10:30-11:30 am: Nate was still mowing and I was working on trunk or treat prep and McCall was playing with Legos and puzzles.

11:30 am -12:30 pm: Lunch time for both of us.

12:30-1:30 pm: I went to my Inklings group where we talk about conference talks (I do this every Tuesday) and Nate was still mowing and saw this huge toad in the pond.

1:30-2:30 pm: I was picking up Paige from school and Nate was on the gater at his shop doing work.

2:30-3:30 pm: I was doing some more trunk or treat with the hour I had after I picked up Paige and before I had to go get Baylor and Nate was working and looking at his computer before he was done for the day.

3:30-4:30 pm: McCall loves to join me to pick up Baylor from school and Nate got home from work.

4:30-5:30 pm: I made dinner and Nate ran to the store with McCall to get something that I needed for dinner.

5:30-6:30 pm: I got the kitchen cleaned up from dinner and went outside with the girls and Nate stayed in and cleaned up some things and listed things to sell.

6:30-7:30 pm: I was outside with Celina while the kids played out on the street and rode bikes and then we were all together watching some TV and getting ready for bed.

8:30-9:30 pm: We got the girls to bed, then Nate and I watched On Patrol Live for an hour, and then we went to bed at 9:30.

Just a normal day, but no one else I would rather do life with.