We still don't have our pumpkins to carve for Halloween. We didn't go to the farm and ride out to the patch. Wanted to. Didn't. Too much other partying and visiting (and staying out of the rain) to do. We did do a hayride in late September and the kids decorated pumpkins with stick-in face parts that my friend had...but those pumpkins rotted before October even darkened our doorstep.
Rotten pumpkins are gross, so I always want to wait until the last minute so that lighting the Jack-o-Lanterns isn't a matter of sticking my hands into some mold-encrusted cavern of yuck.
Last year I convinced the kids to forgo the carving for something new. Well, Sprout went along with that plan - Tater was a harder sell.
This week we are chock full of extra-curricular activities leaving this afternoon as the one possible opportunity to go out and have the kids pick the pumpkins. And in the name of magical childhood experiences, I guess they should pick them. On a farm. With ice cream and cider.
Or do you think they might just go for this?
Of course, the kids already have their costumes. After much deliberation and many changes of heart, Tater is going to be a ninja, and Sprout is going to be a trucker.He has a full-body black suit and mask and a plastic sword that I am sure won't make it until the big day. She has a very tall trucker hat, a flannel shirt and a toothpick. She makes a cute trucker. If there is such a thing.However, we are attending a party on Saturday with an 80's theme, so for the first time in many years, I need a costume, too. And my headband with pumpkin antennae won't work. Nor my cat ears. And that's pretty much all I have lying around.So...80's. I wasn't that much of a fashion plate in the 80's (as I am now...not). But I spent much of yesterday piecing together something that should work - leggings, a pink sweatshirt, big pink earrings, a scrunchie. But the sweatshirt, in order to work for this, needed to be Flashdance-ified.So I took scissors to my $5 sweatshirt, much to the horror of my children."Why are you cutting that?""Why are you wrecking your new sweatshirt?"It is hard to explain Flashdance to elementary school children. But I tried.
So I cut a wide hole at the neck and I cut off the wristbands. And then we stuck them on Tater (see above). And then we stuck them on Sprout.And then we stuck them on the puppy.
We thought the neck part looks like pig ears. Dixie thinks we are nuts.Sprout wore this for the rest of the afternoon under her bike helmet. Quite a look.Later the dogs decided to try on their costumes (they can be so diva-like with their demands).Dixie is going to be a pumpkin. Angus is always a skeleton. It is difficult to get dogs to look at you and smile. I have a new respect for the people who make those posters with cute puppies on them. Much patience is involved. I don't have it.
So, here is a picture of Angus smelling Dixie's butt. Because that's the best I could do. What do you think - poster?About two seconds later Dixie started trying to rip her costume off.Not a fan of Halloween apparently.So, Saturday is the party. Sunday we have to go get pumpkins and carve them and all that. I might have to eat some cider donuts...because it's traditional. Thursday our friends are having a Halloween party, Friday is the Halloween Ball at school and then Saturday is the real deal.I don't know when Halloween turned into such a multi-event extravaganza. We aren't even going to the various trick-or-treat events at local farms, shopping centers, malls... What happened to one night collecting candy in a pillowcase while wearing a horrifically uncomfortable costume (possibly with your cousin attempting to pull your horse head off the whole time, possibly dressed as a crayon wrapped up in poster board in a way that made it impossible to bend, possibly wearing your grandfather's Navy uniform that survived a war and then was destroyed when you fell on your face running for candy...just possibly)?I guess that all went the way of the Flashdance sweatshirt...Have fun out there!
How fun is this?We were at home yesterday. An in-service day...following a day off for Yom Kippur = desperate for things to do!Even though it is not yet October, we decided that it would be a good idea to get started on Halloween decorations.Yet again we started with an idea from Family Fun Magazine. They suggest doing this with cardboard. I thought poster board would be infinitely easier.We carefully measured our upstairs windows. This is unlike me. I usually eyeball it and wing it. And then regret it and rig it. This time I was smart and patient and measured. And promptly left the paper with the measurements at home. Oops.Luckily my intermittent dyslexia (which kicks in when I am attempting to tell someone my phone number and I blank...) didn't strike and I was able to remember that the windows were each 33" X 64".We went to Target and found black poster board for $0.69 per sheet (which rang up as only $0.57 each...ka-ching!) Each sheet was 28" x 22" so I figured we could stack 3 together with a slight overlap and end up in the 28" X 64" range.
Aren't you glad I am sharing the specific numbers since your windows will totally be a completely different size? I just want to show off how good I am at math. Impressed?We laid the sheets out and taped them together with packing tape. Then the kids each drew Jack-o-Lantern-ish faces on the boards. Sprouts window has a seam down the middle, so she did it as one big face. Tater was doing two separate windows.Then we (I) cut out the holes. I did offer to let them cut. They didn't want to. Really.
Is it some measure of progress on the Zen-Mommy front that I didn't yell at Sprout about sitting on the table until after I took her picture?After we (I) cut out the faces, the kids took white tissue paper and taped it over the holes. They each did a "Dracula" face and used red tissue on the "blood".
Tater felt the need to use the longest pieces of tape he could possible tear off.I wasn't all that zen about that.
After all of the holes were covered with paper, the faces were ready to hang up.How happy is this kid?We used masking tape to stick the finished faces into the windows. Of course, since I didn't actually measure the sheets as we taped them together, the first three were a few inches too long. But we rigged it to fit. Improvisation is our friend.
Sprout's window. Now her room is like a cave. No light is getting in there. She can peek out through the eye holes if she wants a glimpse of the outside world.Tater decorated our guest room (his room is in the back). He is sad that he can't look at the faces all the time.
I suggested he could sleep in the guest room, but he was freaked out by the double bed. And the fact that we call the room "Grandma's Room". Like she might sneak in at any moment. Scaaaaarrrryyyyy!!Now we are all set for Halloween. Although I think that the kids are on a roll now and will want to keep going. Tater had some interesting ideas last year. I wonder what he'll come up with as the month rolls along.This was a fun, easy project that took up a decent chunk of time. And the final results are, I think, "spooktacular"!
Tater felt that he needed the regular carved pumpkin. But liked the idea of cable ties for hair.So. Voila!
How fun is this?I am so proud of this idea. I was not looking forward to carving pumpkins with the kids. The oogy slimy scraping. The sharp knives accompanied with incessant whining that they NEED to try to do it themselves.So I got this idea to put stuff ON the pumpkin. Like hardware!I went to Lowe's and wandered around looking for things (cheap things...each under a dollar) that could be face parts. I came home with a collection of little plastic pipe pieces and bolts and washers and laid them out before my children.
Sprout was on board. She picked out pieces. She helped poke holes in the pumpkin with a nail and a hammer (probably why she was on board...the girl LOVES tools). She approved my idea of wrapping stiff wire around the pieces and then poking the wire ends into the pumpkin to secure them. She jabbed the cable ties into his "head".
Tater is rejecting this break from tradition and insists that we have to make his pumpkin into a REAL Jack-o-Lantern. Darn.
Once upon a time, when I was a newly minted working girl, my friend and I were somehow placed in charge of planning parties for our work group. Remember when people used to have parties at work?
Anyway, we were working in downtown Wilmington, and the Halloween party was approaching. So, we did what any reasonable people would do when faced with the need for pumpkins and Halloween cheer - we drove to Media, PA and went to Linvilla Orchards! Pumpkinland!
I grew up just around the corner from there...and it was THE place to get pumpkins. At least in my mind.And I wasn't the most committed corporate drone...
Anyway...flash forward more years than I'd like to admit (um...20??? Ouch). The kids had the day off from school, and Esther and I were looking for a place to take the whole crowd of them for some fall fun. So...off we went to Linvilla Orchards!
It is still a somewhat unreasonable drive from where we live, although meeting for brunch at the Happy Days Finer Diner in Frazier broke up the trip. After we fueled up on Mickey Mouse pancakes, off we went.Despite the Yom Kippur holiday, there were many bus loads of children at Linvilla. It is a mecca for fall class trips to pick apples and go on hayrides (neither of which we participated in, but both of which are available.)First we went and visited the animals. There is a wide assortment of beleaguered looking chickens that can be fed, a new duck pond, a couple of horses, some pigs, goats, ostriches, sheep and a few deer. The kids love to visit the animals. Usually my kids go with their Nana and she has a big bag of bread to share with the animals...this time we had a handful of dried corn from the vending machine. Bread is better.Next stop was the train ride. $3 per person to go "around 3 times", which the driver said was "about 9 minutes". Apparently she is a bit of an over-estimator. We thought that "around" was through the fields or something...but the train went around in a big circle...and probably took under 5 minutes. But the kids enjoyed it very much, so that was good.
We passed on the playground this time. They do have a really nice one with lots of interesting things to climb on, but we had other things to see, so we moved on.Our next stop was the Apple Flinger...I don't actually remember what they were calling it - but we got 20 apples for $5 and the kids flung them down a hill with huge slingshots. They liked that a LOT.
Tater hit one of the targets in the field and was somewhat disappointed that there wasn't a prize, but he got over it quickly!The big event was the hay-bale maze. Esther and I decided to sit it out and sent the four kids into the maze, with strict instructions not to skewer one another with the flags they were holding (so they wouldn't get lost since they are all shorter than a bale of hay). We watched the 4 flags go back and forth for a while...and then there they all came...back out of the entrance. We turned them back around and sent them back in...back and forth for a while...back out the entrance. Back in they went for a third try...and finally Esther decided she would go in the exit and figure out how to coach them out. And then SHE got stuck in there...Eventually she got them all to climb over one of the walls (shhh...you aren't supposed to do that...) and everyone made their triumphant way to the exit!
Finally we were ready to go into PUMPKINLAND!! The kids were so excited to pick out their pumpkins! I usually make them wait until closer to Halloween...so my guys were terribly excited that they were getting to SHOP for pumpkins!
After carefully investigating nearly EVERY pumpkin in the place (and trying hard to convince me that we really needed a 100 pound pumpkin "for Daddy!") they finally picked the winners. Tater's is round-ish, Sprout's is tall-ish. They each also picked a Jack-be-little and we got a few little decorations as well.
THEN (long day) we went into the shop to look for some Cider Donuts (for Daddy!) And a big bushel of apples to make a pie! And, since it was an insanely hot day, lots of water! After all that, we pushed our shopping cart full of about 60 pounds of pumpkins and apples and donuts, up the unpaved hill (ouch) to the car.Obviously, given my propensity to drive long distances to visit, I recommend checking out Linvilla Orchards. It has become significantly more commercialized since I was a kid (lo those many years ago) so all of the additional activities cost something. Even the playground charges $1 per person (which I personally find offensive). But there is lots to do, the kids love it, and it just feels like a fun, wholesome sort of place to be.And they make REALLY good donuts!
The Halloween decorations are coming out.
My neighbor (Hi, Deb!) put up a bunch of ghost-y things today. Soon there will be Halloween lights up, skeletons sticking out of the gardens, and pumpkins on every doorstep. Other people do the full sheafs (sheaves?) of wheat, scarecrows, witches crashing into trees thing. One neighbor does a full-on haunted house in his garage. We haven't been brave enough to go in (there is smoke coming off of his lawn on Halloween and my kids refuse to even walk directly past the house, much less enter the attraction).Here is my question. When did this all start?When did Halloween become a decorating holiday to rival Christmas? When I was a kid (back in the day...) we carved pumpkins and called it a day. I don't even know that there were other options available. Perhaps that spider-web stuff that you can stretch across the bushes...but that was it.About 8 years ago, I put pumpkin lights up around my front door and I felt like quite the overachiever. Now I am completely dusted...often forgetting to even carve the pumpkins (I don't like to do it too soon since they get all mushy and gross, and then I forget completely).I am torn between my competitive side, my "good-excuse-to-put-cute-stuff-up" side, and my "but-it's-only-Halloween" side...triangulated...in a holding pattern...paralyzed...I am guessing the decorating urge will win out, especially once the kids realize we are under-adorned. I give it a week.
My friend Jen, who is one of the Funnest Mommies around, sent me some pictures of Halloween crafts that she has done with her kids and I just had to share them with you.
Then we have this completely awesome pumpkin patch cake. She got the idea from Family Fun Magazine (always great), but I think her execution gets bonus points.
Anyway - I was sharing Jen's stuff...so the other thing she sent me was these little craft-y pumpkins made with rolls of toilet paper wrapped in fabric. So clever. Another Family Fun idea involving very few "ingredients" and a great end product!
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