Your Jack-O-Lantern Pumpkin Would Be Better As A Wine Dispenser

You've just finished scooping the guts out of your Halloween pumpkin, and not only are you thoroughly grossed out by having had to stick your hands in the goop, but you're fresh out of artistic inspiration for how to carve it. All of the clever, creative ideas have already been done, and besides, you know you don't have the artistic skills to pull them off. What you really need is a drink, so you reach for your trusty box o'wine, when suddenly inspiration strikes! Forget the jack o'Lantern, how about a thematically appropriate DIY wine dispenser?

Making a jack o'wine couldn't be much easier once you've already done the hard work of gutting the pumpkin. Instead of carving a face, all you need to do is make a round hole where a mouth would be. Remove the wine bag from the box, then stuff it down inside your pumpkin, pull the dispensing nozzle out the mouth hole, then put the lid back on. The red nozzle even kind of looks like a pair of puckered lips, but if you think your pumpkin looks odd without a face, you can go ahead and add some eyes and a nose, as well (before you stuff the bag in, that is). These extra holes won't matter, since the sturdy plastic bag will keep the wine in place.

If you're not a fan of boxed wine, you can still use your pumpkin as a wine holder by the simple expedient of sticking the bottle inside. There's no need for any hole carving, but again, feel free to add a face if you wish. If it's the kind of wine that needs chilling, add some ice cubes, too. If you have an extra-large pumpkin, you could also use it as a beer cooler. Seven-ounce pony bottles (which are not to be confused with the much-larger pony kegs) may fit even if larger ones don't.

Halloween mocktails or cocktails more your style? Make a witch's brew out of lime sherbet, ginger ale, and pineapple juice and serve it up in your pumpkin punch bowl, and for a more spirited punch, spike it with homemade black vodka. Yes, it's okay to pour it straight into a hollowed-out pumpkin as long as you rinse this first, but if you plan to carve a face, you'll need to line the pumpkin with a container of some sort. You can even create an extra-spooky effect by placing a few pieces of dry ice in water in the bottom of the pumpkin, then pouring the punch into a jar that fits inside. This way, the ice will create billowing "smoke" while not coming into contact with the drink since frozen carbon dioxide isn't safe for human consumption.