How I Carve Jack-O-Lanterns: Part 1 - Intro and Selecting a Pumpkin

I'm taking a short break from my LEGO hobby to create this first of a series of 4 videos describing how I make jack-o-lanterns. I'm no master like people who can carve works of art into pumpkins, but I've made dozens of jack-o-lanterns over the past 19 years and I've gotten pretty good at carving the patterns that you might see in books from the store plus creating a few of my own. I make jack-o-lanterns for Halloween but I also carve pumpkins for other holidays and characters from TV and movies and sports teams and much more. I've been asked how I do it and how I make so many, and I figured it is about time I recorded my process.
In this first video, I introduce the hobby and explain what the tools are that come with carving kits at the store and a few other tools that I use. I also share what I look for when I'm picking out a pumpkin.
Look out in the next few weeks for these installments:
Part 2: Cleaning out the pumpking and transferring the pattern
Part 3: Carving and displaying the pumpkin
Part 4: Odds and Ends including: extending the life of the pumpkin, faux pumpkins, other types of jack-o-lanterns, disposing of your pumpkin
Websites with carving patterns:
www.spookmaster.com - Free Halloween and other holiday and assorted patterns
www.zombiepumpkins.com - Patterns for a fee, some are free
www.pumpkinpile.com - Free patterns
www.pumpkinglow.com - Free NON-Halloween patterns
www.pumpkinlady.com - Free kid-friendly Halloween and other holiday and assorted patterns
www.stoneykins.com - Very complicated patterns, some free, others for a fee.

[@BrickTrains]

WOW, that is a lot of pumpkins. We usually carve pumpkins when we go camping in October. Not having kids at home anymore means we use the plastic variety of pumpkin at home. LOL

[@jwbowl1]

@BrickTrains That's cool that you carve pumpkins while camping. My extended family used to have an annual gathering at my uncle's farm/property in late October with a campfire and hayride and he'd have a truckload of pumpkins and carving tools for anybody who wanted to carve one.

[@pastajensen]

Woa!