This Should Be About Pumpkin Carving

Every time I see the pictures of the boys carving pumpkins I think I need to write a post about that.  This morning as I think back to that day I can't help but think not about the pumpkin carving but about my husband, whom I am so thankful for.  Hopefully I can cover both in this post.

The local pumpkin patch that we normally go to is not open this year.  There is another one but you have to pay to get in and it is a bit of a drive.  Every weekend for quite a while my husband has been working on painting the house, so we can't get away for a long afternoon at a pumpkin patch.  We hope to make a trip to a pumpkin patch at some point before October is over but wanted to get started on our pumpkins now.  We thought for now, we would just go to our local grocery store.

We needed to pick up some other things while we were there, so we gathered our list.  Then I noticed, it's 5 and we are all hungry, not a good time to go to the grocery store.  This is when my husband came up with a super simple and super fun idea.  Let's pick up a pizza and have a pizza picnic in the van before we go to the store.  We have a mini van but we (as in he) takes out the two middle seats and so it is open in the middle.  I can't tell you how nice this is, that I can get the kids safe and inside the van as well as myself as I get them buckled in.  If I need more seats for some reason, I just let him know and he puts them back (just one more reason I am thankful.)

So we picked up a cheap pepperoni pizza from Figaro's, the only pizza the boys actually eat.  We drove to the middle of the parking lot of the grocery store, unbuckled sat in the middle of the van and ate our pizza.  It was cool because we got to people watch, but more than anything it was just unusual and fun to be together as a family, squeezed inside our little van eating pizza.  Jeff was really thrilled by the experience and so was I.  I don't think this would have been something his family could do because each meal had to be formal.  I bet this sort of impromptu outing will be one to stand out in the boys memory, or maybe not, because I do hope their lives are full of things like this.

Next we picked out our pumpkins then went inside to gather a few other items for our list.  It was so fun to go grocery shopping as a family.  It really was another fun part of the night.

When we got home, we put the food away and got right to work on the pumpkins.  The boys did really well with scooping the gunk out this year.  Jeff helps them out by first taking a spoon and scraping around the outside real quick.  He just separates the gunk from the side but leaves it all in there for them to scoop out on their own.  Another great idea by Jeff.

I had seen this idea on I Can Teach My Child, to use golf tees and a toy hammer to pound the tees into the pumpkin.   I immediately new my boys would love this.  I showed Jeff and he was game.  Another reason why I am thankful for him, not all husbands would get on board with all these different ideas.  On the blog she just had her kids pound the tees where ever on the pumpkin they wanted which gave the pumpkin a star effect.  I told the kids we were going to make an S for our last name.  So I drew an S and put dots along the S for them to line the tees up on for pounding.  They took turns lining up and pounding in the tees.  When we were almost all done I realized I should probably get some pictures so I had Jeff grab the camera.

I started pushing in the tees a little bit so they didn't have to be held in place and Peter could just pound away with out fear of squishing Mommies fingers or his own fingers.   When we were all done, Peter really enjoyed grabbing all the tees and putting them back in the holes.

I posted one of these pictures on Facebook and a friend made the comment "I love seeing all the things you do with your children."  This same weekend, Jeff at one point said "I love finding random rocks around the house."  Simple statement or so it seems.  I LOVE that my husband said this.  It's proof that we have the same heart when it comes to our children.  You see, when we bought our house we had river rock everywhere.  We didn't really like it but hey, it's there.  Now most of it is in the front yard and with out fail when we go out front to get in and out of the car or for any reason, the boys have to stop and pick up a treasured rock.  The treasured rock ends up in their pockets or their curious little hands and carried inside.  Inevitability we will find rocks everywhere around the house.  In bed, in the bathroom, on the floor, window sill and most commonly, the washing machine.  The rocks are then placed by me, up somewhere high to be taken back outside at some point.  This of course could be seen as annoying, but my husband sees it as a blessing.  Knowing that the little hands of his precious boys brought this treasure inside and placed it there at some point through out their day.

I guess what I am saying is, with out the love and support of my husband, I don't think we would do nearly as much cool stuff as we do.  My children are blessed with an amazing Father.

Now back to the pumpkin carving.  Each boy then got to pick out a face to carve on their pumpkin.  We don't do scary Halloween, I hate scary Halloween.  Lachlan wanted his face to match his pumpkin costume.  He is dressing as a super cute pumpkin this year.  So we got out the costume and Jeff carved out the face.

Next it was Peter's turn.  What a great opportunity to talk shapes!  Peter, what shape eyes do you want for your face, square, circles or triangles?  "Triangles, no I want squares."   What shape nose do you want? "Circle."  How about a smile?  How many teeth should he have? "Three."  Jeff did the carving, but instructed by Peter.  It is quite the cute pumpkin.  On the back side of the pumpkin I drew an L on Lachlan's, with dots for him to hammer.  We ran out of time to do the P on Peter's but will do it sometime before Halloween.  I still have the tees and hammer out.   

So here are our cute pumpkins to greet our guests and make us smile when we come home.  The boys thought they were pretty awesome.