Pumpkins, and more pumpkins

I adore pumpkins.  Their stupid curly vines, their cheery roundness and color, their association with Fall and better still — Halloween.  Sturdy, tasty, beautiful — I adore pumpkins.

When the kids were little I volunteered at their school in the Pumpkin Patch which morphed from 'Every Kid in Primary School Goes Home with a Pumpkin' day to a fun story hour about Halloween and Every Kid in Primary School Goes Home with a Pumpkin day.  In those early days they really weren't pumpkins at all, but greenish gourds from Malaysia, but we were happy to have them.  At least we didn't have to carve watermelons like those unfortunate expats in Brazil.  Not grown locally, pumpkins in Singapore were very expensive.  Grocery stores which catered to western expats sold them for outrageous amounts and of course because of the unrelenting heat, once they were cut into to make Jack 0'Lanterns, they rotted in a matter of hours.  My involvement in the Pumpkin Patch however, secured a supply of pumpkins in late October, even if they were a little misshapen.  

Once we moved back to the US, I started planting my own with mixed results.  Some years my yield is varied and robust, other years... lackluster.  But no matter — I pick them and use them in displays inside and out.  To date I've never cut into, let alone eaten one of my own pumpkins, I just can't do it.

This year my Mom helped with the harvesting.

Not a bad haul!  Because of a very rainy spring,  some varieties were a no show.