Tips & Tricks You Need to Know Before Carving a Pumpkin!
Choosing a Pumpkin
Buy Local – Pumpkins that haven’t been shipped too far tend to last longer, plus you’ll support local farmers. Check out Kidsguide’s list of nearby pumpkin patches.
Lift & Tap – The pumpkin should sound slightly hollow when you tap it. The heavier the pumpkin, the thicker the walls which makes it harder to carve into or for light to shine through.
Color Check – Hunt for deep orange color and avoid the pale yellow ones.
Ban Blemishes – Avoid holes, wounds, scabs, or soft spots that could make your pumpkin spoil faster.
Hearty Handle – A green stem is better than a brown one, although dried stems are ok too.
Let’s Get Carving!
Carve Out the Bottom (Not the Top): The guts attached will come out with it and you’ll have less scraping to do. Plus, it’ll be easier to sit the pumpkin on top of your candle and it makes your pumpkin last longer.
Gut Scooping Tools: Big metal scoop or spoon (ones with serrated edges are great), plastic lid of a butter container, or if you’re cautious and handy… try this technique from A Wonderful Thought using a power drill and mixer beater! But of course, the BEST method is letting your little one get the job done. It makes for squishy, gooey, messy, wonderful Halloween time. Save the seeds for this 5-star recipe!
Thin the Walls: Scrape out the walls, especially where the “face” of the design is going to be to make for an easier carving experience.
Tracing Tricks: Instead of poking one hole at a time to trace a pattern, try using a fork. Or, do a pencil rubbing by completely rubbing the back of your stencil with a pencil/graphite and tracing with a ballpoint pen. To avoid tracing altogether, use a wet-erase or dry-erase marker to draw your design directly on the pumpkin. Once you’re finished, just wipe it away!
Preserving Your Pumpkin
Prevent Pumpkin Rot: You could use a store-bought preservative or things around your house like bleach, Borax, petroleum jelly, coconut oil, WD-40… Plant Care Today explains the different methods.
Beat the Heat: Use no-heat, LED candles or battery-powered string lights to prevent cooking the pumpkin with an open flame candle.
What are your go-to pumpkin carving tricks? Share it below!
Categories: Blog
This post was written by Kidsguide
