Carving Jack-O-Lanterns 2024

November 10, 2024

 Carving jack-o-lanterns the last weekend in October. 


Halloween might be in the past, but I can't close out the season without this post. We always wait to carve our jack-o-lanterns the Sunday before Halloween, however it may fall during the week. With festive snacks, the hope of roasting cleaned pumpkin seeds - they sat in our fridge for a week and half and just hit the trash - creativity for producing a unique pumpkin face, and shrieks of disgust for pumpkin guts, our jack-o-lantern carving is always highly anticipated. This year proved no differently.

A big change was our children's independence in cleaning and carving. Their earnest desire to do a lot of the work on their own was bittersweet. It's fun to watch their capabilities take off, but there's also a hint of sadness to watch our babies not be babies anymore. However, when those snacks came out, they were happy to pass the torch momentarily before getting back to work.

In the end, we had one "love pumpkin," a "scary pumpkin," and a "quirky pumpkin" to round out the trio of jack-o-lanterns on our porch steps. Tea lights brought them to life the fives nights leading up to and including Halloween. Their pumpkin faces slowly caving in as the unseasonably warm weather sped up their withering, only enhancing their Halloween vibes.