A Twelve-Step Guild...On How To Make A Birthday Jack-O-Lantern For Your Mom

Here are the twelve-step instructions for making a birthday Jack-O-Lantern for your mom.

1. Find the perfect pumpkin

2. Clean it in preparation for pumpkin carving

3. Create/find a fun design--it should include a "Happy Birthday" message and perhaps a clever staying--a plus if you can include an iconic Halloween symbol (ghost = good, witch = not so good...)

4. Prepare the pumpkin for carving--cut off the top, scoop out the insides

5. Transfer your clever design to the pumpkin

6. Carve your pumpkin

7. Once finished, test you pumpkin in a dark room (if already dark outside, us that...)

8. Make sure your mother's birthday is close to Halloween, preferably within a day or two of the holiday, but not longer than a week (sorry if that is not an option for you...)

9. Give your finished product and "Happy Birthday Pumpkin" to your mom, or place the pumpkin on your mom's headstone

10. Miss your mom terribly and wish you could still give it to her in person

11. Continue this tradition from the time you were in Jr. High School until today--over four decades (except for the years you were living in Denmark or Colorado...)

12. Do it all again next year

My Pre-Halloween Tradition...Happy Birthday Mom

I think I've only missed a couple of years when she was with us and only one after she passed. It's a holiday tradition, except it's a month before Thanksgiving and two before Christmas. We pick out a pumpkin that we'll carve early and once done, place it atop a tombstone in a cemetery on a hill.

I've written about it before, to celebrate my mother's birthday instead of cake and ice cream, we carve a jack-o-lantern. 

Yesterday as the weekend came to a close was when I asked the kids what pattern they thought would be fun and we cut it up.

Autumn is my favorite time of year and it's not even close. I love the crisp air, the beautiful colors, the time when all children dream of Halloween as the unofficial beginning of the holiday season. 

But now, a sense of melancholy drifts into this time of year as we're reminded of a wonderful woman.

When I think of her, I want to be better. I want to do better. I want to make her proud. It seems the least I can do is carve a pumpkin and leave it on her grave.