Pumpkin Decorating Ideas Part 1 - Light Bright

 Princess number five told me this year that she had never carved a pumpkin by herself and that she wanted to do it. 

I thought we would go all out and that is why we got five large pumpkins when we went to the pumpkin patch a few weeks ago. (see that post here)

I pulled out our Halloween stuff and showed her all the fun things we had that she could do. 

When she saw the "light bright" kit, she decided that she wanted to do that first. 

In the kit, there are several patterns and about 30 little light bright pegs and a little hammer to hammer them into the pumpkin.  

She didn't want to use any of the patterns they had but wanted to do her own making some balloons.  

However, the pumpkin was so thick and so large that when she pushed the long pegs in, they hardly reached through the thick pumpkin and also, she stuck them into the top portion of the pumpkin so the candle light didn't quite reach the top portion of the design well.

While Princess five took a shower, I pulled out the little pegs and scraped the inside of the pumpkin thinner so that more of the pegs would be showing on the inside of the pumpkin and more light from the candle would show through.  

You can see how much more they show through after I did that. 

I think you could actually use regular light bright pegs and hammer them in using a rubber hammer. You would have to use a shorter pumpkin and also scrape away much of the inside of the pumpkin when cleaning it out but I think that way you would have more color options, more design options and the candle light would light up the design more, making it brighter.

Princess two said it wasn't fair that I never was in any pictures. I told her that I was happy to not be in any photos but she took one and told me that I had better not delete it as they would want some photos of me later since I was usually behind the camera. I guess she has figured me out! 

So, for her, I posted this photo of me finishing putting the pegs back into the pumpkin. I think next year, I will try the actual light bright pegs and see how it works. For now, Princess five was VERY happy as she got to make three pumpkins. I'll share the others tomorrow! 

You can see in these photos how the darker colors and the ones towards the top don't show up as well but if you start lower and thin the pumpkin out before hammering them in, I know it will work better. Here are the pictures showing how you can see the green and top balloon better after I scraped the pumpkin some. It took a little less time than carving but gives you a few more options.