Saturday, October 23, 2010

Fall Festivities

Ah yes, the Halloween season is again upon us. Do I need to remind you how I detest Halloween? And how having a child with food allergies has not helped matters? I mean please, peanut butter cups were one of the only redeeming qualities Halloween had to offer!

I will admit that I look forward to roasting pumpkin seeds, but the process of cleaning them off... don't get me started!

Friday night, for Family Night, we gussied up a couple of pumpkins, potato head style. My mom gave the kids these kits last year and it was a brilliant choice. Harper clearly loved revisiting her witch kit.


Michael was pretty excited about things as well. As the pirate pieces fell into place he kept exclaiming, "Mah punkeen bootifoo!" (My pumpkin's beautiful!)


Then we made him go to bed and he cried. Sadly every night can't have a happy ending.

Harper, on the other hand, got to stay up a bit later and "help" me make potato soup. She worked on peeling potatoes. She'd never peeled potatoes before. I don't know if you have ever peeled potatoes with a five-year-old, but it is quite a task. I use little baby red potatoes for soup so peeling is probably more difficult.

Maybe I should have started her on carrots.


Harper peeled potatoes at the rate of about one every ten minutes. It. Was. Agonizing. But you can't learn without doing it, right? And all the other tasks involved chopping things with very sharp knives and I wasn't eager to visit the ER.

Harper sticks her tongue out when she concentrates.

Even though things went along a little more slowly than normal I really enjoyed my kitchen time with Harper. She was just so happy to be able to help and she was cracking me up with the things she was saying. At one point she commented, "This (peeling potatoes) is a great thing to do while you're just hanging out and chatting." She also said something about the potato skins being students and she was like the bus driver taking them to school. She followed that comment by reminding me that she has a really big imagination.

Today Harper helped me make a loaf of bread to go with the soup and Michael helped me make brownies. Maybe the two of them will open a restaurant one day!

5 comments:

Emily said...

I'm impressed with your patience. Katy constantly wants to help me in the kitchen, but it feels like a torturous exercise in patience. I think the problem is that when I'm cooking I'm always in a hurry. Maybe if I did it as a fun activity it would be better.

Cute pumpkins!

Christina said...

So cute! I love the pictures. Aaron loves to try to help me peel, and agonizing is a good word for it...carrots aren't much better! He and Melina are technically my sous-chefs around here (Melina likes to make muffins especially). Maybe there is hope for the four of them later on down the road. Peanut free cafe that serves soup, bread, and muffins.

Erin said...

I like your potato pumpkins.

But why does everyone hate Halloween so? I cannot imagine losing my love for it, peanut butter cups or no. Pumpkins and costumes make kids MORE cute!

CARRIE said...

Halloween lover here too. People hate me because I have no great love for Christmas.

Kudos to allowing Harper to help cook with you. When N helps me it is all I can do to not grab stuff out of her hand and scream, "JUST LET ME DO IT, FOR GOD'S SAKE!!!" An exercise in motherly patience, to be sure.

Love the tongue sticking out.

bluedaisy said...

So glad you had some Fall fun!! The pumpkins are super-cute :)