The Great Pumpkin is real and he comes to our house Charlie Brown......

My favorite Halloween story is "It's The GREAT PUMPKIN Charlie Brown."  I remember being a child and waiting for the night that you got to watch all the Halloween shows on TV.  It's not like today where you can own a copy, or possibly just go on to the Internet and watch it.  You had to wait, you had to be home to see it, and if you weren't home you missed it for a whole year.  I think sometimes that is a problem in this world, no one knows how to wait and enjoy something when it finally comes.  But that is not my topic.

In the Great Pumpkin movie, Linus waits for the Great Pumpkin in the pumpkin patch and misses all the Halloween fun.  The Trick or Treating, and the Halloween party.  Trick or treating with kids is fun.  My kids through out the years loved to go out and get free candy.  When they are little you can control the amount of candy they get and eat, but as they get bigger what do you do?

I realized as my children got bigger  that they wanted to go to more and more houses and get more and more candy. The ability to control the amount of sugary treats in my house at Halloween and after was not an easy task.

Then I got a great Idea.  Thanks to Charlie Brown and the Great Pumpkin.  I told my children that The Great Pumpkin would come to our house after Halloween if they would do one thing.

They wondered what that was.  I told them if they would leave out their Halloween candy, that The Great Pumpkin would come and take some of the candy and leave them a present in place of the candy. 

They were so excited about receiving a present for their candy. That the first Halloween that we tried this they left all their candy out.

Here is one of our Great Pumpkin Halloween offerings.  The kids never minded that most of the candy disappeared.  They were so happy that The Great Pumpkin came to their house and left a gift.  The gifts were never big or expensive just a small toy.  It was worth it though as I did not have to argue with them about how much candy they were eating after Halloween.

This year my children are teens.  My daughter dressed up and went out to a few houses, she brought home a little candy, but not the mountains of their younger years.  My son stayed home and gave out candy.  He really enjoyed giving out the candy.  There was no need for a Great Pumpkin visit.  But we all watched the video and remembered the years that unlike Linus who never had a Great Pumpkin visit, we had quiet a few.  I hope when my children become parents that they carry on the tradition of a Great Pumpkin visit.

So if you are a parent in that stage of getting too much Halloween Candy, try having a Great Pumpkin visit.  You may find the days after Halloween are happier and not filled with arguments over how much candy your children can have every day.  I know we used to get enough to last until the Easter Bunny came.

G.G.