We just love Halloween at our house, so here are a couple more book reviews for October! I love orange, don’t you? I love to drive past patches of pumpkins and see the stands filled with that glorious autumn color. What fun to stop and pour over the different shapes and sizes to find the “just right” pumpkin for your grandchild. Want a story to open the door of pumpkin trivia? Our first book, Too Many Pumpkins, by Linda Arms White, Illustrated by Megan Lloyd. This story is a little longer, but will appeal to second grade to 5th grade or 7- to 12-year-olds, and…it’s filled with lots of orange. Yea!
Our protagonist in this book is Rebecca Estelle, who lives alone with her cat. She gardens and grows a bit of everything, except pumpkins! She hates them! When she was young, her family was struggling, and they had nothing to eat except pumpkins. They ate them stewed, mashed, steamed, and baked. They ate them for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. She decided she would never eat pumpkins again! She didn’t even want to look at them. Yuck!
Then one autumn day, a truck filled with pumpkins was passing by her house and off popped a pumpkin. Splat! Pumpkin “smithereens” all over the edge of her yard. She yelled at the driver of the truck, but he wouldn’t come back, so she threw dirt on top of all the pieces so she wouldn’t have to look at it (Good teaching moment–what do plants need to grow? Water, sunshine and DIRT)! Well, as you can guess, next spring, up came pumpkins. Although she did her best to destroy them, she finally decided to just ignore them.
Fast forward to fall, pumpkins were growing everywhere! Now, she had to decide what to do with them. I will just say, she shared and lured her friends, neighbors, and townspeople to come get them by carving and lighting a great many of them. And, if you light them, they will come. Come they did, and they had a great party!
I found this story very satisfying. Pretty pictures, lots of orange, imagination, and fun times. Also, the story gives a great opportunity to look up a lot of pumpkin fact-o-las to impress those cuties of yours. For instance, unlike most fruits and veggies, we can eat the seeds and they are good for us! Champion pumpkin growers will pay as much as $10 for a single seed! Plus, a large pumpkin can gain as much as 30 pounds in a single day. It is said that pumpkins are the fastest growing plant in North America (tell that to the dandelions in my lawn). Top it all off with some delicious pumpkin cookies for your cuties to eat and share.
Our second book is a Halloween joke book called 99 1/2 Spooky Jokes, Riddles, & Nonsense by Holly Kowitt. Here are a few examples of the jokes you will find:
“What kind of jokes do vampires tell? (Neck-neck jokes) ~ Knock Knock Jokes
“How dld you feel after seeing Dracula? (Drained)
Monster boy, “Look mom! I brought home a jogger!” Monster Mom, “How many times do I have to tell you! No fast food!”
Where does a Cyclops go after 5th Grade? (To Junior Eye School) ~ Junior High School
Seriously corny, right? But….my grandkids thought they were hill-arious when they had a joke to share with their friends. You can find a lot of joke books around, and dangerously funny jokes online. You might as well be the “funny grannie” that sends them a joke a day until Halloween. Happy Halloween! Go forth and be awesome!
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