Family will carve for a cause this year

Dan Frickle grew up wanting to carve pumpkins.

“When I was a kid, my mother was a pretty fastidious housekeeper,” Frickle said. “She never let me carve jack-o-lanterns. I could watch her carve a small one, maybe.

“I remember thinking that, once I grew up, I was going to carve all the jack-o-lanterns I wanted to carve.”

And Frickle has.

In fact, the whole family gets into the act and annually puts more than 200 carved pumpkins on display at the family home at 20924 E. Wabash Ave. in Otis Orchards.

“We’re not talking about triangle-eyed jack-o-lanterns, either – these are detailed carvings,” Frickle said. “What started out as just a small family thing has turned into a big family tradition. My kids look forward to pumpkin-carving week more than they do Christmas.

“The month of October is Pumpkin Month for us. We plan meals around it, we plan what designs we’re going to do. We plan new features. We have a few things this year that we’ve never done before.”

And that’s a lot of carving. Right now, Frickle said, there are some 212 pumpkins waiting in the family garage, with a few more to be added once the creative process begins Sunday.

Then, “my married son, his wife, my daughter and her boyfriend come over along with some friends and neighbors,” Frickle said. “Last year we ended up with 230 carved pumpkins on display.”

The family grows only about 50 of the orange squash themselves. The rest come from the Fresh Start Fruit Stand down the road from the family home.

The display will go up Halloween night and will remain in place through Nov. 1.

And in case you’re wondering, none of the carved pumpkins will be turned into pumpkin pie.

“We carve them a week ahead of time, so they really aren’t in the kind of shape you want them to be in to make pie,” Frickle said. “But if we have any left over, they usually get turned into pie or pumpkin bread. The carved pumpkins just get taken to the compost heap.”

But oh, what carvings they become.

“We’ve branched out into creature features,” Frickle said with a laugh. “We’ve done alligators and hedgehogs and that sort of thing. We’ve put pumpkins together to form bigger pieces as well.

“My son is really a pumpkin-carving master. Over four nights, he’ll carve a Chinese dragon that covers four pumpkins. It’s a very detailed, very intricate carving, so he does one segment a night and when he’s done it’s magnificent.”

This year Frickle and family are planning a multi-pumpkin haunted Eiffel Tower as well as an assortment of goblins, ghouls and other Halloween mainstays – all lighted with either electric lights or votive candles.

The family serves hot chocolate and other refreshments to visitors and asks everyone to make a donation to charity.

“This year we read an article that said the local food banks were running low,” Frickle said. “We plan to donate whatever money we raise to the various local food banks. We’ve managed to raise between $200 and $300 each of the past few years.”

As perhaps the Spokane Valley’s resident expert on pumpkin carving, Frickle has a few tips for those looking to make their own jack-o-lanterns.

“My suggestion would be to use those little saw blades you can get – those come in handy,” he said. “And aside from that, I suggest you be patient and take your time.”