American Robin (Turdus migratorius) Female-©WikiC

Abigail and the Pumpkin Carving Contest ~ by Emma Foster

Once there was a small Robin named Abigail who lived in a tiny nest in a massive oak tree by a pumpkin patch. As autumn steadily approached, more and more red and yellow leaves fell into Abigail’s nest. Every day Abigail pushed them off down into the pumpkin patch on top of the growing pumpkins. Eventually, Abigail noticed that most of the pumpkins had grown really large and the leaves no longer covered them up.

Several families began coming to the pumpkin patch near Abigail’s nest. The parents picked heavy round pumpkins to take home to carve. Sometimes the owners of the pumpkin patch would come and teach some of the children how to carve a small pumpkin of their very own. One day Abigail decided that she should carve her own pumpkin for Halloween.

Flapping down into the pumpkin patch, Abigail surveyed a small pumpkin left alone in the corner. Carefully watching to see how the kids carved their pumpkins with small knives, Abigail began to carefully peck with her beak to make a small hole. She decided that this would be the eye. Abigail pecked out an identical hole next to it and another hole underneath the two, making the other eye and nose. Lastly, Abigail pecked out a long wide oval to substitute as the mouth. But looking around, she noticed that several children were cutting a hole in the top of their pumpkins and pulling out seeds. Abigail followed them, pecking until she could pull off the top by the stem with her beak. Abigail began pulling out gobs of seeds and pumpkin insides with her beak. This proved to be her favorite part because of how much she loved pumpkin seeds.

Pumpkins Tasty Bird ©Nipomo Pumpkin Patch

After triumphantly finishing her pumpkin, Abigail realized how late it was. Almost everyone had already gone, but one of the owners was nailing a sign up on a telephone pole. Flying over to it, Abigail read the sign. The sign read: PUMPKIN CARVING CONTEST THIS SATURDAY.

Abigail grew excited. Today was Monday. If she began practicing, she could carve a pumpkin good enough to enter the contest.

Wind up Bird Pumpkin ©Daneof5683

For the next several days, Abigail spent most of the day carving pumpkins until pumpkins with all kinds of faces were scattered about the pumpkin patch. When the contest day arrived, Abigail rolled her best-carved pumpkin over to the judges who had gathered near the crowd as the contest began.

Everyone in the crowd was astonished that a bird had entered a carved pumpkin in the contest, but the contest continued as planned. Abigail waited patiently as the judges examined each of the carved pumpkins by each of the participants, and eventually the winner of the contest was called. Abigail did not win the contest, but she had fun anyway. She considered the most fun part of the day was giving away the rest of her carved pumpkins to each of the contestants.

Pumpkin Inspector came by to check out Abigail’s Pumpkins.

From then on, Abigail entered the contest every year. She even won a few times. She was sure to carve a pumpkin for each of the contestants in the contest whether she won or not. For Abigail, the best part of carving the pumpkins and giving them away was being able to eat the pumpkin seeds.

American Robin (Turdus migratorius) ©Laura Erickson

“I have shewed you all things, how that so labouring ye ought to support the weak, and to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, It is more blessed to give than to receive.” (Acts 20:35 KJV)

(Photos added by Lee. Sorry, but I couldn’t resist these photos. I just imagine Abigail’s Pumpkins had to be rather fancy.)

*

See Emma’s Other Stories