Recipe for Halloween fun

Step one: Visit the local farm's pumpkin patch


Every Halloween requires a pumpkin and its just not the same to pick it up at the grocery store. We went with Nana and Papa to the patch this year. The Smith Family Farm also has a corn and straw mazes, animals to see, a ride behind an old tractor and musical shows for the children to participate in. The straw bail mazes were by far the favorite at the Smith Family Farm. I remember spending hours and hours in the straw bails with my cousins and brother when I was growing up on my family farm in Idaho. It was fun to see them enjoy a little bit of what the farm has to offer.
























Step 2: Harvest the Pumpkin.


As we loaded our pumpkins on to the tractor pulled trailer a worker asked us, "Is that it for you?" Jason made one of his silly comments and said, "Well, we would really like to help with the harvest, what time does that start?" The worker replied "Right now. You just harvested the pumpkin when you took it out of the patch". I'm not sure what he expected the "harvest" to look like but I thought that was kind of funny. :)

Step 3: Carving the Pumpkins

Sadie really got into carving this year. She designed her face by drawing out the face so Jason could do the cutting. It turned out really good! She helped pull out the seeds for the first time this year. She typically doesn't like to get her hands dirty and in years past was kind of grossed out by the stringy slimy seeds. Braden was another story. He didn't want anything to do with the carving and wasn't fond of the finished product either. As long as the lights were on he was ok with the Jack O Lanterns. Braden later helped me paint a face on a pumpkin. That he actually enjoyed and was very proud of "his pumpkin".

This picture looks like it's from a horror movie with Jason's knife in the background and Braden's scared face... Actually this is his reaction to the pumpkin guts. If only I had his reaction to the "slime" we made for Sadie's preschool. That was even funnier!

Step 4: Halloween Parties!

We had a Halloween party for preschool co-op at our house on Thursday. After the kids got done with their writing assignments they painted pumpkin faces on orange tins and filled them with popped corn (could be reused as trick-or-treat can), we made a Peter, Peter Pumpkin Eater craft, made slime (thanks for the recipe Torina!), had a snack picnic eating apples and popcorn dipped in caramel while I read some great Halloween books my mother-in-law let me borrow. We didn't have time to do all the things I had planned but I think they had a good time.

The next day Sadie had a fun day at her other preschool in Brentwood. They made more crafts and decorated cookies, collected candy from all their preschool friends, watched the Charlie Brown's Great Pumpkin movie, and then all the kids did a little parade to the "I want candy" song in their costumes around the court for their parents to see. So cute. Of course my camera battery had to die just as I went to snap a picture of all of the preschool kids in the parade. :(

Step 5: Trick or Treat!!

The McMullens and the Roberts family joined us in pizza for dinner and trick-or-treating around our neighborhood. Not that we needed any more candy since we did trunk-or-treat a couple days before at the parking lot at our church. We had fun doing the traditional way of collecting candy though. I think it just isn't the same if they can't knock on the door and see all the decorations around the houses. Its a fun tradition to go with friends.

The finished product: Candy coming out of your ears! I'm glad this Holiday only comes around once a year because I would be eating way more than my share of candy if it was any more often. The dentist recently confirmed that I do have 4 cavities! If anyone wants to take some of this candy off of my hands I would be happy to give it up... just don't say anything to Sadie, Braden or Jason about my offer.....