I love, love, love pumpkins. I don't think it's healthy, actually. I go crazy for pumpkin spice anything, I can't get a cactus to live yet I muddle through an attempt at a pumpkin patch at least every five years (just long enough to forget just how bad I am at growing things), a visit to my favorite local pumpkin patch (shout out to Fredrickson Farms in Carl Junction, MO) is a necessity, and I have pumpkins everywhere! Imagine my delight when I discovered that there is actually a National Pumpkin Day!
So what does a devoted pumpkin-lover do to celebrate National Pumpkin Day? Um, can you say ALL THE THINGS?!? Okay, so I understand that the kids might not share my extreme love of all things pumpkin and so I turn down my pumpkin-meter just a smidge when I'm preparing activities for the club. First, we need a pumpkin themed snack. The kids are always excited when we have food, and even the big kids get happy with themed food (even if they are too cool to admit it most of the time). For our super cute snack we're having Tangerine Pumpkins found over at Bren Did.
After we enjoy a healthy and super cute snack it's time for daily programs! First program is triple play where we often do games in the gym. For National Pumpkin Day, we are playing a pumpkin broom race that is super simple from One Charming Party. If your group doesn't have real pumpkins, some other options are to use orange balloons or foam pumpkins (I was able to find very inexpensive ones at Dollar Tree this year).
After our game in the gym, we move to Power Hour and Project Learn. Power Hour is pretty basic - it's homework time, but for Project Learn we do a fun learning activity each day. For National Pumpkin Day, it's a great opportunity to incorporate some pumpkin science. I found a fun idea over at Little Bins for Little Hands I was surprised to find how many of our kids don't get the opportunity to actually experience "pumpkin guts" because so many families no longer carve pumpkins. Well, I felt like that was a kid experience that everyone should have, so the first step of pumpkin science is actually a bit of pumpkin dissection. I cut the top off our pumpkin and let the kid take the opportunity to feel the pumpkin guts and pull some out. Don't throw those guts away - clean the seeds off and roast them for kids to try. After the pumpkin is cleaned out, it's time to carve a simple face. As this uses sharp objects, it's an adult demonstration activity. If you want, you can do this in a two pumpkin-process so that you have one already carved and ready for the volcanic effect. Make sure if you're using a carved pumpkin, make sure you've got it placed on a large sheet pan or a hotel pan so that you don't have such a mess to clean up at the end.
Do you have favorite pumpkin themed activities? What does your club to do incorporate pumpkin science? Do you share my ultimate love of pumpkins? Let me know!
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