Bayview Pumpkin Pavilion 2024

Last weekend was perfect for the Bayview Pumpkin Pavilion because of the super mild weather. We'd had temps in the 70s last Friday. Nice and warm for this swamp monster....

Talk about attitude. This guy was creeping out of the water. He's referred to as "The Creature from the Humboldt Park Lagoon". Isn't the green lighting perfect?

The black light sign for the event:

Remember the zombies? I think this guy may have been new.

I like the reaper's wings. They're like boney frames. 

I took a ton of pictures of this guy. He was the guardian of the pumpkins. At least that's what I'm going to call him, because he was looming over them with his arms outstretched. 

I'll limit myself to just sharing a few pics of him. I'm sure you guys have seen these giant skeletons at night and noticed how their eyes change. I caught an especially sinister expression here!

So as you can see here, the pumpkins were lined up in rows. They went on and on. 

The fog machine was really rolling.

Here are some of my favorite carvings. I'm trying to think of some carving inspiration for the next few days when I'll be carving one to display where I live. We have a similar set-up in the downtown area but it's much smaller than this. I saw lots of different jack-o-lantern faces that might influence what I do. 

How about the eyes here? Someone did well not having them fall apart with just those centers left. He's kind of a Cheshire Cat. 

How impressive is this skull!? I'm always impressed when people carve in layers with a sort of translucent "skin" left. 

This pumpkin is turned horizontal. 

Love this one. The face looks like it is made of flames. 

This one may just be my favorite. So. Many. Cuts. Someone really had control of the knife. I'm getting carpal tunnel just looking at this. 

I like those lower teeth on the one on the right. Again, that's a lot of control. 

Mr. Oogie Boogie Man. 

Nosferatu - probably. 

This is probably my second favorite carving. So many cat carvings this year!

An owl:

Nice teeth.

Hello Kitty:

You may remember this art installation from last year. So here it is at a distance:

Skeletal pigeons lined the perimeter of this structure and the top of these ropes. They were painted with black light paint. 

Some of the houses around the park had some decorations up. There weren't as many as in years past, but the ones we saw were pretty impressive. Like this ghost on fire holding a human heart. As I type that, I'm thinking I need a bit of a backstory on this character. 

Skeleton reaper dude:

Beetlejuice Sandworm:

This front yard is awesome. Everything they do with the lighting and what I think is a homemade pumpkin creature. It's all so creative. See the red-eyed skull in the planter?

I bet his body is made from pipes.

Here's a good picture to end on, because he's waving goodbye. The bright orange lighting on these last two is so classic. 

Hope you guys enjoyed this year's photo show! I was pretty impressed with this year's pumpkin carvings. I'm actually more impressed now that I'm home looking these photos over. Some serious work went into some of those pumpkins. I wonder how long they took to carve. Maybe an hour? Some of you who do intricate carvings might be able to give me an estimate. 🎃

A Warm Glowing Night at the Pumpkin Pavilion

Last weekend my mom and I went to the annual Pumpkin Pavilion event in Bayview. It was such a nice, warm night that we decided to explore a nearby neighborhood too. I ended up with so many pics between the Pumpkin Pavilion and the neighborhood decorations, that I decided to post them separately. So you'll see some awesome, mostly DIY yard displays in the next post.

Our visit to the Pumpkin Pavilion was "glowing" in more than one way. There were of course the jack-o-lanterns, but also there was an art installation that was glowing with blacklight paint. But first, here are some of my favorite carvings:

I managed to get a few shots of the rows of pumpkins from the side. It was so crowded that I mostly had to zoom in from a distance.

Maybe a pig?

I love this one! It must have taken some patience to carve all those teeth.

This is another one that took some care. Carving all those little star points without making random funky slices is some feat!

This one looks like an alien to me.

Grumpy cat? 

Here's another favorite of mine. What patiently carved teeth! Looking this pic over now, I can't even imagine how someone managed to get a knife in that narrow mouth and carve upper and lower teeth!

This big toothy grin has been carved in that way where just part of the pumpkin is scraped off. I'd like to try that some time. I wonder if it is difficult to do? The pumpkin becomes almost like a lampshade with this technique. There's something extra spooky about there being no eyes above the mouth.

Glamour Girl:

Alien? Minion? Cyclops? 

It would be cool if this one came with a cackling sound effect. It looks like it is saying "Muahahaha!" 

This Creature from the Black Lagoon carving fit with this year's theme. There was a person in a Creature costume dancing to music at the event. I unfortunately did not see that dancing Creature in person but there are some videos online. I also saw some pics of a Creature sculpture someone made near a small lake in the park. I wish we'd seen that, but we must not have walked on that side of the park. It is a pretty large area. Again, I cannot imagine how long it took to carefully carve this!

So here is that blacklight art installation I mentioned earlier. There were neon skeleton pigeons all over the place. They were perched up high, so they really had the look of real birds. I mean, aside from the neon skeleton paint. But, you know how it is when you look up and there is a bird above you on a wire or a tree. Well, they were doing some realistic perching.

Some of my favorite pics from that night were taken looking up at the birds.

I hope they keep this installation or something like it in the future. 

The zombies were back again and looking grosser than ever. I think they were looking grosser because they weren't lit very much. So for the most part, they looked like oozing slime glittering in the dark. 

To my surprise, a number of the up-close zombie portraits turned out well! They must use glass eyes and artificial teeth from medical supply shops on some of these.

This one has more of the glossy ping pong ball eye look.

That backlit tuft of hair adds something.

This one is a hot mess.

Either this one or the first one I shared may be the scariest to me. What do you think?

This one is definitely the most assertive.

There were a few inflatable decorations and random props set up as well. You can walk around the park and see some little different themed areas. 

This inflatable stack of pumpkins was massive, as you can tell by where the stem meets the top of the building.

Behind some of the inflatables was this bright, blacklight painted sign. It goes well with this year's painted pigeons, hey?

Last night, Mom and I carved some pumpkins that are on display with a different group of jack-o-lanterns. It was fun to contribute to the type of event I photograph each year. Those pics will be up soon. 🎃