Harvest Hoedown

My son's preschool has a special Harvest Hoedown every year just for the "big" 4 year olds!  The kids wear their cowboy/cowgirl finest of hats, blue jeans, bandannas, & boots, and the gym is decorated Harvest Hoedown style with hay, pumpkins, scarecrows, leaves, mums, burlap, etc.  They have lunch all together in the gym with cupcakes for dessert.  You can download the Harvest Hoedown cupcake toppers HERE (print on white cardstock, cut with a 2" circle punch, & attach with tape to coffee stirrers cut in half).

Here's a picture of the tables.  The kids all made their own placemats before hand. 

The Harvest Hoedown planner did such a good job and was able to borrow some small riding tractors from the local pumpkin patch.  The small tractors, along with hay bales, pumpkins, scarecrows, & leaves made an excellent backdrop for individual and class pictures.  Here's my little cowboy!

Next, it was time to play some games!  Here are some ideas for Harvest Hoedown games:

1. lasso a stick pony stuck into a bale of hay
2. decorate a pumpkin
3. throw a cowboy hat through a hula hoop
4. obstacle course/relay races "riding" a stick pony and jumping in a potato sack
5. freeze dance hoedown or line dancing
6. boot race (All kids take off shoes at one end of relay then line up at other end of relay race.  They run down and try to find their shoes in the pile before running back to the group.)
7. pumpkin bowling where the ball is a pumpkin and the pins are tin cans
8. knock down tin cans with a water gun or by throwing bean bags
9. running game using coloring pages (Color & laminate, if desired, 4 harvest coloring pages.  I attached these to sand buckets with tape.  Put each one into a different corner of the gym or field.  Tell the children to pick one page to stand at.  Randomly pick one of the pictures by pulling the name from a bag.  All of the kids at this picture are out.  Tell them all to switch places and repeat until only one kid is left!)

(7. & 8.)

(9.)

I made these little favors for our class using a kit I ordered from Oriental Trading HERE and filled them with candy corn (wrapped in sandwich bags).  They wouldn't be good for a 4 year old craft as they take a little finesse to look right but they turned out super cute as favors.  I definitely recommend reading the reviews and following other's ideas to help get these together!

Sometimes it's hard to find fall-themed ideas that aren't Halloween or Thanksgiving specific, so these should help!!  What a fun time!