Jack O'Lanterns at Washington Park

Every Halloween there is an event called "Jack Spectacular" at Washington Park when the public is able to walk around the carillon section of the park and view 2100 carved, lighted pumpkins. It is quite a sight - not one to be missed by anyone in the area. The carving is open to the public one week before the actual event, and this year we decided to participate by carving 2 of our own pumpkins (the organization supplies the pumpkins for you, you provide the tools and imagination for the carvings).

Even Ethan took part in this - when I wasn't chasing him around and preventing him from putting acorns into his mouth!

Ethan and Olivia with their creations. This was a really nice event. While we were carving there were about 20 other families sitting around in the grass carving any number of pumpkins. It was a lot of fun to walk around viewing all of the carvings - some were extremely well done.

The night of the event. As you can see, every princess needs an entourage!

Grandpa had the "honor" of pushing Ethan (a sock monkey - he just wouldn't keep on his hat to show you that) in his stroller. Ethan made it about halfway through the event before we gave in to his demands and let him out. Ethan was fascinated by all of the pumpkins. He would sit in the grass in front of them and just look at them. When there are 2100 pumpkins to look at, this took a lot of time!

Olivia, aka Princess Belle, in front of some carvings. We did not find the 2 pumpkins that we carved, darn. But, Joe and I seemed more upset about this than the kids.

The sock monkey and Princess Belle in front at the entrance to the event (while it may seem out of order, we actually arrived through the back entrance so this was not the first picture taken).

We even found a Belle pumpkin for Olivia/Belle to pose with!

While it is not easy to find people you know at this event due to it being so dark, we did manage to find Olivia's friends Kellan (a knight - a great costume) and Caden (Bumblebee from Transformers). These 3 spent the rest of the evening running around the event and yelling (which made them easy to find in the dark). Crazy kids. There were also Halloween tunes from the carillon and old spooky movies being silently played on the side of the carillon.