Faison’s Amazin’ Pumpkin-Palooza

Ah yes, it’s truly autumn indeed, that magical time of year! We’re in our heavy sweaters with hot cider in hand, watching the leaves start to fall. And what better way to accompany this sheer seasonal bliss than a full-on, cut-throat, megamundo pumpkin carving competition to end all competitions? I’m talking pumpkins tipping the scales in the hundreds of pounds. I’m talking we’re using power-tools to rip these suckers apart. I’m talking Faison’s Amazin’ Pumpkin-Palooza, that’s what I’m talking about!

With that said, on Friday, October 17, the good folks at PUNCH debuted a carving team comprised of Stephanie Russell, Cassandra Wilder, Rich Trevillian, and myself—Sarah Shannon. We carved our little hearts out during the Pumpkin-Palooza competition to benefit the Faison School for Autism, which was held at the Science Museum of Virginia. And although the competition was in fact steep, everyone who participated was a fantastic sport, and the event was a huge amount of fun! Of course, the high quality of delicious catered food and drink (ooh, and the desserts) definitely helped the carvers power through their three hour time limit.

Now I can safely admit that no one on our team knew what we were getting ourselves into! In fact, I had never even carved a pumpkin before in my life (Yeah, I know, it’s been brought to my attention that that’s weird. What can I say? I’m not the biggest fan of sharp objects). We didn’t even finalize our pre-design for the pumpkin until a couple hours before the event, and we were literally working on our practice pumpkin up until 5 minutes before we had to leave to get to the event. But true to form, we banded together only to produce the most delightfully beautiful (and completely non-Halloweeny-looking) pumpkin. In all actuality, our final pumpkin looked more like a gorgeous Fabergé egg than a Jack-O-Lantern. Oh, and as an added bonus, I got to use a power drill to make a series of intricate holes in the design…always fun when you can incorporate power tools into your design.

So being that the event was a competition, that means there needs to be a winner right? Well actually, there were seven winners! One for each of the categories: Best in Show, People’s Choice, Carver’s Choice, Most Original, Most Halloween, Best Use of Pumpkin, and Honorable Mention. Now with around 50 pumpkins entered, and seven winners picked, we thought we had a pretty decent chance. After all, we thought our “Fabergé Egg” pumpkin was pretty creative, and not to brag, but we DID get our fair share of compliments. But as it seems to go, PUNCH is never one to smell the sweet sweet smell of victory all too often…and this event followed suit. That’s right, we didn’t win a single category (aaaawwww, insert sad music here).

But dry those eyes, we’re already planning to come back better than ever next year! This time, we’re practicing early! We’re going to sculpt and carve the greatest pumpkin man has ever laid eyes on! Just remember to look for PUNCH next year at Faison’s Amazin’ Pumpkin-Palooza, because right now, we can hardly wait.