Okay, I wanted to blog all this stuff about Halloween, but I neglected to attend to one of the more important tenants of publishing – deadlines. Of course for a blog, I don’t have to plan as far ahead as traditional publishing, but perhaps some of this would have been more interesting/useful BEFORE Halloween. It’s highly unlikely that my three readers would take a look at this today. In any event and without further ado, here are my Halloween snapshots.
First, we picked pumpkins. This was a time for funny faces and produce bigger than my baby. In AZ, we sell our pumpkins alongside dried chilies.
On to the massacre. The Weisers continue to invite us to Pumpkinpalooza in spite of the fact that we ALWAYS come. Robyn is a great pal who shows us a good time and feeds us well. Chili – YUM! I took a photo of my dinner. This year, I let the ankle biters carve their own designs with actual knives. No trips to the ER. Phew!
The 8 YO boy carved a bat in flight and the 6 YO girl carved a kitten cat. I scored a surplus pumpkin for free because someone dropped it. I carved snakes coming out of the resultant crack, which I had enlarged. We coated our pumpkins with Vaseline so that they would keep. We didn’t do such a great job this year and that, partnered with the heat, saw two of our pumpkins turn gross-out mushy.
I painted the girl’s fingernails orange, but it didn’t last. Then we roasted our pumpkin seeds. We washed the 3 or so cups of seeds, boiled them for 10 minutes in 14 cups of water and 14 tablespoons of salt, then coated them in olive oil and roasted them at 400 degrees for 20 minutes. YUM! Better than I thought, though I’m not the sort who cares for the outer shell.
Finally, we are looking forward to Dia de los Muertos. The kids made sugar skulls at one of the school’s fundraisers. Cute huh? These were made sans glue, so they are entirely edible.
Anna and I have been talking about how fun and inspiring Dia de los Muertos is in comparison to the more somber Memorial Day. They each have their place. Grace St. Paul’s Episcopal Church is celebrating the Feast of All Saints on November 1st and the Commemoration of the Faithful Departed (All Souls’ Day) on November 2nd. I’m looking forward to bringing photos of my loved ones who’ve passed on to the services.
Gotta love the harvet time! Those sugar skulls are WaaaaY cool. Halloweem is Cool. I need to blog about my night…
-Tracy
I love your sugar skulls too-somehow this is the first year I’ve heard of them, so I think it’s cool your kids did some. BTW: I had the BEST pumpkin seeds today- they were coated with the seasoning used for Chex Mix, so salty, buttery and delicious- YUM!!!
-Robyn