Whine, whine, whine....

[BlsdMama]

Older parents have to be a little more jaded.  The young mama would have said, "WHEE! Pumpkin carving!"

 

The old mama says, "I cannot believe I'm going to pay $40 for pumpkins to make a giant mess and throw them away in less than a week."

 

Seriously.

 

This post can go one of two ways:

 

1. Either you can add how you've become jaded over the years, lol, and cheer me up.

 

OR, alternatively:

 

2. You can come up with a brilliant idea to offer the minions as a substitute or figure out how to get 9 pumpkins for $10, because somehow, then it annoys me less.

 

You may not:

 

Suggest we just paint them.  No.  Just no.

[regentrude]

I'm not jaded - if I don't enjoy it, then I just don't carve pumpkins. Period. I do things that I dislike if they are necessary. Carving pumpkins is not.

 

If you absolutely must: get mini pumpkins. Or do one family pumpkin. Or group pumpkins.

 

Edited October 28, 2016 by regentrude

[luuknam]

Older parents have to be a little more jaded.  The young mama would have said, "WHEE! Pumpkin carving!"

 

The old mama says, "I cannot believe I'm going to pay $40 for pumpkins to make a giant mess and throw them away in less than a week."

 

I did the pumpkin carving thing once (last year) and never again. Apparently both my kids think that taking out the seeds etc is gross, so they tried to do that without actually touching them with their hands (they spent a looooong time, and eventually I ended up cleaning out the remaining stuff). So, since then, my stance is that it's not part of my cultural heritage, so not my problem.

[luuknam]

Wrt money, you could plant pumpkin seeds in spring.

[luuknam]

Oh, and the other day on the radio the host was raving about foam pumpkins to carve (or something along those lines). No idea about the cost though - probably not cheaper than real ones, but you could look into it.

[JudoMom]

We haven't carved pumpkins in probably 12 years (if we did, I blocked it from my memory).  

I say use the $40 to create another tradition that you can stick with for the next 16 years.  Or create another tradition that is free.  Or use the $40 to pay the kids off.

 

[BlsdMama]

Oh, while I am looking, I seem to remember that one idea is to use mr potato head parts and shove them in the pumpkin. 

 

 

LOL!  Ohmigoodness, that's hilarious.

[cjzimmer1]

We don't do pumpkin carving but if we did we take the same approach my mom did to get us Halloween candy, wait until the day after and get it super cheap.  My mom quickly figured out we didn't like the costumes, we had no desire to traipse around on a cold dark evening (that 9 times out of 10 was raining) and we really just wanted candy.  Add to it the scare of the late 70's early 80's of needing to get your candy x-rayed for fear of people sticking thing in it, she discovered we were just as happy to wait till the day after and she'd buy each of us 2-3 bags of candy for less money than she would have spent on costumes.  It was a win all around.

 

So from that lesson I've learned to teach my kids that "celebrating" something on the specific day isn't really important.  It's left me to pick a more convenient (and cheaper) time to do things.  So all candy comes after the day that everyone thinks you need to celebrate it, pumpkins carving would definitely come after Oct 31.

 

Alternatively, do you have any farmers who grow them nearby.  The Amish around here have fields full of them that will just sit and rot and for a few dollars one could easily acquire lots of pumpkins.

[bolt.]

I started out jaded about expensive pointless messes.

 

I'm now not even slightly guilty-feeling about my jaded-ness. My kids are old enough to (if they really want to) spend their own money on pumpkins and meet my checklist in order to gain permission to do it mostly-independently. So far, no takers.

[gardenmom5]

jaded older mamma. - who also doesn't do the pumpkin thing becasue -

dudeling has no interest in pumpkins.  he never wants to go trick or treating.  though might change his mind closer to the date 'cause 'candy'.  this year (today) he gets to go ToT at his sister's employer, has a church ToT thing tomorrow - we'll see how much he actually does on monday.

oh - and he only eats the stuff he likes (which isn't much) and will give the rest to siblings.

 

so, I haven't even tried to carve pumpkins with him in a few years.   even now, If I'm making squash - he gets grossed out.

[BlsdMama]

We haven't carved pumpkins in probably 12 years (if we did, I blocked it from my memory).  

 

I say use the $40 to create another tradition that you can stick with for the next 16 years.  Or create another tradition that is free.  Or use the $40 to pay the kids off.

 

 

 

 

I think maybe because we just always have done the pumpkins that this really didn't occur to me.

 

I sat the middle kids down and said, "Look, here is the budget for the fall activities this weekend.  We can do pumpkins if you really, really want to.  But with the same budget we could go get caramel apples, popcorn, cider, cinnamon sticks, and the cool things that make the fire change color and do a fire outside instead."

 

It was unanimous - they voted for the second option and no pumpkins.

 

Thank you for making me NOT the killer of the pumpkin tradition but instead empowering them iwth choice.  

 

:D

 

Huge improvement in my day.

[Guest]

I hate pumpkin carving too. We show up the day before Halloween and get all of the left over pumpkins at the patch for 1/10th of the price we would have paid five days earlier. Are they perfect? Nope but the kids don't care!

 

And yes- echoing the potato head parts. They work swell. :) 

[J-rap]

I hand more stuff over to the kids to do, and then it still feels fun.  But in your particular case, you can do a couple things...

 

Here, pumpkins are a lot cheaper if you wait as late as possible.  

 

Some years, we don't carve but we decorate differently:  paint faces on them, spray paint them with a metallic color and put glitter swirls on them, and more (you can check out different stuff online!).  If you do different things like that and don't need to carve them, you can even get some of the mini-pumpkins instead which are also cheaper.

 

My kids have gotten into digging out the seeds and roasting them over the years.  I used to do it, got tired of separating out the seeds, but now my kids do it.  :)

 

 

[MysteryJen]

We did pumpkin carving a couple of times. My solution for the holiday "have-tos" that I don't want to do is to turn it over to the people who care. Dh took pumpkin carving: the buying, the carving, the clean-up. Lasted two years. We haven't had pumpkins even on the porch for about 8 years now.

Grandma took over the dying of Easter Eggs. And that has continued....

 

Same approach for Christmas lights, decorations, Thanksgiving. The people who care do the work AND the buying of materials. It is shocking how little my kids wish to do for "holidays" if their own money is at play.

[almondbutterandjelly]

Oriental Trading has tons of stickers specifically for decorating pumpkins, so no carving.  I've been into those the last couple of years.  They had Snoopy ones this year!  I was going to post a link, but it looks like the snoopy ones are sold out.

 

But, yes, nine pumpkins is a lot.  Maybe you could half that and have each kid decorate one side of the pumpkin, like front or back?

 

 

[Seasider]

I dislike it for the mess but in recent years I've come to feel that it is a waste of a food crop. I just feel like we're throwing away food.

 

Now I know that it's a commercial crop, those pumpkins wouldn't actually be people food anyway, there's probably a sound economic trail in all of it, etc, but it still feels like food waste to me.

[SKL]

We usually draw the faces on.  :P  Maybe I should go all supermom and let them carve this year?  Myself, I will be working.  Hopefully they don't chop their fingers off ....

[SKL]

One year we did roast the pumpkin seeds, and I found some use for the squishy part (mixed with some food or other).  No way am I ambitious enough to do serious cooking with a pumpkin.  Maybe next year when my kids have more cooking experience.  :)

[Onceuponatime]

This year I had one pumpkin decorator. He printed out a stencil of Albert Einstein, cut out the stencil and colored it on the pumpkin with black sharpie. He's happy so I'm happy. We all went through the local farm's corn maze and had pumpkin ice cream. I'm all for cheap and simple.

[Kalypso]

 I'm with you. I have to buy 3 pumpkins to carve that won't last but a day in this heat. I'm so over carving pumpkins!

[happypamama]

I have half the children you do, but a similar age span.  I get the jaded older mom thing.  Stuff that I didn't mind using temporarily for one or two children seems like a ridiculous expense when multiplied by five (soon to be six).

 

Our compromise about things like pumpkins is to buy a couple of large ones that we will carve as a family.  Er, the kids and DH will come up with something, and DH will probably do the carving.  He's pretty talented at stuff like that, and the kids are always impressed with Daddy's skills.  Two pumpkins were only $5 total at WalMart, and we'll save the flesh and seeds, so that'll mitigate the cost a bit.

 

You could divide the children into groups and have each group choose a theme, with the older ones directing, and everyone contributing as they're able.

 

And for Christmas, etc. decorations, we either go with paper decorations, which are cheap enough that I don't mind throwing them away, or I go with something reusable.  One year, we used hot glue and felt to make a bunch of adorable ribbon candy decorations.  Everyone got to make some, and we have them as a perpetual decoration now.  Same with some beaded trees.  But I cut scrapbook paper into strips one year and let the kids make Easter egg decorations, and they were super cheap to make, so it didn't bother me to throw them away after a couple of weeks.

 

It is hard, when you have a lot of children and a big age span, to make sure that the little ones get to do the little kid stuff.  I totally understand that.  I do find that it requires a conscious effort to make sure my little ones get to enjoy little kid characters, picture books, etc., because they seem happy when they're following the big kids around too.  It's a privilege to be allowed to stay up to listen to me read LOTR to the older ones, and so my younger ones are motivated to use good listening manners, but I have to make a very conscious effort to ensure that it's in addition to, and not in place of, Paddington.

Edited October 28, 2016 by happypamama

[mom2scouts]

Shhhhh, I'm on the computer trying to delay helping my child carve her pumpkin.

[ikslo]

DS:  Can we get a pumpkin?

Me:  Pumpkin or small box of Legos.  Your choice.

DS:  Who needs a pumpkin?  Can we go to Target right now?

[TammyS]

I hate doing "crafts".  I will happily buy things for my kids to do, as long as I don't have to participate.  Which means the only time my older son got to carve pumpkins was when he went to a friend's house once and did it, because I was just not willing to supervise the wielding of cutlery (or watch my knife destroyed in the operation, either) or do it myself.  Somehow, he got to adulthood and college without too many issues, despite a pretty much carving-free existence.  My younger has never carved a pumpkin, maybe never will.

 

If a mommy's goodness is measured by the dumb kid crafts she does with her kids, then I'm as evil as they get.

[Mrs_JWM]

Look - the squirrels carved ours AND took most of the seeds out. They did a lousy job cleaning up, though...

 

 

Sent from my XT1049 using Tapatalk

[JumpyTheFrog]

Last year we all bought pumpkins, but DH and I never got around to carving ours after helping the kids with theirs. This year I decided I don't feel like decorating, so I didn't. The only pumpkin we have is one of the white pumpkins left from last Halloween. Yes, it is a year old and didn't go bad!

[Rebel Yell]

I think maybe because we just always have done the pumpkins that this really didn't occur to me.

 

I sat the middle kids down and said, "Look, here is the budget for the fall activities this weekend. We can do pumpkins if you really, really want to. But with the same budget we could go get caramel apples, popcorn, cider, cinnamon sticks, and the cool things that make the fire change color and do a fire outside instead."

 

It was unanimous - they voted for the second option and no pumpkins.

 

Thank you for making me NOT the killer of the pumpkin tradition but instead empowering them iwth choice.

 

:D

 

Huge improvement in my day.

AWESOME!!!

Not that you need it anymore, but another reason to add to the list of "why I don't carve pumpkins anymore" is that in my neighborhood, it will end up smashed in the street. Diamond cried her eyes out one year because she couldn't understand why someone would destroy something she worked so hard on. 😡

[Lang Syne Boardie]

We do ONE jack-o-lantern. Well, my husband will also carve a squash or a turnip if we have one; one year he carved a Halloween red onion...

 

Just because everybody else buys a $4 pumpkin per family member, and spends $100+ on costumes, and $75 at the pumpkin patch/apple orchard/hayride, and buys big blow-up thingies for the front yard, and goes broke on candy...doesn't mean we have to.

 

Our family loves Halloween and makes a huge deal of it. With a budget of less than $20 for the whole family.

 

Costumes are homemade with whatever people can scrounge for themselves, and the kitchen is decorated with creativity and materials from the year 'round arts and crafts cupboard. We go down to the community 'safe Halloween' at the firehouse, for the costume parade, fireworks, and car show. Then we come home for homemade music and tons of games (indoors and out). Depending on the weather, we either have a chili supper and spooky movie, or a bonfire/wienie roast. Not one of us would miss it. It's more than enough, it's actually really good, how we do it. :D

 

I feel like Charlie Brown: "Down with commercialism!"

 

(Edited to attach a picture of the Halloween onion...we DID also have a pumpkin, of course.)

 

Edited October 28, 2016 by Tibbie Dunbar

[BlsdMama]

We did pumpkin carving a couple of times. My solution for the holiday "have-tos" that I don't want to do is to turn it over to the people who care. Dh took pumpkin carving: the buying, the carving, the clean-up. Lasted two years. We haven't had pumpkins even on the porch for about 8 years now.

Grandma took over the dying of Easter Eggs. And that has continued....

 

Same approach for Christmas lights, decorations, Thanksgiving. The people who care do the work AND the buying of materials. It is shocking how little my kids wish to do for "holidays" if their own money is at play.

 

 

So the catch with that - my mom is not frou frou.  My MIL is a baker, not a mess maker.  So if I had to ask who wants to oversee this, it would be in the hands of an 8yo and 10yo.  Yup, not happening.  Now, grandma (MIL) *does* do the Easter egg hunt.  My husband and I both are all for big traditional meals for all holidays - Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years. 

 

I'll admit that well over half the "guilt" is that I hate, hate, hate Halloween.  We stopped celebrating it about 11 years ago.  But, the littles are now big enough to see pictures of costumes, kwim?  So instead we started giving dress up clothes as Christmas gifts.  But *this* year we took them to a church festival and let them dress up.  So I felt a little better about ripping away the remaining custom of pumpkins.  I think letting go of traditions isn't a big deal if they were never your family's traditions to begin with, kwim?  But it's a whole other ball of guilt if you did all these fun things with your oldest few and then decide to discontinue (take away) without replacing with another tradition.  It's a recurring theme in my life - guilt over not doing with 9, 10, 11 what I did with 1, 2, 3. :P ;)

[Julie Smith]

I don't carve pumpkins. Dh insisted we do it once, or was it twice?

 

The kids have no interest. But if they did we would carve them at a place that offers the service, as in gets the pumpkins, provides the tools, and cleans up the mess. Right now I think the library does it one evening, and Home Depot does it a few times near the end of October.

[Spryte]

I think maybe because we just always have done the pumpkins that this really didn't occur to me.

 

I sat the middle kids down and said, "Look, here is the budget for the fall activities this weekend.  We can do pumpkins if you really, really want to.  But with the same budget we could go get caramel apples, popcorn, cider, cinnamon sticks, and the cool things that make the fire change color and do a fire outside instead."

 

It was unanimous - they voted for the second option and no pumpkins.

 

Thank you for making me NOT the killer of the pumpkin tradition but instead empowering them iwth choice.  

 

:D

 

Huge improvement in my day.

 

That was brilliant!

[myfunnybunch]

Sigh. I hear you.

 

When I suggested not carving pumpkins, it didn't go over well.

 

But my guys are old enough to carve their own and help set up and clean up, so it wasn't too painful.

Edited October 28, 2016 by myfunnybunch

[mamiof5]

I love pumpkin carving!!! Wait, let me reword that... I like to see the finished product, like taking the cute pictures while they do it. I actually don't carve pumpkins. Dh does 😄😄😄

[DesertBlossom]

I have never liked Halloween. I have never liked dressing up. I don't like spending money on elaborate costumes and pumpkins for 6 kids is expensive. And I HATE that it all leads to one big candy overload. Why? Why?

 

I took my kids to the thrift store and let them have $5. Any more than that they had to spend themselves. And we managed to find $2 pumpkins, but it was a limit of 4 and I have 5 who will want to carve. So...

Edited October 28, 2016 by DesertBlossom

[DesertBlossom]

I think maybe because we just always have done the pumpkins that this really didn't occur to me.

 

I sat the middle kids down and said, "Look, here is the budget for the fall activities this weekend. We can do pumpkins if you really, really want to. But with the same budget we could go get caramel apples, popcorn, cider, cinnamon sticks, and the cool things that make the fire change color and do a fire outside instead."

 

It was unanimous - they voted for the second option and no pumpkins.

 

Thank you for making me NOT the killer of the pumpkin tradition but instead empowering them iwth choice.

 

:D

 

Huge improvement in my day.

Love it!

[ScoutTN]

We carved a watermelon once for a summer party. Lovely pink light. Way easier than the pumpkins.

[Tammi K]

Where we live there are no trick-or-treaters (too rural) and the moose eat the pumpkins left outside, so I have a very handy excuse.  Not sure what you do if you don't have moose.

 

[Xahm]

I know you are set, but I'll share anyway. Right now my kids are content to share a family jackolantern (and let dh do the goopy parts), but if they weren't, I'd have them each paint a pie pumpkin. After Halloween I'd wash off the paint, bake them, and then have plenty for pumpkin bread, casserole, and such.

[kewb]

Oh, no pumpkin carving. I did it when they were little a couple of years because they liked it. Hated every blessed moment of it. The squirrels end up destroying them so I bought a ceramic pumpkin.

 

Now I am so jaded I don't decorate anymore.

[vonfirmath]

We did not carve pumpkins growing up so I never introduced the idea to my kids.

 

Unfortunately, their schools do "Storybook Pumpkins"  -- so I bought two pumpkins to decorate because my daughter wants to do it and I'm sure my son will want to as well.

 

Specifically, both schools say NO CARVING.

 

[redsquirrel]

My kids love pumpkins, we even have special pumpkin carving tools...but I could not care less about carving the damn things.  Every year I whine about it...same as the dumb christmas tree. I never get out of the pumpkins and I never get out of the dumb tree.  My kids love all that stuff. I buy things like 'Halloween foaming hand soap' and they notice and say thank you.  Weirdos.

 

But, I've only got two kids so I figure it's not for much longer, lol.  And frankly, DH does 90% of the pumpkin carving with them, including the clean up, so I don't have much to complain about. All I do is clean and roast the pumpkin seeds, lol.  And now that we have this cool tool that attaches to an electric drill and cleans out the inside of the pumpkin we get them done fast.

 

But I think you've put in your time. I keep reminding myself that in two years my eldest will be off to college and my youngest will be 12 this year, so it really can't be too many years more until I am FREEEEE. In your case, seeing as you really don't like it or don't feel comfortable with it, just let it go.

 

And man, that is a LOT of pumpkins to buy. I was having a hard time fitting 4 in my Mazda, I can't imagine how you get 10 pumpkins home.  But, 10 pumpkins for 40$ is a good deal.  I spent 20$ on four and we live in pumpkin country.

 

Now if I could just convince my family to stop getting a christmas tree. 

[trulycrabby]

Yeah, we are just about the only house on the block that doesn't decorate for Halloween. :zombie:

[momto10blessings]

I have 10 kids. We get a big pumpkin at Aldi for $2.50. Each kid gets a smaller pumpkin to carve and make their own when we go to the fall festival (it's included in admission)

[Spryte]

I love pumpkin carving!!! Wait, let me reword that... I like to see the finished product, like taking the cute pictures while they do it. I actually don't carve pumpkins. Dh does 😄😄😄

Have you considered renting out your DH to help with pumpkin carving?!? :D

[mamiof5]

Have you considered renting out your DH to help with pumpkin carving?!? :D

Lol!!! Have never thought of it. Not sure he'll go for it? They carve 3-4 pumpkins. I'm afraid that's his limit 😄😄

[mamiof5]

Now if I could just convince my family to stop getting a christmas tree.

Oh, no, no, no. I might do without pumpkins some day. But our Christmas tree? No negotiation on that one 😉

[mommymonster]

Oh, while I am looking, I seem to remember that one idea is to use mr potato head parts and shove them in the pumpkin. 

 

 

I did this a number of years ago... much easier than carving.

 

Edited October 29, 2016 by mommymonster

[bluemongoose]

We "carve" sugar cookies after using a pumpkin shaped cookie cutter. Kids each hack faces in them with butter knives and then bake...frost or don't. This was my solution, although I do like pumpkin carving.

[Carrie12345]

With extra kids in the house (younger than mine,) I am feeling very Old Momma.  I may consider stopping by the local farm for 50% off pumpkins today, but only b/c dh will be home, and he is still Young Daddy when it comes to pumpkin carving.

 

(Dh was away for work for the past two Halloweens and I got stuck with that job. I'm over it.)

[luuknam]

And man, that is a LOT of pumpkins to buy. I was having a hard time fitting 4 in my Mazda, I can't imagine how you get 10 pumpkins home.  But, 10 pumpkins for 40$ is a good deal.  I spent 20$ on four and we live in pumpkin country.

 

I'm going to guess your pumpkins were bigger. The pumpkins we did last year were something like 6-7" tall, which was a workable size, imo (not the mini pumpkins, and not the huge ones either). I could definitely fit 10 of those in my Kia Rio, and if I had 10 kids I wouldn't be driving a Kia Rio... you can always just stick a pumpkin beneath each kid's feet in the van.