Pumpkin Carving Time

The Nationals are once again holding a pumpkin carving contest this fall. The lucky winner will receive an official game-worn Adam Dunn jersey! All you have to do is carve something Nats-related into a pumpkin and send the team a photo of your creation. Photos should be 720 x 486 pixels in size and no larger than 1MB. More contest information is available on Nationals.com. To participate, you must enter before 2 p.m. ET on Tuesday, Oct. 26, 2010. The Nationals also offer four Nats patterns for your use including a Curly W, Screech, the DC logo and the Nationals logo. You can also make your own pattern! Just take a big photograph and start adjusting the color settings. You'll need to make it grayscale first. Then slowly increase contrast, brightness and black level, while decreasing white level. Adjust slowly and soon your picture will become a pumpkin pattern. Just be careful to make sure that all of your existing pumpkin parts (black spots on the pattern) touch another part of the pumpkin. You don't want to cut out someone's eye by accident. Once you print it, use a sharpie to fix any potential problems. Back in 2008, I entered with a Manny Acta pumpkin. It was a finalist, but it didn't win. I'm still deciding on a pumpkin or two for this year and I'll probably get to work this weekend (just for fun, not for the contest). If you have pattern questions, leave a comment below and I'll be happy to try to help!