Pumpkin Perplexity

So we had a garden this year.  It started out being Josh's garden.  Then half way thru it became my garden.  No hard feelings, I really liked learning to take care of it.  When Josh decides to do a project, the boy reads EVERYTHING about the subject beforehand.  So when he was taking care of it, there was really nothing for me to do with it.  With our efforts combined we grew captain pumpkins!!!!  (geddit?) Anyway... these weren't just any pumpkins.  These were pie pumpkins!  Perfect for getting the most flesh out of them to make yummy recipes for the fall.  We grew four, but one wasn't quite as ripe as we wanted so we only cooked 3 of them.  We also grew a couple of cute buttercup squash, which apparently have a yummy sweet flavor, not unlike butternut squash.  I am going to make some buttercup squash casserole in hopes that it will be as big of a hit as sweat potato casserole.  I'll let everyone know how it goes...  Anyway, back to the pumpkins.  So you have to get them cut, scooped of seeds, cooked, then scooped of flesh, and finally pureed.  Well Josh cut and scooped the seeds, but got an allergic reaction to the skins and had to retire early from the pumpkin making party.  He's fine, it was more comical than scary.  Well it was comical then.  Once I started scooping the flesh and trying, TRYING, to puree the stuff, I realized that this was a serious all night job.  Number one, they take forever to cook, number two, they hold some serious heat, so I opted to not sit around even longer and wait for them to cool, and number three, the flesh is so dang thick that pureeing it was a nightmare!  I need to get one of those really cool hand food processors.. Know what I mean?  Cause our food processor was NOT a happy camper after about 1 pumpkin.  As the pureeing continued, the kitchen not only smelled of pumpkin, but burning food processor motor. Great.  By about midnight my poor feet had enough of this and I ended up falling asleep on the couch with one pumpkin to go.  Yeah, maybe I'm a sissy, but I don't even care!  So the next morning I woke up to realize just how much pumpkin got all over the kitchen and just how well it dries and adheres to surfaces.  So.  I finished the last pumpkin, and then next two hours was scouring the kitchen of anything orange that wasn't supposed to be there.  Haha... But long story short- we got 10 CUPS of pureed pumpkin all ready for making pies, rolls, cheesecake, cookies, soup, etc!  YAY!!!!  I am definitely going to make a pie for Thanksgiving!  It freezes really well too, and can last up to a year in a deep freezer.  I'm sure I'll use it all by then, but I have never done anything like this and wanted to share the experience.  Mostly, because I am sure I will continue to do it in future years and I want to look back at this first experience and laugh at how immature at being an amazing homemaking mom I was.  ;)