Katie Pumpkinhead’s Pumpkin Patch

 I haven't done much blogging this October, as I've been more focused on the annual photo challenge I do over on  Instagram . However, I've recently fallen in love with a new Halloween movie, and felt the need to talk about it.  A week ago, a movie called Carved appeared on Hulu, and I had to watch it ASAP, as I'm always looking for new Halloween-themed media, and this one was actually centered around a pumpkin! It's interesting to me, in a way, that the "pumpkin's revenge" storyline seems like a bit of a gimme, yet it really hasn't been done very often. The only other instance that immediately comes to mind for me is the final segment in Tales Of Halloween. Carved  is, to my knowledge, the first movie to do "pumpkin's revenge" as a full length storyline. And quite frankly, how could a movie about a pumpkin getting revenge on those who have wronged it not become an instant comfort film for me? Carved doesn't necessarily do anythin...

 The December pumpkin is tired. The December pumpkin has been living in fear. A nagging fear since the very dawn of November 1st, as the world around them turned into something they didn’t recognize. Beautiful, natural colors replaced with blinding, manufactured lights. Their brethren rotted, or simply discarded, as men made of snow that has not yet fallen take their place. A forgotten world, that just a short time ago, brought joy to so many. The December pumpkin has been told, for so long now, that their time is up. That they shouldn’t exist in this world beyond October. They’re not needed, unimportant. Just succumb to the rot. Fall in line. Surely a pumpkin existing beyond October should have no identity of its own.  There are, of course, many pumpkins who fall victim to this mentality once October has passed. They rot. They crumble. They roll over to make way for Santa Claus and whatever menagerie of colorful creatures he brings with him. For some, there is no turning back...

  Summer is the angry flame of a million discarded Jack O'Lanterns.   So many of us wither and die, but there are many of us that survive.  Perhaps 'survive' is too strong of a word, but we continue to exist. Rotting. Fading. But holding on for the promise of a new October.  The wait is long and hard as we waste away on porches or in abandoned woods. We know our time will come again, but it never seems to get here.  We relish in what we can find in the interim; the little scraps we can salvage. The cold, ghostly silence of winter. The spring breeze that's not too much warmer than fall's, if you close your eyes.  But by summer, we are tired. We have grown weary of waiting, and we're tired of the pain that the change of seasons continues to bring. It is but a single step away. So close we can taste it. So near we can almost smell the air.  The heat is excruciating; the sun beating down upon us as if trying to force us into some type of submission. Is ev...

  Is winter the most hopeless time within the countdown to Halloween? There is definitely a case to be made.  The cold air comes, making everything brittle. The snow falls, and buries beneath it any last remnants of autumn that there may have been. The Christmas decorations, which seem to have been up forever, are still there well past Valentine’s Day, as it’s always too cold or too snow-covered or ice-glazed to go outside and take them down. The lights blink tirelessly, almost as if they, too, have grown weary of being up all this time. The countdown seems to move in a very reluctant way, away from three-hundred days. The days feel like an endless frozen wasteland, as if autumn and Halloween are an entire world away. But Halloween never strays too far from the ones that love and believe in it. As a new patch of pumpkins waits to be born, don’t forget about the ones that are still lingering. Somewhere, out there in the cold, buried within the snow, are the rotting pumpkins who...

  You hop off the hayride, so excited to be choosing your first real pumpkins of the season.  As a child, you always worried. What if you couldn’t find the right one? Your mother was only going to wait so long for you to make a selection. You didn’t want a pumpkin that was bruised or scratched or soft, or any other kind of imperfect that a pumpkin could be. It had to be just right. Now, though, pumpkin picking is a full experience. It’s not just about the pumpkins that will ride home with you in the end. Sure, you love to see the excited, sometimes envious eyes of the other patrons of the farm on the hayride back; you even instinctively keep your hands on your chosen pumpkins, just in case someone has the thought that they’re perfect enough to steal. But your time in the pumpkin patch is more precious to you, ultimately, than what you will take home. As you walk through the patch, taking care not to trip over vines or disturb the pumpkins that aren’t quite what you’re looking ...

It seems like the last of the “real” pumpkins around the Patch is about to leave us for the big pumpkin patch in the sky. I am always sad to see them go, despite probably having enough “fake” pumpkins to fill the local farms’ patches, but I must say, they had a terrific run this year.  I thought we could take this time to look back on some of our “real” pumpkins’ best moments through the year. As you can see, it’s always exciting for the residents of the Patch to find a new pumpkin. Either that, or our little ghost friend here is wondering how in the world he’s supposed to carry this one in addition to the three he already has.  A family photo of our dear Pumpkids (and Pendergast the ghost poppet, all of these made by TheBeastPeddler) and most of the pumpkins, taken shortly after returning from Sleepy Hollow. These sorts of photoshoots make post-Halloween depression a little less debilitating.  Another little photoshoot from shortly after Sleepy Hol...