Carving Pumpkins

It's that time of year again!! I happen to love this time of year because it kicks off the whole holiday season. I love Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas. Despite the cold and the snow- I love what comes with it. And I think the reason I love Halloween so much- is because of all the good childhood memories that I associate with it. My mom is and was kind of a Halloween nut- she went all out every year. She had a witch costume that was known for blocks. We still have pictures- you wouldn't recognize her unless you knew it was her. She would also go crazy with decorations and treats and parties... It was so much fun. Now that I'm the mom- I know how tired and how crazy life is without the addition of holiday extras- but I remember how much effort my mom put into these things and how big a payoff it was for me as a kid. So- even though I AM tired, and it just feels like one more thing... I keep telling myself that the memories I am helping my kids build- is totally worth it.

So today- we carved pumpkins. We only did two for now and hopefully we'll be able to get the others finished before Halloween- but if not... I guess we can just leave them out for Thanksgiving decor!

Now I want you to take a look at the pumpkins we have on our front porch... There are some serious pumpkins sitting there. Both my parents and Shaun's parents brought pumpkins to us this year. My parents brought the normal sized ones and Shaun's parents grew Giant Pumpkins this year in their garden... They weren't kidding!! These things are freaking huge! Ty wanted to carve one of them- but I put my foot down... I'm not near dedicated enough to the pumpkin carving process to carve one of those babies. Besides- I think you'd have to have a chain saw to get through all the flesh!!!

Anyway- once I finally talked Ty into carving a normal sized pumpkin- we got to work. We carved a little "happy" pumpkin and a big "scary" pumpkin. At least that's how Ty described them. He actually did most of the little pumpkin himself- and he even managed to keep all his fingers- a feat I was pretty impressed with. I mean think about this... Even though they are just little knives- they have to be pretty sharp in order to make all those little designs and cut through the pumpkin itself... Why do we, as parents (you know- the supposed responsible ones) give these knives over to 4 year olds? It seems somewhat silly to me. But I did it anyway- and it turned out pretty well! The other pumpkin we carved was supposed to be a scary vampire pumpkin (Ty's idea)... We tried hard to make it scary- and if you don't think it is- don't tell us- we don't want to know. We'll have to light them tomorrow and see how they turn out in the dark!