Each week is beginning to look more ghoulish than the last as we inch toward Halloween. Spooky activities are available most days of the week, including a Halloween festival and trail this coming Friday and Saturday. One of the coolest-sounding events this week celebrates pumpkins themselves, so make sure to visit a local pumpkin patch to pick your own beforehand.

If you're not so into Halloween, there are plenty of other ways to enjoy the fall. My kids and I recently went on a scavenger hunt at Gore Place (pictured), where plenty of other cool activities for families are offered in the coming weeks. Keep your eye on the full Event Calendar for more happenings all month!

As we get closer to Halloween, even more family activities throughout Westchester focus on the holiday theme. This week, kids can do some Halloween Hand Sewing and combine a sweet tooth with some creativity. Or wax nostalgic at the big-screen showing of the Back to the Future trilogy—with three films for the price of one.

There are many more fun Halloween programs on our Event Calendar, and don’t miss our roundup of uncommon Halloween events that are FREE! Read on for our top picks for the week.

East Haddam, a town in southeastern Connecticut that is rich in natural scenery and history, is a fabulous destination for a day trip and there is no better time to visit than the fall. Located along the Connecticut River, most of its charms are outside, so be sure to wear comfy shoes and bring a camera because there will be some spectacular fall foliage photo-ops. You might have to plan two day trips, however, to fit everything in.

It is commonly thought that exposing children to music at an early age helps to kick-start their learning. If nothing else, it gives them an opportunity to have a rich sensory experience through rhythm and movement. Whether little ones prefer attending live music shows or taking classes to learn how to make their very own beats, parents can't go wrong by encouraging them to tap their toes and sing their hearts out.

Interactive rock and roll "kindie" band Jason Didner and the Jungle Gym Jam came to WXPN in Philadelphia on Saturday, October 10, 2015, and they certainly did offer up that amazing sensory experience! They often play shows in New Jersey and New York as well. Read more about what my family thought about the concert, learn about what makes the band tick, and see where they're playing next. 

This post is from 2015. For current info see our 2016 post.

There are many levels of pumpkin carving. There's picking up a pumpkin at the grocery store and jabbing it with a knife until is makes a crooked smile. There's downloading a stencil and spending an afternoon with a $5 carving kit turning your pumpkin patch purchase into Jack Skellington. And then there's taking 5,000 fresh pumpkins per week and carving them into multi-gourd masterpieces never before conceived out of fruit. That last thing is what you'd call Rise of the Jack O'Lanterns.

The Rise, as those in the know call it, has been a popular Halloween event near NYC, on Long Island, for years; SoCal got its first peek at the hard-to-describe pumpkin phenomenon last year, when it moved into Descanso Gardens. This year The Rise is at two LA locations (adding the Santa Anita Race Track), as well as the San Diego Zoo Safari Park. And it is pretty darn different from any other Halloween event I've seen.

Apple picking season is still in full swing and though there are plenty of orchards that offer the chance to pick your own apples and pumpkins in upstate New York and New Jersey, it was really important for my family to choose an organic orchard. Turns out, truly organic farms are harder to come by than I thought.

I did a little digging and found Fishkill Farms a few years back and since then, my family has made the annual apple-picking pilgrimage to this lovely farm that practices ecologically-sustainable farming and offers low-spray apple varieties in addition to a growing number of organic ones. An hour and half from Midtown Manhattan and an hour from central Westchester, Fishkill Farms makes for a great day trip.

These recipes are imagined by Mommy Poppins, but sponsored by The Laughing Cow® cheese.

Pinterest is packed with adorable snack ideas for kids, but let’s get real—ain’t nobody got time for that. And while it’s true that kids fall for presentation, that doesn’t mean you have to make everything look like an adorable panda/Minion/Star Wars icon to get them to eat it. The truth is, children love to feel grown-up, and it’s super easy to make kid-friendly snacks look like fancy party foods in a matter of seconds. Any afternoon can feel like a special occasion with these easy ideas that don’t just look and taste yummy, but can inspire even your pickiest eater to try something new.

Sometimes it just makes more sense to eat out on Thanksgiving. Heading out to one of these fine dining establishments is sure to guarantee a memorable and hopefully delicious holiday feast. Litchfield County isn't the most populous county and that shows in the limited number of restaurants there may be in any given town. That being said, there are some incredible dining experiences to choose from. Listed are some of the best Litchfield has to offer on Thanksgiving Day. We've also rounded up some popular restaurants in Fairfield County and Hartford County.