DLTK's Holiday Crafts for Kids
Pumpkin Carving Patterns

Well, I love letting the girls design their perfect triangular eyed and one-tooth mouthed pumpkins but as they get older they're starting to want fancier designs on their Halloween masterpieces. While you can muddle through some of the simpler designs with serrated knives, tablespoons and a small nail, you'll be well served investing in some pumpkin carving tools if you plan on attempting some of the more detailed designs.

Pumpkin carving sets are quite easy to find at the right time of year at your local Walmart-type store, home and garden store or even on-line.

These are not intended as cut and paste paper crafts -- check out our Jack-o'-Lantern Faces instead.

Materials:

pumpkin,
printer,
paper,
spoon or pumpkin scoop,
small nail or pumpkin poker,
serrated knife or pumpkin saw (the more complicated the pattern, the more you're going to want a pumpkin saw).

Instructions:

Prepare your pumpkin by:
- Cut a hole in the top for the lid. Make sure you angle the saw inwards so your lid sits on top of the pumpkin and doesn't just fall through
- Scoop out the seeds and strings with a spoon
- Scrape some of the flesh from the inside so your pumpkin is about an inch thick all the way around (or at least wherever you'll be carving). You can poke a straight pin through it to estimate the thickness.
Print out the pattern.

There are two types of patterns. Some require you to cut the character out of the pumpkin. Other patterns, like Blue's Clues, use the leftover pumpkin to represent the pattern and you cut out the background to make the character look back lit. Generally speaking, the patterns like Blue's Clues are easier to make because there is less fine cutting.
Trim off excess paper
Tape or use pins to affix the pattern to the pumpkin.
If your pumpkin is quite lumpy, dip the paper in water or vegetable oil (the oil will make printer ink run less, but makes the project quite slippery). Darren likes oil, I like water -- I wonder what that says about our marriage?
- Smooth the pattern onto the pumpkin, affix with pins or masking tape and let the paper dry.
- You can also make small cuts in the paper where it bunches so it lies flat on the pumpkin. Add pins or tape to hold.
Poke holes through the pattern with a nail, push pin or pumpkin poker. Make the holes about 1/8^th inch apart (or even closer for more complicated patterns). This step can take quite awhile so be patient. Just place the pumpkin in your lap and work away at it.
Remove the paper from the pumpkin.
Optional: Rub flour or chalk dust all over the part where you poked the holes so you can see them better.
Push a nail through the pumpkin skin where you want to start carving.
- Turn and push until it's all the way into the pumpkin, then remove.
- Repeat anywhere you're going to need to start carving (eyes, nose, etc).
- You want to do all the pushing before you start carving because it take some pressure (once you start carving, the pumpkin becomes weaker and applying pressure may cause it to break)
Using your nail hole as a starting point, cut the design with your serrated knife or saw.
- start somewhere in the center of the design to keep from putting too much pressure on areas already carved
- Use a sawing motion to cut out your design, using very light pressure… take your time and allow the sawing to do the work rather than applying pressure and forcing it.
When making curves, just slightly turn the saw. When making sharp corners, remove the saw and re-insert it at an angle.
To remove pieces, push them out from the inside. For larger pieces, you may want to cut them into smaller bits and remove them in pieces.
Once your pumpkin is all set, use a pumpkin light (safer than a candle) or a candle in a candleholder designed for pumpkins to light it up.
- Light the candle and place it on a piece of aluminum foil inside the pumpkin. Put the lid on. Let it sit a minute
- Remove the lid and there should be a smoke mark on it
- Cut a vent in the lid where the smoke mark shows