(picture from hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com)If you'd like to make your own easy advent calendar, you can copy these activities, jokes and trivia that I used for ours. I tried to make everything something that could be done with little or no supervision and with nothing that I needed to go out and buy. I'll attach these inside of the 31 links of a paper chain. Some will be too big to put inside of the link, so I'll set them elsewhere and put a note in the chain telling where to find the instructions. If you'd rather not do the chain, you could also print the sections, cut them up and put them into a jar to draw one out randomly each day. Please do swipe this idea if it's something your family would enjoy and write to tell me about it!
The 31 Days of Halloween:
1. Q. Why did Dracula take cold medicine? A. To stop his coffin.
2. The people of Grave's End just discovered that someone -- or something! -- has messed with the town's famous historical marker. It might have been bewitched by a legendary pirate ghost that haunts the village! Oddly, many villagers can still read the sign. Can you?
3. The ancient Celts thought that spirits and ghosts roamed the countryside on Halloween night. They began wearing masks and costumes to avoid being recognized as human.
4. Q: What do they teach in witching school? A: Spelling.
5. Make grocery bag ghosts:
Balloon Ghost Craft
This cute ghost is easy to make from a balloon and two plastic grocery bags.
It makes a great Halloween decoration or a toy (but not for very young children). This ghost flies really well!
Supplies needed:
• A white balloon
• Scissors
• 2 white plastic grocery bags
• Tape
• A black marker
Cut the handles off the white plastic grocery bags. If there are colored markings on the bags, cut them off too.
Leaving the seam at the bottom of the bags intact cut the bags into strips.
Blow up a white balloon.
Tape the plastic bags around the end of the balloon (tape the bags in a circle a few inches from one end of the balloon). If you plan on hanging the ghost up as a decoration, tape the plastic bags around the plain end, leaving the tied end of the balloon exposed so you can tie a string to the top of the ghost.
Using a black marker, draw two eyes and a mouth on the balloon.
You now have a spooky ghost that you can use as a Halloween decoration or as a toy (but not for very young children). This ghost flies really well!
6. On Halloween, Irish peasants would beg the rich for food. For those that refused, they would play a practical joke. So, in an effort to avoid being tricked, the rich would hand out cookies, candy, and fruit – a practice that morphed into trick-or-treating today.
7. Q: What do you get when you cross Bambi with a ghost? A: Bamboo
8. Walk the neighborhood on a Halloween Themed Scavenger Hunt. Using only the things you can see from the sidewalk, find the following items:
A skeleton
A pumpkin
A spider
A ghost
A black cat
A scarecrow
A broom
The Word “Halloween”
9. Q: What's the ratio of a pumpkin's circumference to its diameter? A: Pumpkin Pi
10. Orange and black are Halloween colors because orange is associated with the Fall harvest and black is associated with darkness and death.
11. Make a Halloween Card today to deliver to a friend.
12.Q: What is a ghost's favorite party game? A: Hide-and-go-shriek
13.90% of parents admit to sneaking goodies from their kids’ Halloween trick-or-treat bags
14. Use items in nature (sticks, leaves, etc), glue and a piece of cardboard to make a sign with our family name like this one:
Use string to hang it on our front porch.
15. Q: Who did the ghost invite to his party? A: Anyone he could dig up!
16. More than 35 million pounds of candy corn will be produced this year. That equates to nearly 9 billion pieces – enough to circle the moon nearly 4 times if laid end-to-end.
17. Take This Pumpkin Quiz (circle the correct answer):
1. Jack O' Lanterns were originally carved from:
Pumpkins
Turnips
Watermelons
2. Can you guess the weight of the biggest pumpkin ever grown?
1,689 pounds
992 pounds
94 pounds
3. What is a Native American word for pumpkin?
Gourd
Isquotersquash
Homobock
4. Pumpkins, zucchini, cucumbers, and tomatoes are all:
Grains
Vegetables
Fruits
5. What pumpkin eater had a wife but couldn't keep her?
Jack Sprat
Peter Piper
Peter Peter
6. Who rode to the ball in a horse-drawn pumpkin?
Cinderella
Sleeping Beauty
Queen Elizabeth
7. Who rode around Sleepy Hollow with a pumpkin for a head?
Ichabod Crane
The Headless Horseman
Bart Simpson
Answer Key
1: Jack O' Lanterns were originally carved from:
Correct Answer: Turnips
2: Can you guess the weight of the biggest pumpkin ever grown?
Correct Answer: 1,689 pounds
3: What is a Native American word for pumpkin?
Correct Answer: Isquotersquash
4: Pumpkins, zucchini, cucumbers, and tomatoes are all:
Correct Answer: Fruits
5: What pumpkin eater had a wife but couldn't keep her?
Correct Answer: Peter Peter
6: Who rode to the ball in a horse-drawn pumpkin?
Correct Answer: Cinderella
7: Who rode around Sleepy Hollow with a pumpkin for a head?
Correct Answer: The Headless Horseman
18. Q: What is a monster's favorite food? A: Ghoul scout cookies
19.Trace your hands and feet and color them to create witch and monster hands like this:
20. Q: How do you keep a monster from biting his nails? A: Give him screws.
21. Some so-called vampire bats do drink blood, but they're not from Transylvania. They live in Central and South America and feed on cattle, horses, and birds.
22. Glue leaves to paper and make them into animals like this:
23. Q: Why didn't Dracula get married? A: He never met a nice Ghoul
24. The witch is a central symbol of Halloween and is identified with the holiday throughout the history of Halloween. The name comes from the Saxon wicca, meaning 'wise one'. When setting out for a Sabbath, witches rubbed a sacred ointment onto their skin. This gave them a feeling of flying, and if they had been fasting they felt even giddier. Some witches rode on horseback, but poor witches went on foot and carried a broom or a pole to aid in vaulting over streams.
25. Using the palms of your hands and tracings of your feet, make a pumpkin and ghost wreath like this (attach to a cardboard circle):
26. Q: Why didn’t the skeleton cross the road? A: He had no guts
27. The world's fastest time to carve a face into a pumpkin is 54.72 seconds, by Stephen Clarke (USA), on October 23, 2001 (source: Guinness World Records)
28. Magic Time! Play these tricks with your shadow:
Try to:
• hide from your own shadow
• shake hands with someone else's shadow without actually touching hands
• touch someone else's shadow with your own
• make your shadow do things you can't, such as touch the top of a tree or building
• fit your shadow inside someone else's
• turn your shadow into letter shapes (b, f, k, p, t, and y are good ones to try)
29. Q: What do you call dead cows that come back to life? A: Zombeef.
30. The next full moon on Halloween night will be October 31, 2020
31. Play a few rounds of: The Legend of Shrinking Island
Instructions
1. Before play begins, place a few old towels on the floor, making sure the group of towels offers just enough standing room for all of the players.
2. As in musical chairs, players must walk around in a circle whenever the music is playing. When the music stops, each player scrambles to stand on a towel (several players might be able to fit on one towel, depending on its size). Players are allowed to clutch onto a friend so that they can squeeze onto an island. Any player who can't stand with both feet on an island is out.
3. After each round, an island is folded (to reduce the available standing room) or removed entirely. You may want to switch to a hand towel or a washcloth for the final rounds. The last person standing on an island wins.
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