Something old and something new from Grickily (A Sampler of Things).Remember to check up on Linus' big Halloween visitation... The Great Pumpkin is on his way!
2 average (but GOOD) pumpkins came home a few days ago. Still uncarved, but I'm thinking... Hopefully get more before the 31st.
I'm thinking of trying a stencil off the internet this year. Boris as The Monster and Regan after her spin (as seen on my profile). I never tried a stencil... I need pumpkin carving tips. So I don't wreck my Jack-o-Lantern or get bloodied with my own blood.
This blog thing has gotten really slow now that I've added so much. If it and the scanner cooperate, I'll try to post scans of craft instructions including illustrations. More stuff later. Oh my, I'm feeling drained...
2 comments:
For a really good stencil, I recommend getting the lowest-quality jpg or gif you can get from a picture on the internet. I don't know how big your pumpkin is, but I usually try to get as close to an 8 and a half by 11 pic.
Cut off most of the superfluous paper around the picture as you can. Tape the head shape on the pumpkin, folding down creases where it's curved.
Now, take a nice poker, the kind you get with pumplin carving kits, and poke dots around the perimeters of the shapes and shadows of your picture.
I should add that you probably have hollowed out your pumplin already--I recommend cutting a hole in the bottom. Also take care to hollow out the pumpkin REALLY WELL. That means shaving out a lot of the flesh, to make it thin--not so thin that carving will make it collapse, though, but thin enough that removing only the outer orange skin will allow light to show through.
Now, if you've outlined everything about the head and face you can, remove the paper--but SAVE it. You'll need it for reference.
It may help to get some constarch to rub over the dots, to help you see them better.
Now, keeping in mind that you are removing the skin on places you want to be LIGHT, begin shaving. That will also mean that you'll probably want to shave an outline around the head. I recommend a sharpened paring knife for this job.
You can make a highly detailed face in this way. If you light up the fruit and still can't see well, go back and shave off some more from the inside. The pumpkin scooper works pretty well as a shaver.
I've been doing pumplins this way for about ten years now--I've made Bela, Spock, Chaplin, L Ron Hubbard, and various political figures. The best were always done from blown-up pictures from small newspaper clippings.
WOW! Thanks so much! I'll definitely try this :)
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