trick or treat

I carve pumpkins. This year, I got it in my head to put the entire Revs roster, plus assorted team staff, into pumpkin form. So I went to the local garden center, rounded up my buddies Evan and Julie to help, and spent a couple of days carving 35 pumpkins for the game yesterday. As far as I know, they went to the players themselves postgame.

"Wow, that must have taken a lot of time!"
Yep. Julie and I spent one afternoon buying the pumpkins, then on Thursday night, she and Evan came by to open them all up and clean them out. On Friday, I took a vacation day from work and spent the whole day carving; Evan pitched in for a few hours in the evening. Saturday morning, we still had eight left, so Evan and I finished the rest. The last one (the Revs logo) finished at about 11am. Then Evan photographed 'em all, and we loaded up my car, Julie's car, and my husband Mike's car to haul 'em down to Foxboro, where they were displayed alongside the team entrance to the field.

"Wow, that must not have been cheap!"
No, not really, but two things helped. Pemberton Farms, where I buy these, cut me a discount for buying in volume (remember, I still have eight left for my house after this), even throwing in the butt for free. I bought the lights in bulk from a wholesaler (these were all lit with LEDs, as stadium rules forbid open flame), bought the batteries on a coupon from Target, and bought the entire production on the team's dime. Yes, this was all funded by the front office, courtesy our pal Cathal, who was excited to help with the project. Usually, my fan projects come out of my own pocket, but after how well this worked, I'm definitely going to explore working with the team more often.

"Wow, your wrists must be sore!"
Sorta. My right hand's still pretty swollen and my wrist is bruised, but otherwise, I'm not as sore as you'd expect after carving 30 pumpkins (Evan did six of the 35, but I did one on Thursday for my office, too).

"Pix or it didn't happen!"
Here you go:
My site
Evan's site, which are really nice looking
Official team site, which, as of right now, has the Larentowicz and Phelan ones switched