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Harvest Pumpkin - 1yr - Indian Summer Soup

January 2001

Susan in Shreveport, Louisiana USA

Special Mention

Harvest/Pumpkin Party

I didn't know what theme to use for my 1-year-old's birthday. Being 1-year-old usually calls for a small party, but I wanted to include activities for his older cousins (ages 3-5).

The birthday boy was also born right between Halloween and Thanksgiving.

The invitation said "our little pumpkin is turning 1" and had a picture of the baby inside a pumpkin.

I had a bakery make a large cake actually shaped like a real pumpkin. They made a miniature one for the baby to devour. The older children got cupcakes with orange icing and green vine icing.

It was easy to decorate the house with orange balloons, hay bales and scarecrows and of course, lots of pumpkins. Hay bales made great seating outside and I filled a wheelbarrow with ice to put lots of sodas in.

We made Indian Summer Soup (cheese/corn/chicken soup) and served it out of a hollowed-out pumpkin. Other food was a turkey sandwich tray, chips, cornbread muffins and hot apple cider.

I had a pinata shaped like a number one (I couldn't find any pumpkin shaped piñatas).

Activities included painting small pumpkins, sponge painting some placemats with leaf shapes, and stringing wooden beads for necklaces.

I had also planned some pumpkin relay games (jumping over a hay bale, throwing a hula-hoop over a pumpkin), but ran out of time.

We filled a cardboard box with leaves and had placed small, wrapped dollar-store gifts inside. Each child could feel around in the leaves until they found a prize - always a good idea to choose games where everyone wins something.

I found some small orange canvas tote bags for favor bags. Inside we put a bookmark with the baby's picture on it, some harvest-shaped candies, pumpkin Playdough (made with flour, salt, food coloring and pumpkin pie spice), and we made rice-crispy pumpkin pops (round rice-crispy balls with a Popsicle stick, which I had added orange food-coloring to, and tied plastic wrap around them with a green "vine" string).

The party was a success and enjoyed by the children and the adults felt comfortable with everything too.

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