Festivities, Somewhat

There was a paradeand a whack-o-lanternand trick-or-treatingand tree climbingand more tree climbingand just general awesomeness

and for me, 46 papers to grade, many of which are not at all awesome by any stretch of the imagination.

Here's a little thing I look forward to every weekend, however: the Dover Sampler. I don't remember how long ago I signed up for this, but every Saturday morning in my email in-box I receive a secret link to a site with free pages from Dover books--mostly coloring book pages, which the girls enjoy immensely, but sometimes simple mazes or puzzles or activity pages. Some recent favorites were pages from a birds of America coloring book, a butterfly alphabet coloring book, a famous ballets coloring book, and an activity page on learning to tell time.

To show you how additionally cheap/awesome I am, I'll tell you that whenever one of my print cartridges is almost out of ink, I set it aside and put it in just to print out coloring pages and cutting templates--the kids don't care if their free sample Cats of Siam page is inked in black or pink, don't you know.

Another way in which I'm cheap/awesome? I've never bought my children a coloring book, much less a Dover one.

P.S. Check out my review of earth-friendly children's books over at Eco Child's Play and my tutorial for sewing appliques onto denim buntings over at Crafting a Green World.