Happy Halloween 2020
Happy Halloween to you all.
This year, Xavier dressed as a chicken. Mom made a felt body, bought some white sweat pants and started sewing on feathers.
Xavier informed Rebecca after two rows of feathers that was all he wanted. Less work for Mom.
As for his pumpkins, he sold all but three. So, we had the three we kept plus three more to carve.
We carved our first one Thursday after school. The rest we carved today.
Or, perhaps, Dad carved four of the five remaining today. Xavier had the neighbor kids over to play just after we sat down to carve the first pumpkin.
Xavier really wanted to have one pumpkin eating another. This was the one we carved on Thursday.
With one notable exception, we decided to keep the carving to simple, more traditional faces.
With so many pumpkins to carve and an impatient seven year old, it was a real sanity saver.
Rebecca took some of the meat from one of the pumpkins (the spider's legs, thorax and abdomen) and made pumpkin soup for supper.
The neighbor kids came over and Xavier and Rebecca joined them in making the neighborhood rounds. Not many houses participated, but Xavier still had a full bag, including a "Vote for Trump" box of chocolates.
Farm To Porch
Hello to you all.
What to do with all those pumpkins Xavier grew this past summer?
That is a question I asked Xavier. His answer was "Sell them around the neighborhood."
Today, he executed this plan, though I wished he had executed it yesterday when the temperature was in the mid 70's and not in the low 30's.
Upon coming home from school, Xavier wanted to load up his wagon (given to him for Christmas five years ago) and go door to door.
We decided to wait an hour to give people time to get home. Also, Xavier needed to do his homework first.
After I popped out to grab the mail, I returned to the house to discover Xavier had already loaded his wagon with the one pumpkin he could easily carry.
He practiced his spelling words, then we loaded up the wagon with three more, which was not easy; the wagon is not a big as I remember.
Xavier had a strategy. He had two houses with kids he wanted to visit. The first was around the corner. He sold two, charging $5 for the big 27 pound pumpkin and $1.25 for the small three pounder.
Next, Xavier headed across the street to the house with an elaborate Halloween themed front lawn. The lady living there bought the wagon's two remaining 35 plus pounders for $5 each.
It was back home to reload the wagon. The next two stops met with "I don't do Halloween," and "I don't have any money." So, no sales there.
The next house bought the 17 pounder, and the next house bought the 43 pounder.
Xavier then wanted to sell to a family we met at the neighborhood park because they had three kids, so we started the five block trek to that family. On the way, Xavier targeted houses decorated for Halloween.
One household did not buy any because they had just as Xavier rang the doorbell come in from harvesting their own pumpkin patch. (It's expected to get to 24° tonight, so lots of gardeners were harvesting crops today)
The house across the street said they planned on visiting a pumpkin patch this weekend.
We finally reached the "house with the yellow sign" as Xavier explained his targeted family's location.
The family remembered Xavier from the park several weeks back. They needed another pumpkin. They had carved two last week and both deflated and got mushy. Xavier sold the last pumpkin in his wagon, a 37 pounder.
We walked home in a heavy drizzle, Xavier pulling his empty wagon. All in all, he made $31.25 in under an hour. He paid his Sherpa (aka Dad) one dollar for hauling the loaded wagon for him.
Six Games and a Participation Medal
Hello everyone.
Xavier played his last two no-score soccer games today, back to back. The second one was a make up from the second week that was cancelled due to a covid scare.
Of course, there is no such thing as a no-score sport. At least as long as there are boys playing and dads on the sideline.
The Purple Wolves, Xavier's team, won their first game, lost two games and tied three games.
Xavier learned a lot and showed much improved skills in playing with a team, as did his teammates.
Xavier played well today, making many key plays setting up teammates' almost scores.
Harvest 2020
Greetings to everyone.
Xavier is on Fall Break. He has three days of it. Yesterday, we went to a park for him to run off excess energy and lunched on McDonald's.
Today, we went to a park for him to run off excess energy and lunched on KFC.
When the day warmed enough, we headed out to the pumpkin patch with parrot shears in hand.
We had an unexpected freeze last night, and the vines were hit hard. We decided to harvest the pumpkins.
Xavier wanted to start with the biggest one and work to the smallest. But first, we had to clear a path of one that was in the way of getting to the biggest pumpkin, which lay nearly in the center of the patch.
After clearing out that pumpkin, we came upon another smaller one. When we moved it, we discovered it hollowed out. A mouse had eaten it and made the shell one of its homes.
We did see the mouse scurry under the vines a number of times. Then, Xavier found its hole in the dirt. The mouse peeked out at him and Xavier got excited. "I see its nose and eyes!"
As we clipped pumpkins from their vines, Xavier discovered a large ripe tomato and a small spaghetti squash.
There were three types of pumpkin in the patch. Two varieties claiming one hundred pounds plus and one variety, called Jack-be-Little, which grew quite small pumpkins.
The Jack-be-Littles had spread themselves out throughout the patch. 31 fruit were harvested from their two vines.
The larger pumpkin vines produced fifteen viable pumpkins.
The largest, the one in the middle of the patch and the one we watched closely all summer long, weighed in at 54 pounds. Not the 100 plus Xavier had hoped to grow.
A second pumpkin grew under a thick mat of sunflowers and tall grass. It nearly beat the one in the middle of the patch, weighing in at 53.5 pounds.
The average weight of the big pumpkin haul was 34 pounds. The smallest pumpkin weighed in at 3.5 pounds. Three pumpkins over forty pounds and six over thirty pounds.
What are we going to do with all these fruit? Xavier has yet to decide. Some of the thoughts are to pick two or three to carve and donate one to his class. The Jack-be-Littles he has given a few to neighbors and the rest will be used as place settings Thanksgiving Thursday. Beyond that, he's still thinking.