I love to celebrate holidays. This year, as Halloween grew closer, I wondered how we would want to celebrate it. To be honest, there are parts of Halloween that I’m not very fond of. And then there are other parts that I like. Year by year, we keep forming our family traditions for each holiday. I wanted to choose the parts of Halloween that felt wholesome to me and leave the other parts. Jeff felt the same way. We didn’t want to be part of the scary parts or go trick-or-treating (we don’t eat candy.) The wholesome activities we wanted to be a part of? Hayrides, pumpkin patches, pumpkin carving… those were a few things that came to mind. When I found out that there was going to be an event at the Eugene Waldorf School, that felt like a great fit for us. With those plans in mind, I made Bracken a bear costume. Bracken was excited to be a bear and he had never experienced Halloween before.
Yesterday I put Bracken down for a nap on the earlier side. Then Jeff and I started getting ready. Parents were encouraged to wear costumes to the Waldorf school as well as the kids, and we thought it was a fun excuse. When Bracken woke up, he was delighted to see mom and dad as new characters. Jeff’s costume was easy. He was a wizard and since he pretty much already looks like one, all he had to do was to put on his wool cloak and hold the wooden staff he carved. He put glitter on too because he’ll take any excuse to use some glitter. I dressed up as a Native American. I put my hair in two long braids, wore a long brown skirt and moccasins, and put a beaded headband on (that Jeff made many years ago) and stuck a feather in it. Then we got little Bracken bear all ready. We searched the house for eyeliner (didn’t I have some from years ago?) to draw a nose and whiskers on Bracken, but we didn’t find any. (Jeff stopped by a store to buy something on our way there.) We ate our lunch in the car and we were off. On the way there, I felt disappointed about the weather. We had been having such gorgeous autumn days, but on Halloween the weather turned. It was overcast and rainy. But it didn’t ruin our fun.
We went to Thistledown Farms. We said hello to the goats.
Then we climbed aboard for the hay ride.
On the weekends they have wagon rides with draft horses, but on the weekdays they have their hay rides pulled by a tractor. Bracken thought the tractor was very exciting.
Then we got to the pumpkin patch. Bracken went right over and picked out his pumpkin. I thought it might take him awhile to decide, but no- he picked his out right away. I took longer to pick mine than he did.
‘Hurry and take the picture ma, it’s getting heavy!’
Then we went on the hay ride back to the farm. The ride was really bouncy, which Bracken loved.
The hay maze had a roof over top, which was great.
There were tunnels to climb through.
Bracken talked dad into going.
I was able to look over the side in the front and watch.
Then Bracken started hiding from dad and then surprising him. He thought it was really funny.
These are the three pictures I got of Bracken when I tried to get him to stand still for a picture. He was having too much fun to stand still. There was a corn maze, but we decided not to do that this time because we needed to head to the next place. We saw animals on the way back to the farm store and Bracken thought the noises the donkey made was hilarious.
It was October 31st. The annual sale at Thistledown Farm is November 1st and 2nd. I’ve written about it before here. We didn’t want to drive back for the sale this year. Instead, we got a few things that were already great deals, even before the sale began.
Then we headed over to the Waldorf school.
This is the only picture that came out of Bracken’s nose and whiskers. It got smudged off in the first few minutes. Next time we need to get something better for painting faces. I realized as we drove home that night that we didn’t get a single picture of Jeff or I in our costumes! Darn. Jeff put his on when we got to the school, but I had mine on the whole time.
We got to see friends from our Rainbow Bridge class. It was so fun to see the costumes. We went on a guided tour around the school grounds. There were different stations set up. Each one had people in costumes and a short skit. In one station, they gave out pears and Bracken’s eyes lit up. (He’s been a big pear fan lately, but he really loves all fruit.) There were creatures in trees, strumming windchimes. A wizard casting wishes in a fire. Musical instruments.
Bracken’s favorite station was a little wooden house on the playground. It was filled with glowing pumpkins. There was a woman inside who sang a song and then gave out roasted pumpkin seeds. That was Bracken’s favorite stop by far. He even wanted to go back later to get more pumpkin seeds. I was so grateful to be a part of a Halloween event where they were giving out wholesome things to eat- like pears and pumpkin seeds. At the end, they gave a cookie to each child, but I was prepared for that. I had a little bag of dried blueberries we had picked up at farmer’s market. I told Bracken we were saving them for Halloween, so he had been excited about them for days. I gave Bracken his dried blueberries and he didn’t even notice there were cookies. By that time it was getting late and was time for us to drive home. I thought we would carve pumpkins when we got back, but it was nearly bedtime. Instead, the pumpkin carving happened this morning. I made breakfast and did dishes while Jeff and Bracken hollowed out the pumpkins. I hadn’t carved a pumpkin in a long time. Jeff used some power tools a few times, which made me nervous. We need to get a pumpkin carving kit for next year. Jeff made a smiley cat. Bracken didn’t seem inclined to draw on his pumpkin, he was so involved with everything else going on. I drew a bear face on his pumpkin. On mine, I did a simple star.
They may not be that exciting in the daytime…
But at nighttime they are transformed into something magical.
This “blooper” picture turned out pretty cool!
I took these pictures of our pumpkins tonight. Bracken likes to blow out the candles right away and then he wants us to light them again.
I do believe we have some new holiday traditions for next year when Halloween rolls around again!
………………………
P.S. When I was growing up in Iowa, we always said a joke to get candy when we were trick-or-treating. People would open the door and wait for the joke or ask “do you have a joke?” Then, after the joke, you would get candy in your bucket. This morning my mom called and told me that in Florida (where she moved to), they don’t tell jokes for trick-or-treating. I was so surprised. Apparently, they only do that in Iowa?
What about where you live? Do jokes go along with trick-or-treating there?
Leave a Reply