carving time

Every year, the boys seem to forget that carving pumpkins is kind of gross. And then they remember, and there is a chorus of disgusted squeals that lasts about 10 minutes until they finally get engrossed in the task. Then it's mostly quiet concentration, punctuated by an occasional "eeewwww" when they get to a particularly mushy/stringy part. This year, we got a pretty interesting variety of pumpkins, and we saved the seeds to try to grow some of our own next year. We have done this before, but the critters usually manage to gnaw off the vines before the pumpkins get big enough to carve. But hope -- and hopefully, pumpkin seeds -- springs eternal, so we'll see. In the meantime, we'll have these frightful visages to gaze upon for the next couple of weeks...