Did October even happen?
What a quick and busy month this has been, especially here in Key West. As we wind down this month, and move into the next, we’d like to encourage you all to take a pause, take a deep breath, stop for a minute; the next couple of months will be even more busy than the last with the holidays quickly approaching. Pausing is something that we are encouraging our Pigeon Plum friends to do to help them recognize within themselves that they need to breath for a moment, whether it be because they were getting overly excited or too frustrated, helping them to learn this valuable skill now will help them better control these emotions in the future. And there is no better teacher than seeing mom and dad use these skills!
But about this month, whoa! Fall approached and it came fast. We enjoyed a visit from the Key West Fire Department firefighters, where they brought us a fire truck to see and some friends even went inside! And of course it wouldn’t be October without pumpkins; pumpkins were everywhere in the Toddler Community this month! We asked for pumpkins and gourds for our playground pumpkin patch and everyone went above and beyond, and our patch grew and grew! The children loved carrying them around the playground, pushing them in wheelbarrows, standing on them, sitting on them, and learning about their names. Our two favorite books this month were Five Little Pumpkins (and of course the song, too!), and Big Pumpkin. We even had pumpkin scrubbing, a pumpkin language lesson, and different kinds of pumpkins and gourds in a basket for the children to hold and look at in the classroom. It was fun to bake pumpkin muffins this month and see what pumpkin looks like in another form; the children thought it felt “squishy” and “slimy”, but boy did it smell delicious!
And to leave on happy note to remember all of the fun and good things of the past month, a quote that is a favorite for this time of year, “I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.” ~Anne of Green Gables (Because who doesn’t love pumpkins, cooler weather, and falling leaves—even in our tropical Key West!)
Here’s to more happy fall days ahead!
~Ms. Melanie and Ms. Ashley
