Halloween is Grinch Night!

The Cat In The Hat Pumpkin

Entry for pumpkin carving/decorating contest-October 2004

We had a pumpkin carving contest in our office in October of 2004.  We were assigned to teams of  3 or 4 employees.  But, sadly, not all of us have carving skills-yours truly included!  Well, there were 4 of us-me, Kim, Marlie and Shawna, and coming up with an idea was almost futile.  So finally, I begged to do The Cat in the Hat and the girls agreed, as time was running out. And the plans evolved!  I did make the shirt for him using black and white felt.  You can get them cut in squares, so Karo helped me make a pattern and "voila"!  I stuffed the sleeves with newspaper to give his arms definition.  His shirt is wrapped around a starfoam cube and is easily pinned with floral pics to the starfoam.  We painted the pumpkin over and over with white acrylic paint-what a job!  Kim made his ears of white felt-they were cute and we used black pipecleaners for his mouth, whiskers and nose.  I found plastic rolling eyes and we glued them on.  Shawna made his hat, and I think it turned out pretty good.  And, lastly, we placed his head on top of the large starfoam cube.  Well, we didn't even place in the contest, but we did get pretty good reviews.  The actual winners were pumpkins that were cleverly carved-I have pictures of them around here SOMEWHERE-heh! heh! Below are a few of the other exciting entries.  All in all, it proved to be a good bonding time for all of us!

 Halloween Pumpkin Lineup-October 2004



Dr. Seuss

Theodor Seuss Geisel was born March 2, 1904 in Springfield, Massachusetts.  His father's desire was for him to become a doctor.  He did attend Oxford with intentions of earning a Doctorate in literature, but  he married and left before acquiring a PhD.  He then began to write humorous articles with illustrations that he did himself.  It was after his leave of Oxford that Seuss put the "Dr." in front of his name (Seuss was actually his middle name as well as his mother's maiden name).  And before he started writing children's stories he was drawing advertisements for NBC, General Electric and Standard Oil.  Theodor was very patriotic and in 1942, he began drawing posters for the Treasury Department, and also did some documentary films.  Sadly, in 1967, after 40 years of marriage, Dr. Seuss' wife Helen became very ill and committed suicide to end her suffering.  Within the year, he had met and married his wife Audrey and the two remained married until Dr. Seuss passed away in 1991.  Dr. Seuss never had any children, but loved children and was considered the best selling children's author in the world.

Aside from his writing and illustrating 44 children's books, Dr. Seuss' honors include The Legion of Merit Award, two Academy Awards, two Emmy Awards and the Pulitzer Prize in 1984.  His widow was left in charge of his affairs, and after the 2003 production of "The Cat in the Hat", she declared there would not be anymore live productions of Dr. Seuss' books.  It has been said that Audrey disliked Mike Myers' interpretation of the "Cat in The Hat".

 Dr. Seuss National Memorial Sculpture Garden

After Dr. Seuss' death in 1991, his widow, Audrey, authorized the Springfield Library of Museums Association to create a memorial in Massachusetts at the Springfield Museums.  The sculpture garden features bronze characters and a sculpture of Dr. Seuss himself at his drawing board with the Cat in the Hat looking on.  These sculptures were created by Dr. Seuss' artist stepdaughter Lark Grey Dimond-Cates who witnessed many of these characters being born.  The Memorial Garden is said to have been opened in 2002.

I would like to give credit to all the articles found in my research of Dr. Seuss:

New World Encyclopedia.org

catinthehat.org/memorial

biography.com

photobucket.com
yahoo search.com

*** A special thanks to Laura at forestwalkart for her "unbeknownst" idea! ***

"One man's toxic sludge is another man's potpurri!"

The Grinch!

"You pay this woman to sit on babies?  THAT'S disgusting!  I do it for nothing."

~the cat in the hat~

"Without my hat, I'm just your garden variety, 6' tall, talking cat!"

~the cat in the hat~

Welcome October-a month of all seasons...
 And welcome to KardKornerKrib!