Saturday, November 7, 2009



Pumpkins
I love to grow my own pumpkins and we often incorporate them into the flower beds at the resort. My favorite (although it's really a squash, not a pumpkin) is called "Red Warty Thing". I think I like it as much for the name as for it's character.
When my kids were little, we used to grow a pumpkin patch in the back of our yard. The kids would sell the pumpkins to the neighbors at Halloween and that's how they made their Christmas money.
A fun activity for kids is to scratch their name into the flesh of the pumpkin when it is small. As the pumpkin grows, the name will grow with it and the kids will end up with personalized pumpkins.

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Scarecrow Sentry
My friend, Janice helped me make this scarecrow. It has a wooden frame with wing nut-hinged arms so it can be posed ,to a degree, The head is a styrofoam wig stand covered in burlap. Hair is raffia hot-glued to the hat. We dressed him up in farmer clothes and placed him on sentry duty to protect the gourds, squash, hops and corn in the cart. With his hands on his hips, he doesn't take any sass.
If you don't feel the urge to create your own scarecrow, there are many for sale now in craft stores. I bought a kid-sized scarecrow which was actually a crow dressed up like a farmer, and placed it in the Children's Garden at the Resort where he invites all of his friends in to feed on the last of the strawberries.
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