"I looked out the window and what did I see?
Popcorn popping on the apricot tree!
Spring has brought me such a nice surprise;
Blossoms popping right before my eyes!
I could take an armful and make a treat,
A popcorn ball that would smell so sweet!
It wasn't really so, but it seemed to me,
Popcorn popping on the apricot tree!"
Our little condo faces south and when all of the snow melted out of our yard this past winter, our neighbors across the drive (who face north) decided to donate their snow to our yard! They spent an hour or 2 shoveling enough snow out of their yard to cover ours. My girls decided we needed to prank them back. M remembered me talking about a time I popped 3 or 4 garbage bags of popcorn and trashed a friend's room and decided we should fill our neighbor's yard with popcorn.
We spent long months waiting for the snow to melt and spring rain to stop so we could pull our prank.
Last week, we pulled out an air popper and spent the afternoon popping 2 garbage bags of popcorn (1/2 a cup at a time!) and gluing popcorn to a bare branch we found outside.
We added our poster board sign:
The next morning, before blinds were opened and neighbors got out of bed, we sneaked out and set our tree in the middle of the yard, with our sign toward their windows, then left a big mound of popcorn and scattered it out from the center!
The girls then rang the door bells of both adjoining condos and we ran back to watch through the crack in our own blinds. Only one of our neighbors came to the door- we saw the door open and then shut and about a minute later the little boy who lives there came running out. He looked at the tree and smiled curiously, then walked around the tree to investigate. Then he looked around and tentatively picked up a popped kernel and nibbled it. When he was sure it was real he took a bite and grabbed a few more. For the rest of the day there were neighbor kids in the yard eating popcorn off the lawn!
This was such a fun (and so harmless) prank and the girls loved it! If you want to do it all you really need is popcorn. 2 or 3 large bags of popping corn should cover a good sized lawn and even without a Popcorn Tree, your neighbors will laugh at their popcorn blizzard-ed yard.
If you want to go all out, you'll need a tree-like branch. You can stick it directly into the lawn or use a planter like we did. Make a sign with the lyrics above, or just the first 2 lines. Glue some popped kernels to your branch along with your sign. As for popping the popcorn- I'd recommend borrowing an extra air popper or 2. 1/2 a cup makes a large bowl and 1 large bag made enough to fill a 13 gallon garbage bag + about 1/3 of another. Just make sure whomever you choose as a target will take it in good humor- but I can tell you most people with kids will get a kick out of it- even just for the reaction of their little ones.
Happy Pranking!
