Halloween: Make It Work!

Forget Christmas--fall is the most wonderful time of the year, no matter what Andy Williams sings. I wish I could explain just how much I adore autumn and how it seems to reawaken my soul. The air is crisp and cold--you can almost taste it! The world that was blue and green start to catch fire and transforms into deep oranges and reds. Even in death, the world is gorgeous. Crunchy leaves, cold pumpkins, apple picking, candy, bonfires, costumes, hoodies, scary movies. Of course, living in China, it is really hard to get into the spirit of the season. Leaves are not changing, the temperature is not cold (it's going to be 88 degrees on Monday), and there is no sense of Halloween arriving in just two weeks.

I love my life right now--semi-nomadic, seeing the world, and experiencing life to the very fullest. But sometimes (like right about now), I cannot wait for someday when I am settled somewhere in America with a house to call my own, decorated for Halloween to the point where it resembles The Haunted Mansion. Who knows when someday will be here? So for now I have to make due with my own pathetic decorations on my door.

These were all just made out of index cards

Last year, I was still able to be in the Halloween spirit around this time. I got to go to a party with some of my best friends in China...even though they all abandoned me to return to the land of cheese and chocolate (read up on that story!). This year, there are several possibilities of parties though probably not to the same extreme as last year. So now I need to decide, what should I dress up as? I'm thinking either a Disneybound of Mickey Mouse (if I can find yellow shoes), a human version of a panda bear, or Wednesday Addams... Only time will tell!! Opinions? What say you?

Last year, I also got to introduce my students to the holiday and most of them barely knew anything about it. This year, I get to do the same thing but I will also host a small pre-Halloween party tomorrow night for our university's English Corner (basically just a chance for students to practice their English with native English speakers outside of the classroom). At first I wasn't sure what I wanted to do--I thought showing them a movie would be good ("Hocus Pocus") but I feel like that is not enough. So I am showing them "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!" and we are also playing the mummy game (where you wrap someone up in toilet paper... admit it: you played that game when you were younger). And on top of that, we will be carving Jack-o-Lanterns. Yes. One of my favorite things to do around this time and yet something I have not done in two years.

Jack-o-Lanterns were originally used to ward of evil spirits during the festival of Samhain but today they are just so much flippin' fun! At our house, we always carve at least three or four Jack-o-Lanterns (though that doesn't come close to the 80 we carve at the Swartz's house!). Jed's are always the cute/funny ones but I always like to follow the Samhain tradition and I always make mine scary (sometimes including a knife sticking out of it and bright red nail polish blood).

Only problem? You can't find pumpkins in China, and if you do, they are super expensive. 

Solution: Use the $4 watermelon instead! In the words of the fabulous Tim Gunn, "Make it work!"

Yes, I figured if you can carve a gourd into a Jack-o-Lantern, you can also use a melon (some of the original Jack-o-Lanterns were carved out of turnips for crying out loud)! This was all a hypothesis and an unsteady one at that. My Halloween party is tomorrow and just today, I went out and brought home a melon to test my theories out.

TL;DR: It works and it looks awesome. If you want to carve a witch or a ninja turtle, watermelons are PERFECT! They are actually easier and less messy to carve than a pumpkin and when you light a candle inside, it glows a bright red which is just perfectly spooky! So, if you are interested, I kind of made up a little explanation/tutorial of how I carved my watermelon Jack-o-Lantern. Enjoy!

I tried to make The Pumpkin King... It kind of worked out!

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What you will need:

A ripe watermelon (not sure how easy this is to find in the states in October)

A knife

A spoon

A bowl (to put the melon guts in)

A pumpkin carving tool if you have one (sadly, I did not)

Man your battle stations!

 Step 1: Make the top of your Jack-o-Lantern

Unlike pumpkins, most watermelons do not have a flat bottom so find the flattest part and make that your bottom. Once you find your bottom, you also have your top! Now you need to carve the top (or the "hat" as I call it for my students). 

Your top needs to be bigger than when you cut one out for a pumpkin since you will need to get your hand in to hollow the melon out (That's right! Melons are not hollow like our beloved pumpkins!). I made my top about 1/4 of the watermelon. Remember that you need to cut straight across and not diagonally like a classic Jack-o-Lantern... Again, this is because it is not hollow and you won't be able to detach it otherwise. 

Step Two: Hollow out your Jack-o-Lantern

Unlike pumpkins, watermelons are not hollow so it is up to you to change that! You'd be surprised by how quick and easy this was--it probably took me about 15 minutes. The melon is really easy to dig into with a regular spoon and ladle out into a bowl. It can get sticky so you might want to lay down some of that good old fashioned newspaper. I forgot the reason why it is called a watermelon until I had to keep tipping it over and straining the water into a bowl (you will have to do this A LOT). 

Just like a pumpkin, make sure to not take out too much of the guts--you don't want to break through the skin. Watermelon is a lot softer than a pumpkin so you really have to be careful.

I would be careful with the size of watermelon you choose because once you hollow it out for your Jack-o-Lantern, you will have a bowlful of melon that needs to be eaten!

Oops! That's a lot of melon!

Step Three: Start carving your Jack-o-Lantern face!

Again, I always like to carve scary faces to keep with tradition but nowadays you can carve almost anything if you're talented enough (which I am not). Cute faces, actors, cartoon characters, landscapes, scenes... Anything your little heart desires!

I always like to sketch my idea out on paper first and then draw it on the pumpkin, or in this case, the melon.

 I tried to recreate the face of the Pumpkin King (aka: Jack Skellington) from "The Nightmare Before Christmas." Because watermelon is so much easier to carve than pumpkin, I actually managed to carve a halfway decent scary face and now I cannot wait to show my students tomorrow!

I'm kind of proud of this... one of my best carvings ever!!

Step Four: Light that sucker up!

Your Jack-o-Lantern always comes to life when you place that little flickering flame inside it. I always think of the Headless Horsemen each time I see those eerie eyes staring out at me through the darkness. 

The super cool thing about a watermelon when it is lit up by a candle, is that it glows bright red where a pumpkin glows orange. Both are spooky but I love the deep red of the melon--it's so different and almost looks dangerous!

Not too bad for my first try!

And there you have it! Now I'm not sure how long this will last before it starts to rot (though I don't have to worry about squirrels!) so I will have to let you know about that... I hope it just makes it to the party tomorrow night! 

I hope some of you try this out--it is really quick and easy and a fun twist on the tradition of the Jack-o-Lantern. If you do end up carving a melon Jack-o-Lantern, be sure to send me photos! 

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I'm hoping that my Halloween festivities go beyond the party tomorrow but, if not, I suppose that isn't too tragic. Adam and I have watched either a scary movie or an episode of "American Horror Story" every day since we've gotten back from Xi'an. I'm hoping to have at least one or two parties that I can go to during this sacred season... No matter what, I now have a spooky little Jack-o-Lantern to share the holiday with. 

Now all I need to find is some pumpkin seeds!

Happy Halloween!!

Until Next Time,

Amanda