Pumpkin Carving and Halloween Cookies

This year we carved a very simple pumpkin. We free-handed the "template" instead of using a printed one because the boys had their hearts set on carving Blue from Blue's Clues. (So random, but they were very specific and adamant about it.) We found a template of Blue online but decided it was way too intricate for what we were willing to do. (Read: we were lazy.)

We used the same carving tool as last year and this pumpkin must have been extra tough because it bent the poor little thing on the first cut to open up the top. Casey just straightened it out and carried on...carefully.

It's my job to scoop out the insides of the pumpkin. I do not know how I landed this job, but I actually nailed it. Too bad I cannot say the same for the photos Casey took of me while I was doing it. I passed the scoop to Ethan so he could give it a try...

Logan would not put his hands anywhere near the insides of that pumpkin, but we brought the insides to him. I love this photo.

I am not totally sure what Ethan was really expressing in this photo. Maybe he's saying he's had enough of scooping. Maybe he's had enough of being photographed. Maybe he just noticed that Logan didn't have any pants on (which was true). Who knows?

At this point, we left daddy to his carving and the boys and I went down to the other end of the island.

We decorated some Halloween cookies while we waited for the carving. I learned this lesson last year. We waited a long time for daddy to be done with the pumpkin and I figured we might as well fill that time with another fun activity.

And I sure did just buy a kit with already-baked cookies. There was a ghost cookie and a pumpkin cookie for each of the boys to decorate.

They may not have been homemade from scratch, but Logan thought they tasted pretty good anyway. And they were certainly fun to decorate.

Ethan approved of them too.

My little diversion tactic worked because about the time the boys were finishing up with the cookies, Casey was done carving our pretty simple dog (Blue) pumpkin. The boys were pleased and that's all that counts!