2011 Jack-o-Lanterns

Today me and the kiddos did my favorite of all Halloween traditions, the carving of our pumpkins. We each had one, and I let them pick out stencils for theirs and as per usual I free handed mine. The idea all along for me was to do a Michael Myers one for this year. Being that he's sorta the unofficial face of Halloween, no disrespect to Sam intended, I have only ever done one Myers before. I did it as sort of a nod to the cover of Halloween 5, minus the Danielle Harris in clown suit because let's be perfectly honest here, I nowhere near talented enough to pull that off.

I think it turned out ok, it looks better in person, but you can sorta get the idea from the picture....

The kids both got to pick a pattern from one of my books again this year. My 7 year old chose a skeleton because and I quote "It's like you dad, Mister Bones". You know I'm not arguing with that, so skeleton it is. He's a little friendlier than I like, but still. I drew the pattern on for him and pretty much gave the kid a saw and told him to go at it. Again, this actually looks better in person but here's the end result...

And finally, the light of my life, my 3 year old daughter. We all picked our pumpkins from a pumpkin patch last weekend, and of course my son picked the biggest one he could find, and miss Caitlin picked the smallest one with the maximum amount of mold and imperfections she could find. She insisted that I could clean it up. So needless to say it made for interesting carving. She picked several really large, and challenging designs before I finally talked her into one that would both fit on her small pumpkin, and be a little easier for her to do with minimal assistance. I say that not because I didn't want to help her, but because she's a 3 year old little girl and informs me on a daily basis that she doesn't need my help with anything. So anyway, here's what we ended up with...

It's cute, no? I ended up having to help more than she liked, but she did do quite a bit of it without me. So that's our jack-o-lanterns this year. Not my strongest work, but I think Mikey turned out ok. I still think last year's are my favorite yet. Hope everybody is getting as excited about Halloween as we are at the Bones household! When you finish your jack-o-lanterns, drop me a link in the comments, I'd love to see em.