In "Grandma's smile," Kim helps her grandmother grow pumpkins. Now that it is time for the jack-o'-lantern contest, Kim has to help her grandmother bring the last pumpkin to the festival. Kim marks her name on a special pumpkin, one that is bigger than the rest of them. While at the festival, the two get doughnuts, apple cider, and dance to the do-si-do. Kim and her grandmother were having a great time together. After that, they head over to the pumpkin tent to carve the pumpkin for the contest. Kim picks out her pumpkin without even looking for her name. Kim thinks about how she could carve the pumpkin, but she could not come up with anything. Suddenly, she remembers her grandma's smile. She draws the pumpkin's smile to resemble her grandma and then her grandma carves it out. The ending does not tell the reader whose pumpkin won the contest, but I don't think Kim cared anyway. This book was set in the 1990's and I can definitely tell because of the illustration. The song that the two danced to and the clothes they were wearing suggest that the setting took place during that time period. I love fall and the feeling it gives me. Instead of drinking cider, I love drinking hot chocolate with marshmallows. This book brings back childhood memories of carving pumpkins with my family. We would often have contests of whose pumpkin looked the scariest. No matter what, we were always having fun. Maybe the next time I carve a pumpkin, it will be of my grandma’s smile. ( )

Kim is a little girl who goes to visit her grandma. Kim and her grandma go to the fall fest and enter their pumpkin into the contest. At the end, Kim draws the pumpkin's smile and said that she got the smile from her grandma and her grandma says that Kim put her smile there. I thought that this story was so beautiful and heart warming. I loved it because we all need grandma. ( )

Though it seems to not flow well in places, this is a very warm, relaxing sort of story. I really enjoyed the mellow illustrations and the setting of a Fall festival at a country church.
If religious convictions lead you to shy away from celebrating Halloween in popular, conventional ways, this story is safe for you. ( )