Tuesday/Wednesday, October 8 & 9: I took Brendan home with me from the Gardens. We were having a special "overnight" because tomorrow morning is Grandparents Day over at Trinitas and I will be Brendan's special guest!
We had stopped at McD's for a bite to eat on the way home and with Brendan's cheeseburger happy meal came a Matchbox car with a little track attachment that was pretty cool. Brendan added it to some track I had here and played for quite awhile with this.
Our main goal, however, tonight was to CARVE A PUMPKIN--something I am notoriously BAD at doing. I've never ever carved a pumpkin successfully in my entire life. Seriously. When Kelly told me she and Brendan had picked out a nice big pumpkin to carve and suggested we carve it together over at my house, my heart sank. I thought to myself--DISASTER.
I neglected to take any pictures of Brendan gutting the pumpkin. He did a very nice job of it out on my front deck. Thankfully, a few weeks ago, I picked up a pumpkin carving tool set on clearance--so I at least had tools at hand! After the pumpkin was gutted out, I casually asked Brendan what kind of face he wanted on the pumpkin ...
Without any hesitation whatsoever, Brendan announced that he wanted the howling wolf from Great Wolf Lodge, and he wanted the wolf to look "authentic." Yikes. DOOMSDAY for Grandma Carol!
But look at Brendan's precious face and tell me that you wouldn't do everything possible to carve a howling wolf for him? I knew it! We went over to my computer and googled, "Howling wolf" and found several pictures. Brendan picked one he liked, I enlarged it on my computer screen, grabbed a piece of paper and traced the design, taped the paper to the pumpkin and began carving! And VOILA!
Dear Brendan was SO happy with his howling wolf! And I was very thankful for computers, tools, and the result!
We lit it using one of my scented candles, but then remembered that Mr. Matey can't be around scented candles--so we didn't keep it lit for very long at all. But it was enough to see how super cool our wolf looks, howling into the night sky.
Before I tucked Brendan in for the night, we re-read our story of "Violet Goes to the Country" and Brendan delighted in it as much this week as he had last week! I love this so much about you, Brendan. We laughed through the story and talked as we read, looking at the great illustrations, and feeling Violet's pain as she got into scrape after scrape with Uncle Leo, who eventually rescued her and became her friend after all. We said our prayers together and then Brendan crawled into the sleeping bag in the main room and dozed off to sleep (eventually), as I edited photos on my computer in the same room.
Thank you, Lord, for being with us throughout our afternoon and even in this little pumpkin carving adventure night. I really didn't WANT to carve a pumpkin, felt like I was doomed to failure, looked up and asked You for help ... and our whole time together was a real blessing.
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