19th Annual Underwater Pumpkin Carving

It’s that time of year… time for the recap of the 19th Annual Underwater Pumpkin Carving held at Beaver Lake. We had a great turnout this year and even better weather. The high was 72˚ and sunny. Can you really ask for any better weather this time of year? The water was even a great temperature, the thermocline was down around 30-35 feet. The visibility was impeccable… until Mark accidentally dropped his pumpkin and the weights to get it down, more on that in a bit.

This is a typical Nicole/Kim picture. I’m not sure why, but we do this most every event we’re together. It is what it is. Maybe now would be a good time to tell at least part of the Mark pumpkin story because it involves Kim. So late last month I went to Sams and bought pumpkins for our family pumpkin carving. I posted a picture on facebook of Mark holding 2 of the 4 pumpkins and Kim asked if those were his pumpkins for the carving. I want to mention that they are big pumpkins. So he went and bought one especially for this. We weighed it at the shop and it was 25 pounds. It also took 25 pounds of weight plus Mark to get the pumpkin underwater. But he met Kim‘s challenge and took the 25 pound pumpkin underwater for carving. As he was taking his pumpkin out to the water, the rope that he had his weights tied to broke and we lost 25 pounds to the bottom in about 3 feet of water. Luckily it was all recovered . Grady was happy about that because it was his pool weights we used… haha.

The other funny story of the day involving poor Mark is we told him he was entering the contest. He wouldn’t (although really wasn’t given a chance) sign the release form, so Deb, his mom, and I all signed his release form for him as his parent/guardian. (Note: He did eventually sign it)

Now prior to the carving which started at 1pm, a few divers went for a leisurely dive. Like I said, the water was fabulous, and yes I am speaking from experience as I dove in the underwater pumpkin carving!

Then it was time to come out of the water, get pumpkins ready and head out for the Underwater Pumpkin Carving. If you weren’t diving there was lots of good food to be had because like we always say, if there’s food, they will come.

Like mother like daughter? Just wondering….

Because the blogger was in the water before and during the pumpkin carving, I don’t have many pictures to share. So we’ll just jump forward to the pumpkins as they were presented for the judging. Remember, the participants are the ones who judge the pumpkins. You choose who you think should be #1, Best Effort, and Ugliest. We had 13 entries this year.

Kim volunteered to talley up the votes…..

And the winners are………

1st Greg Cassidy, 2nd Chris Parrish, 3rd Justin Walkinshaw, Best Effort Lance Mathie, and Ugliest Megan Hendrix.

And for good measure… all the participants! Thanks again for coming out!! We had a blast and we hope you did too!

And just as a reminder: There is a Chili/Non Chili Cookoff and Silent Auction this Saturday night to help raise money for the Children of Newton County!

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