November 2023 Harvest Festival

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Location: Sage Advice

  1. What code do you think Dottie and Dashing refers to?
  2. Do you notice how in Dottie's strange advice, all the words start with one of four letters?
  3. Does the quilt look sort of like a street map that one might travel along?
  4. Where did the person who sewed the quilt start and where did they finish?
  5. YOU REAP WHAT YOU SEW

Vegetable Garden

  1. When you start filling in the words for the given clues, do you notice a pattern to their order?
  2. Do you notice that the list of words is in alphabetical order and that there is just the right number of spaces to rewrite them in the chart at the bottom. But what goes in the brackets?
  3. One example of vegetable you were expecting: SPIN/AC[H]
  4. Another example would be YELL/O/[W] PEP/PER
  5. RADISH STEW

Pumpkin Carving

  1. Can you think of three distinct ways to mark cells that (1) are illuminated already, (2) can't have a candle but are not illuminated, and (3) definitely have a candle?
  2. What can you say for certain about any white square that is adjacent to a “0?”
  3. What can you fill in from two 2’s on the very top?
  4. Look at the three evenly-spaced 1’s across the bottom of the mouth. What can you fill in around those? (Remember: the candles cannot illuminate each other.)
  5. SELF PORTRAIT

Apple Picking

  1. Remember words in a word search grids can go in any direction – including backwards and diagonally.
  2. Can you find various words and phrases that either start by an apple or end by an apple?
  3. Two examples to look for: “MOUNT” and “STATE OF MIND.”
  4. After you have found several of the words, what do you notice about the left over letters, read left to right? Do you see a pertinent list of some kind?
  5. Can you think of apple varieties that go with those words or phrases (either before or after) that would collectively fit into the given categories like “natural wonder” or “song?” The list imbedded in the grid might help you.
  6. For example “A natural wonder” would be the combination of MOUNT (from the word search) and FUJI (an apple variety).
  7. Another example “A song” would be the combination of EMPIRE (an apple variety) and STATE OF MIND (from the word search).
  8. NEW HEIGHTS

Corn Maze

  1. Did you try starting with the 14 edge pieces?
  2. The first word you'll have to eat through on your path through the maze is RICE. Which letter can you eat to leave a word behind?
  3. Do you notice how BEANS has two possible gaps, but one of them is blocked by a corn stalk?
  4. Can you find the one gap in the perimeter (about 3/5 the way down the right hand wall) where you need to go to exit the maze?
  5. RAMBLE

Meta: Hay Ride

  1. Of the four possible directions (N, S, E and W), from the starting square, which two can be ruled out pretty quickly as dead ends?
  2. Starting out heading S (south), which three letters do you cut cross right away? Does that look like a promising start?
  3. PARTIAL SOLVE: S(T), W, N(H), W(E), S(F,I), E-S-E(N), S-W, N (A,L), E-N, …
  4. THE FINAL STRAW

Bonus: Ghost Story

  1. As you start reading the ghost story, can you find scary words from the list at the bottom that approximate words or phrases where the blanks are – slurred words, perhaps, that a drunk ghost might say. Example: GOBLIN down a big bag of … candy.
  2. Can you think of what words might fit for “(choc)-olate candy?” How about for “(coast) to a stop?”
  3. Do you notice that the ghosts at the bottom of the page have various numbers of pleats in their sheets!? What do you think those numbers might indicate?
  4. PARTIAL SOLVE: GOBLIN SHOCK DEMON GHOST SCARE FIEND BEHEADED SPOOK HOWL SPECTER FRIGHT HORROR SCREAM SCARY PHANTOM GHOUL
  5. NO MORE BOOS FOR YOU