Month: October 2013

The Art of Pumpkin Carving

 

Tonight was family pumpkin carving night. This year we have a total of nine–count ’em–NINE pumpkins! Whew!
Mind you, two of those were carved up at a workshop at Lee Valley, my husband’s favourite store. It’s a wonder I let him go in there–he’s like a kid in a candy store.
This time, though, he was there with my dad, who had signed them up for a pumpkin carving workshop with the boys.
The cost of the workshop included a fantastic little set of serrated carving knives.
Take it from me: my world changed tonight after I used this little set. I will never, I repeat, NEVER, go back to carving pumpkins with a standard knife or those cheap-o sets that are sold at this time of the year.

carving set

In my last post I showcased some Halloween pumpkins that were my “Pinspiration” for my pumpkin. So I pretty much copied my favourite (the Tim Burton-esque one) by drawing the image freehand on a piece of paper. Then I sprayed the pumpkin with water, “glued” on the piece of paper, traced out the image with a fabric marker thingamabobby and then went to work with the best serrated knife EVER. Here’s how that whole process unfolded…

And here’s Jack, all lit up!

lantern

Other than having to pull all the guts out of the gourd, this year’s carving experience could actually be described as pleasant.
So to all my friends, have a safe, candy-filled Halloween and hopefully Environment Canada gets it wrong for Thursday night.

 

Halloween Pinspiration

I know, I know, I know. I have this fair-weather relationship with my blog. I haven’t been all that involved with it these days months. And I have no excuse other than Life. Yes, Life. So without further ado, I decided to do a quick post with some of my favourite Pins of Halloween decor.

The house is mostly decorated now, but I can’t photograph it very well because contrary to what some might think, I don’t know how to take a good exterior shot of the front of my house. It just ends up looking, well, bad. And definitely not Pin-worthy. Because we all know what makes the cut.

I dig Ghost pumpkins–those are the white pumpkins. And anything a little different from the predictable. Although I love simple, old-school Jack O’ Lanterns too. So I’m leaving you with a few pictures to give you some unattainable inspiration when carving up those ghoulish gourds in the next few days.


I call these Tim Burton style pumpkins


These are beautiful Ghost pumpkins.


And now I’ll just get out my handy, dandy drill!

This is my Pinspiration for now…what are your Halloween Pinspirations?