We wanted to wait until we returned from Nebraska to carve pumpkins, but we obviously waited until the very last second. Since today is Halloween I suppose it is time! It's always interesting getting the kids to participate. Dalan has done it enough, he doesn't take much convincing, Brilyn will do anything she can draw a princess on, but Jayen wanted nothing to do with it. Jayen's sensory issues stopped him from enjoying the activity like the other two. Mom, however, was not giving up that easily. My job/goal in life is to get Jayen to do everything he hates and make it tolerable. He doesn't have to love it, but just attempt it. So what's a mom to do? Get out the power tools! I grabbed the drill and the biggest drill bit I could find and convinced Jayen to drill holes in the pumpkin. Oh boy, was this a game changer! His distain turned to curiosity then to excitement and within minutes there were more holes in his pumpkin that the stop signs on the back roads in my hometown.
But once there was no room left to squeeze even a single hole, it was time to get the insides out. Yeah, I'm sure you can assume this isn't going to go over well either. Dalan was such a big, as always, and tried convincing Jayen that he needed to grab the seeds to we could bake them and eat them like sunflower seeds. Mean mom again demanded that he scoop out 4 scoops of guts before he could go trick or treating. I helped him count 1...2...2...2...3...3...3...3 before he yelled at me, "no, four" and I had to agree since he actually scooped far more than I originally bargained.
Dalan was struggling with the itty bitty tools and the intricate design he was working on and was disappointed he couldn't use the drill like Jayen did, so we improvised and let him use the carving knife (with a lot of adult supervision).
The pumpkins all looked amazing! But it took quite some time and now it was time to head out for trick or treating. As soon as we walked out the door, Jayen ran into two friends from school. These boys have been great friends to Jayen and I can't thank them enough for seeing him for the amazing boy he is!
Dalan also saw some friends and begged to be big enough to hang out with them instead of his parents! I was not so fond of the idea, but know the boys he was going with and trusted they would look out for him and encourage him to do the right thing. I wish I would have known our last Halloween would have been our last Halloween together. Good thing I had a mask on, it could hide the tears rolling down my face. Maybe next year he can take his siblings out and I can sit in the driveway with Eva and drink! Tears gone!!!
Matt and I took the Jayen and Brilyn around the neighborhood. Jayen was very hesitant to visit houses that we even a wee bit scary. If he didn't think it was safe, he kept his distance and bunkered down in the wagon. Since we didn't have Dalan with us, we didn't need the loot we were required to collect before heading home. These two had a reasonable amount of candy so we convinced them to hang with the neighbors in their driveway and help pass out candy. Too bad a group of kids decided to empty our bucket in one visit.
Dalan eventually made it back to the house and we eventually passed out every piece of candy and toys we could find. Even having to dig through the kids' bags to find more to pass out; our neighborhood was crowded. I think we all had a great Halloween. Hope you did too!
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