IDEAS THAT WORK
October 1, 1991
The Halloween Alternative
Ovilla Road Church of the Nazarene in Glen Heights, Texas, is busy planning its second annual Pumpkin Patch Carnival. A year ago a young mother suggested she'd like an alternative to the usual Halloween trick-or-treat activities, so Pastor John Whitsett came up with the idea of the carnival.
The community will read about this year's carnival in the local newspaper. A portable marquee will sit at the church parking lot entrance, and flyers will be distributed through community day-care centers and after-school activity centers during the week before Halloween.
On Halloween night, carnival time is 6:30 to 8:30 in the yard adjacent to the church. Bales of hay topped with pumpkins mark the perimeter of the carnival area, and a church member costumed as a big dog greets children as they arrive.
Other church members supervise a variety of children's games: bowling (with two-liter soda containers as pins), tic-tac-toe (children toss bean bags onto a grid trying to get three in a row), apple-on-a-string, basketball shoot (using a child's goal), pin-the-nose-on-the-pumpkin, fishing (the younger children loved this one because with a little help they always caught something), and a cake walk.
Children may compete at each game as often as they like, but each child can win a major prize only once. Successive wins earn small sacks of candy and a vinyl refrigerator magnet displaying the church name, logo, and telephone number.
Since darkness falls by 6:30, the carnival area is lit with a halogen lamp and several homemade light poles. Lighting splashes out through church windows and welcomes those outside to look in.
A refreshment table strategically located just inside the chapel holds homemade goodies, coffee, and ...
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