Happy Halloween everyone!  Today happens to be my favorite holiday.  I am not exactly sure how this came to be, but since I was a little demon I have always been fascinated by this day.  I still remember a number of my costumes ranging from the classic cheese Spiderman to the pretty cool Zorro.  The latter was especially awesome because my brother’s friend Kevin taught me how to greet the candy givers in Spanish which helped complete the look.  The most enjoyable part of the holiday has to be the barbaric massacre of the orange flesh.  That’s right, the butchering of the pumpkin.  There has to be a study out there that correlates the number of late year stabbings by the sheer viciousness a youth attacks a pumpkin.  I have visions of Orange Juice right now and I don’t know why.   As it turns out, it became kind of a quest with my brother to make a scarier and cooler pumpkin carving year over year.  Over those years, the process was refined to near perfection.  We had the perfect tool for gut scraping, the approach to the scariest eyes and the best cutting utensils to create a smooth and flowing cut.  Needless to say, I think after the first year, there were no more triangles in our pumpkins.  Now I have a urge to go back and find the old pictures.  Would be pretty neat to have a pumpkin through the years collage – note to self.

We were also able to get together along with his kids to carve some pumpkins a number of years ago.   Looked like the skilz’ had passed on to the next generation.  I am not sure if Ron has continued to carve, but I have carried on and have continued to refine and try new avenues.  The largest improvement came with the foam pumpkins.  These are fantastic in the sense you do not have to worry about the rot.  Nothing is more disappointing that throwing out a green fuzzy glob after spending so many hours making it just right.  It also allowed for more precise carving.  About 15 years ago, I had an idea of using the Dremel (I am not taking credit for the idea because I assume many others had done it, but I can honestly say I had not seen it done at the time).  The catalyst for using the Dremel is the desire to do the now common half cuts.  I laugh every single time I think of that night because I was using the engraving ball bit for about 2 hours straight.  I got off the floor and looked in the mirror to see my entire shirt and face covered in pumpkin flesh – the pumpkin rocked though – it had a Blues hockey theme with blues symbols for the eyes (one reversed), a puck for the nose and I thinking a missing tooth grin (everything was half cuts so it actually stayed fresh for over two months.  With the new foam pumpkins, I can work the half cuts to the precise depth I want and get very clean edges.

Here are my 2008 additions.  Note, the spider was stock, but I work a lot on making my own patterns from photos or drawings I find on the web.  A number of hours with a graphics program can turn out some pretty cool designs.  The werewolf and demon were results of that type of effort.  Note, I also embellish a lot with bats for the sole purpose of solidifying the cutouts and hopefully adding to the longevity.

Here is a darker version to give the full effect

Figured I would also show some of my other efforts

and with less lights – they definitely look better in person and generally get good comments about them from the Trick or Treaters that come throughout the night.

Have a safe and Happy Halloween!!