There's Something Fishy About That Pumpkin

It's All Hallows' Eve and the little ghosts and goblins are just about to arrive at your door when you suddenly realize you forgot to carve one of your pumpkins. You search around for anything you can use to decorate it quickly and come across some plastic eyeballs from a decoration you made last year.....

I took my gutted pumpkin and flipped it over on it's side, so that the top became the mouth. This was the inspiration that led to the rest, though I really had no idea what it was until it was done. I then cut two holes in the top where the eyes were going to be, with the intention that the light from the candles would show through and make them glow.

I cut these ping pong ball eyes in half last year to make glowing eyes for another decoration. I took some poster putty and pressed it along the edge of each eyeball and and then pressed them onto the pumpkin over top of the holes I made.

My pumpkin needed a little something more, so I began adding some extra bits from the Jack-O-Lantern I had carved earlier, securing them with toothpicks. At this point I still didn't really know what I was making, but it was beginning to take shape. I decided to try adding some of the "guts" for a more unusual look....

And a fish was born.

I opted for LED candles because I didn't have any ventilation holes. I thought that using two lights would make it bright enough that the eyes would glow.
But I was disappointed with the results. It looked cool, but the eyes just didn't have the bright glow I was looking for. (Though they did glow when it was completely dark. Unfortunately, the photo I took didn't turn out.)

The problem was that I could not get the candles to stay positioned right underneath the eyes, due to the curvature of the pumpkin. So a slight modification was necessary.

I removed the plastic eyes then set an LED candle over the holes underneath them and traced it. Then I widened the holes to the size of the candles, popped them in, and replaced the eyes. This gave me the effect I was looking for.

Finally, I placed a third LED candle in the mouth for added effect.

Bird!

Sometime later, I flipped my fish up on its tail and made a startling discovery. This fish had wings!

By simply making a cut down the center of the dorsal fin and opening it up a little, it became a beak. A spider inserted for added effect completed the transformation. I love two-in-one designs!

I always like to add a little humour to my Halloween decor by doing something unexpected. This year I didn't have a lot of time unfortunately and had to simplify things a lot. But my little fish did receive a few compliments from our visitors and it was fun to do something a little different, even if it wasn't the fanciest carving job in history.