smashing pumpkins

In the spring, we mulched the garden patch, built little mounds and planted pumpkin seeds. All summer long we watched as the seeds sprouted, grew and quickly overtook the garden. The vines sprawled into the playset and crept under the fence into our neighbor’s yard.

Every few weeks a child pulled me to the garden patch, where we counted 1, 2, 3, 4….

By harvest we had 19 large pumpkins and dozens of the little tinies.

For a few weeks the pumpkins are showcased on the front porch and then carved into fantastical designs for their grand, lighted premiere on Halloween night.

But then, after All-Hallows eve, they are shrunken, useless, pitiful. So we like to give them one last hurrah.

Up the stairs….

Through the attic access in the laundry room…

And to the top of the roof, where in a 2 minute barrage of flashing orange missiles they are tossed one by one to the driveway. Screams ring from above and below as each pumpkin transforms to squash.