Pumpkin's fitting obsession

UPDATE: Check out the first comment for this post. I was FLOORED. The author of the Spookley book and writer of the film described in the post below, Joe Troiano, found my blog. Talk about making someone's week!


ORIGINAL POST: Don't break it to my pumpkin that most people only read and sing about pumpkins in October. He and his brother became very attached to a movie called Spookley the Square Pumpkin earlier this fall and continued to watch it all through the Halloween season and into late November.

It's a predictable but cute story of a little square pumpkin who is teased because of his shape but ultimately teaches everyone that it's good to be different (remind anyone of a well-known red-nosed reindeer story?). It is based on the book of the same name, and the lonely extra on the DVD is a reading of the story, page by page. So, when I found the book for a steal (just $1.00!), I knew my little ones would be excited.

I didn't anticipate, however, what a fan little Pumpkin had become. He wanted all Spookley, all the time. No other television viewing was allowed. The book needed to be read over and over ad nauseum to satisfy his thirst for Spookley. And each reading of the story needed to be followed by a serenade of the "The Spookley Song." Yes, the movie is a musical (and the music is actually tolerable until about the 857th time). The cutest song of the bunch is a melancholy little tune called "If I Was Round" in which Spookley sings: "If I was round/ I would be/More like them/And less like me/And maybe I/Would have a friend/If I was round/If I was more like them." (Hearing Pumpkin sing every line of that one nearly melted my heart.) But I knew this obsession needed to be curtailed when Pumpkin decided he would sleep with his Spookley book, open to his favorite pages.

Hi, I'm Pumpkin, and I am reading my favorite pages of Spookley.

Wanna see?

Here, get a good look!

After a while, I started enthusiastically encouraging other books so that he could enjoy other stories, too. But I had to include the video I filmed of him one night after reading the book when he sang every word of "The Spookley Song," complete with key changes and (his added) background vocals. Now that the ritual has ended, I have to admit, I kind of miss it. Then again, there's always next year.

And now, ladies and gentlemen (are there any gentlemen out there?), here is my pumpkin, singing about another pumpkin (with translations below).

The Spookley Song

He's so odd he won't fit in, look at Spookley, look at him

Spookley the square pumpkin

All the pumpkins in the patch are nice and round, we all match

Look at Spookley, look at him, Spookley the square pumpkin

Every time in every town the pumpkins they pick are nice and round

That's true it happens every year, the best will get picked

(I guess you'll stay here)

Look at Spookley, look at him, he's so odd he won't fit in

Look at Spookley, look at him, Spookley the square pumpkin

I can't help the way I am, I wish I could look more like them

It's hard to fit in when you've found, you're a square and the world is round

(Loser!)

Look, look, look, look (he's so rectangular)

Look, look, look, look (he's so triangular)

Look at Spookley, look at him, Spookley the square

Look at Spookley (so rectangular)

He's so odd (he's so triangular)

Look at Spookley, look at him

Spookley, Spookley, Spookley, Spookley

Spookley the square pumpkin!