Free pumpkin carving for kids

The weekend brought an early taste of Halloween for kids in Marquette. They were having fun carving free jack-o-lanterns.

The Marquette Arts & Culture Center and the Downtown Development Authority had a carving tent at the Farmers Market on Saturday.

The jack-o-lanterns will be used this coming Saturday, the 26th, to light up the city’s Halloween Spectacle. “We have asked kids to come and give us their ideas, and when the spectacle is over, they can take their pumpkin with them and light up their porch or their windows,” Debbie White of the Marquette Arts & Culture Center said.

After the kids did the decorating and some carving, adults provided an assist that sometimes came from a cordless drill. The tent was such a hit that it ran out of pumpkins!

“We will have pumpkins here (at the Farmers Market) next week, and I hope you come down and carve your pumpkin,” White said. “I think we carved 40 pumpkins today, and I hope we carve at least that many next week. Please come down to the Halloween Spectacle. It’s going to be a marvelous performance this year, and please put your costumes on and come and parade with us.”

The Halloween Spectacle will start at 7:00 p.m. this Saturday at the Marquette Commons. The performers taking part in it will gather at several downtown Marquette locations beforehand to form miniature parades over to the Commons.

The Peter White Public Library, Mattson Lower Harbor Park, Harlow Park and the Rock Street parking lot will each have a parade leaving it for the Halloween Spectacle. Anyone in costume is welcome to join those parades as well; the city’s official downtown trick-or-treating night is taking place shortly before the Spectacle.