Hosting a Pumpkin Decorating Party

Halloween is one of our favorite holidays, so we’ll use any excuse to gather together in its honor. That’s why we’re hosting a pumpkin decorating party this year, complete with tools for pumpkin decorating and carving, pumpkin-themed food and drink ideas, and pumpkin seed party favors that can be made during the event.

But first thing’s first! For this party, we’ll be using the Jack-O-Lantern Halloween style from our shop for the party invites, and we’ll be using the same style hang tags for our pumpkin carving kits to tie everything together.

Because the weather is nice and mild for the party, we’ve decided to set up our pumpkin decorating table outside. We pushed together two bales of hay, and placed all our decorating tools in the center, including our pumpkin carving kits, sharpies, stencils, paints, brushes and glitter. You could host your party indoors if it’s cold or rainy, but you may want to lay down an easy-clean tablecloth so you don’t have to worry too much about the mess.

For the pumpkin carving kits, we just bundled together our favorite carving tools: carving knives of two different sizes and a seed scooper. You could also include a sharpie or any other tool you like to use for carving pumpkins.

You can even get super inventive with your pumpkin carving designs, and use stencils (search the web for “free pumpkin carving stencils”), or bring out the power tools to create designs using different sized drill bits.

We like to choose pumpkins of different shapes and colors for a nice variety. For instance, these white pumpkins are perfect for decorating with chalkboard paint. We used removable stickers to create the leaf design (found in the Halloween section of our local grocery store), and painted several of our pumpkins with a few layers of solid black so we could write with chalk. These pumpkins will last a lot longer than the carved pumpkins because they remain whole, but you may want to bring them indoors if it gets too rainy.

And these small Cinderella pumpkins are perfect for decorating with glitter. Just coat your pumpkin with spray adhesive, and sprinkle the glitter over the top. Use a large sheet of newspaper to catch the excess glitter, and repeat the process until your pumpkin is coated.

Like the painted pumpkins, you may want to bring glitter pumpkins indoors to keep them fresh if it starts to rain.

As for food and drink, serve your guests plenty of pumpkin-themed snacks and beverages to keep the creative juices flowing. We have a plenty of recipes from our archives that are perfect for any pumpkin-themed occasions.

And last but not least, send your guests home with roasted pumpkin seeds! You can make these during the event using seeds that are scooped from carved pumpkins, and you can have fun experimenting with different seasonings. We created three different flavors for ours: lightly salted, super spicy and cinnamon + sugar, and they were all delicious! Check out our recipe for roasted pumpkin seeds here.

For more inspiration, check out these Spook and Jack O Lantern Halloween party ideas, or read this post on Hosting a Pumpkin Carving Party.

Happy Halloween!

Used In This Project:

• Party Invitations • I chose the “Jack O Lantern” style in lime.
• Scallop Hang Tags • I chose the “Jack O Lantern” style in lime.

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josephine (188 Posts)

Josephine Guicciardi is the nom de plume of our creative Evermine blogger. With romantic connections to Ludwig van Beethoven’s “Immortal Beloved” love letters, it is in keeping with the blog’s themes of love and joy. The great composer writes the famous words “ever thine, ever mine, ever ours” to a woman who remains a mystery to this day. Two of the most likely objects of his adoration are Josephine Brunsvik and Guilietta Guicciardi, and it’s from these two women that Josephine Guicciardi draws her persona.