In what has become a Halloween tradition in the two years that we have lived in America, we headed to Shady Brook Farm this weekend to have some spooky themed fun and pick out pumpkins. Mr Pict and I had thought to take the kids somewhere else, change things up a bit instead of repeating the previous years’ jaunts, but the boys all protested and wanted to return to familiar territory. The Pictlings have determined the tradition.
The boys bounced on the giant trampolines, looked at the animals, played on the climbing frame, and ate pretzels, funnel cake and deep fried oreos. The middle two boys had a shot of a corn cannon, blasting corn cobs at various objects. Everyone guffawed when my 10 year old managed to hit the giant corn doll in its groin. Our 6 year old had fun blasting zombies with a paint ball through a rather too rapid fire technique.
There are two barns that get decked out spooky style for Halloween. In the evening, folks can wander through the dark interior while real life “ghouls” terrorise them but by day it is equally fun to wander around and see all the grotesque and fun decorations. The kids love the alien barn. Donning 3D glasses makes paint jump off the walls and models of aliens seem to vibrate. The kids think it is massive fun. My 12 year old and I then had a wander through the horror barn. It’s grotesque in places with imagery lifted from gory horror movies but it’s the room full of clowns that freaks me out the most.
Then it was time to head to the pumpkin patch so that each of the boys could select a pumpkin for carving. I guess the pumpkins were nearing the end of their season as there were many rotten and smashed ones littering the ground. It, therefore, took a while for the kids to find the pumpkins they wanted. We set them a size and weight limit which was not an issue for our 10 year old who wanted the smallest, roundest, most orange pumpkin he could find.
We then did some freestyle carving to turn the pumpkins into a My Little Pony, two vampires and Jack Skellington. With that, the pumpkins were ready to be transformed into lanterns for Halloween.
A Pict in PA 
Looks like you all had such a fun day! The boys pumpkins are awesome!
Thank you. It was fun and I like that we’ve already established seasonal traditions only two years into living here.
Everyone seems to have a superb time. The boy’s smiles says it all and those pumpkins are so cute!
Thank you. We had a lot of fun.
Looks like the kids had a great day out Laura, no wonder they wanted to go back!! And I would have thought you would have felt like you were back in Scotland, well Glasgow anyway, with them serving deep fried Oreos!!! 🙂
I’ve actually never eaten deep fried sweet food in Scotland. I’m not denying it exists but I never saw it on the menu of any chippy I visited. We’ve actually had deep fried Oreos once before though – at a Redneck Festival last year. I’m not really into fried food generally but the Oreos were surprisingly OK. Mostly I appreciated that they were warm.
It’s amazing how good most hot food tastes, when you’re cold! I’ve now seen two chippies selling the infamous deep fried mars bars, one in Glasgow, and one on Links Street in Kirkcaldy!! Personally, like you, I haven’t tried them, I only tried my first deep fried pizza last week!
My youngest sister ate a deep fried pizza when I was back in Fife in July and had a chippy dinner. I had never seen someone actually eat one before. She liked it but I don’t imagine it’s something I would ever order. I had fish and chips as that was what I had been missing – mainly because of malt vinegar and that brown sauce you only get in east coast chippies. Man, I’m salivating now.
LOL!! 🙂
You have some super talented pumpkin carvers in your house Laura!! We could do with some of that talent, our pumpkins lack that flair…. A great day out, right up our street, but those clowns eeeek….nightmare material.
Thanks. We have specific pumpkin cutting blades which helps. Help was needed for the biggest pumpkins as they were quite dense but the small pumpkin was most challenging actually as we had to avoid cutting too much out or the whole thing would collapse.
Love this! Your son’s are creative (:
Thank you!