Fall Family Fun Night

Sure, we’ve had Fall Family Fun Night five times before, but this year’s event was a full-blown Halloween festival.

With children — and many adults — in costume, more than 900 people turned out for the festivities on Friday, Oct. 29, and found the school brimming with activities.

Children — dressed as everything from a fairy princess to a superhero, a penguin to Super Mario, a daisy to a mummy — were invited to trick-or-treat at stations around the LMC.

Families found activities like pumpkin bowling, relays, crafts, Halloween mini golf, an eyeball bounce and even storytellers.

All the while, families and groups competed in Family Feud — a Fall Family Fun Night tradition.

Congratulations to the Family Feud winners. The first-place team was Jake Fleming, Evan Lang, Drew Winchester, McKenna Grezlik, Madison Grezlik, Jack Damhorst and Sean Fleming. A team with members of the Bradshaw, Palmquist and Lankish families finished in second place.

For the 400+ children who guessed

The pumpkin weighed 59 pounds, 8 ounces.

There were 2,359 candy corns in the guessing container. Winners will be announced Monday.

Thank you, thank you, thank you

Thank you to the many volunteers who worked extremely hard to make this event happen under the guidance of event coordinator Linda Watkins.

Prior to the event:

• Ken Markiewicz for designing and hand-drawing the very creative events signs

• Jamie, Judy, Connor and Ken Markiewicz and Amber Watkins for painting the signs

• Barb Steinkuller and family for coordinating and making our Trick-or-Treat Station Posters

• Tim Reidy for designing the putt-putt golf course

• Maria Kluemper for managing the Family Feud game communication and coordination

• Beth Siwicki for preparing the Spooky Food Guess and creative spooky clues

• Judy and Connor Markiewicz for sorting the trick or treat candy

• Darcy Hutzler for counting the candy corn and preparing the guessing slips

• Khalilah Phillips for choosing the pumpkin and preparing the guessing slips

• Amy Hausman for planning the crafts 

• Yana Chriss, Maria Kluemper, Beth Siwicki, Karen Johnson, Jessica Harris and Kathie

Smurawski for their many hours of craft preparation

• Saily Joshi, Linda Bock and Theresa Hus for helping with everything the week prior to the event (posters, inventory, last minute errands, etc.)

• Connor Markiewicz, Nicholas Watkins and Brookdale Students for drawing the ghost faces for the Pumpkin Bowling pins

• Lisa Burke for prizes

• Ms. Ory and Ms. Perna for their technical support

• Mr. Korbitz, Mr. Tabisz, Ms. Gelso, Ms. Sampson and Ms. Parks for the use of their

rooms

• All Brookdale Teachers for helping Brookdale students to cut and color Halloween shapes to adorn our Trick and Treat Posters

• Mr. Baldridge and Belen from Brookdale’s Facility Department for the set-up and take down of the event

• Joy Ross, assistant principal at Metea Valley High School, for helping to coordinate MVHS support for the event

• Metea Science Department (Mike Kirkpatrick) for use of the Van de Graaff Generator

• Metea LMC (MaryLynne Stoller / Debbie Turner) for laminating the event posters

• Metea Facilities Department (Bradley Swanson) for the use of their stanchions to form our

event game lines

• Metea Key Club Coordinator Kate Carnevale for arranging for student volunteers

• Christi Grezlik for coordinating the pizza for the high school student volunteers

• Event set-up parent volunteers: Rose Baranyk, Lisa Burke, Barb Steinkuller, Mary Hensley, Denise Munro, Laura Schiro, Beth Siwicki, Tim Reidy, Harkirat Sethi, Vicki Lynch, Jen DeMale, Christi Grezlik, Jessica Harris, Fatima Jeyabalan, Jan Mallak, Kathie Smurawski, Laura Schlicher, Ron Heger, Beth Reiman and Tom Stewart

• Lisa Burke for helping with the student volunteer orientation

• Mike Watkins for bowling pin painting, sign stands, spooky food boxes, event map and

logistical consulting

• Nicholas and Amber Watkins for many hours of event help

During the evening -

• Pat Burke and Rick Bock for hosting Family Feud

• Lori Jones, Janet Anderson and Carey Peterson for storytelling

• LifeSavers Club for collecting games to donate to charity

• Barb Nicodemus for taking the event photos

• Many parent volunteers

• More than 40 Metea Valley and Waubonsie Valley high school students (many previous Brookdale students) for their volunteer help throughout the evening!

• A special thank you to Principal LeCrone, Candy Michelli, Cindy Minch, Judy Markiewicz and Amy Hausman for their endless hours of consulting!