Halloween will be here soon and this last week leading up to it is prime pumpkin carving time.
Generally, a carved pumpkin will last 5-10 days before it begins to not look it’s best. (uncarved pumpkins will last much longer)
Some people put a lot of work into their creations so I wanted to give you some tips on how you can preserve your spooky masterpiece for as long as possible.
There seems to be 2 main tips for keeping your Jack o Lantern looking fresh.
The first is to either soak your pumpkin (carved or not) in a bleach solution for a few hours. It’s suggested that you mix 1-2 teaspoons of bleach to a gallon of water.
This will slow decomposition. You can also try spraying it with a mixture of bleach and water.
The other suggestion that I read was rubbing the carved areas with Vaseline. You can do this along with the bleach bath. The Vaseline will helps it to stay moisturized and not shrivel up as quickly.
Side note: Why do we call them Jack o Lanterns?
The practice originated from an Irish myth about a man nicknamed “Stingy Jack.” According to the story, Stingy Jack invited the Devil to have a drink with him. True to his name, Stingy Jack didn’t want to pay for his drink, so he convinced the Devil to turn himself into a coin that Jack could use to buy their drinks. Once the Devil did so, Jack decided to keep the money and put it into his pocket next to a silver cross, which prevented the Devil from changing back into his original form.
Jack eventually freed the Devil, under the condition that he would not bother Jack for one year and that, should Jack die, he would not claim his soul. The next year, Jack again tricked the Devil into climbing into a tree to pick a piece of fruit. While he was up in the tree, Jack carved a sign of the cross into the tree’s bark so that the Devil could not come down until the Devil promised Jack not to bother him for ten more years.
Soon after, Jack died. As the legend goes, God would not allow such an unsavory figure into heaven. The Devil, upset by the trick Jack had played on him and keeping his word not to claim his soul, would not allow Jack into hell. He sent Jack off into the dark night with only a burning coal to light his way. Jack put the coal into a carved-out turnip and has been roaming the Earth with ever since. The Irish began to refer to this ghostly figure as “Jack of the Lantern,” and then, simply “Jack O’Lantern.”
In Ireland and Scotland, people began to make their own versions of Jack’s lanterns by carving scary faces into turnips or potatoes and placing them into windows or near doors to frighten away Stingy Jack and other wandering evil spirits. In England, large beets are used. Immigrants from these countries brought the jack-o’-lantern tradition with them when they came to the United States. They soon found that pumpkins, a fruit native to America, make perfect jack-o’-lanterns.
