October Festivities

I truly enjoy this time of year. I enjoy the fall colors, the change in the seasons, even the chilly morning air and threat of oncoming rain. Eventually, we get a bit tired of the rain but it is what it is in our neck of the woods. However, with the change in weather we are compensated with the holidays…Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years. It is a time for family gatherings, decorating, get-togethers with friends, a lot of baking and cooking and the reason, I’m certain, many diets begin on New Year’s Day.

Halloween is, of course, the first on this list of holidays. While some may skip this as a real holiday, those with young children probably can’t ignore it. Children have active imaginations and the idea of dressing up as their most favorite hero, cartoon character or animal is not something they want to pass up. Of course, they don’t want to miss out on all that candy either!

I miss the days when my boys were young enough to go trick-or-treating; although, I don’t miss those cold and oftentimes wet nights walking from house to house. We did have a lot of fun letting the boys dress up in all sorts of costumes beginning with cute cartoon characters or a favorite super hero and graduating to the scariest movie villain costumes. Some might not be fond of this holiday but it is all in the name of fun.

Now that my boys are older, there is no trick-or-treating and they hardly ever dress up but we still enjoy decorating the house, carving pumpkins and spending time with family and friends. We enjoyed our first Halloween party just this past weekend. Some dressed up but it was mostly the younger kids, so it was a treat and a hilarious surprise to see two of my cousins disappear for a short time only to emerge as giant Teletubbies. Costumes aside, the party was fun and also a great excuse to gather the family together…not to mention other guests…

She was just a tad bit freaky but a great addition to the decorations.

Halloween parties are not only a great reason to come up with fun costumes but they also give everyone a reason to cook and bake various amounts of food. There were a lot of different food options to add to our dinner plates as well as a smorgasbord of choices for dessert. With food options you also have various beverages to choose from. One of my favorites and the most fun was this choice of beverage…the witch’s brew:

It tasted like orange sherbet and was very good.

After eating, drinking, handing out awards to the kids for best costumes (they all received awards by the way) and eating some more, the night eventually had to end. My aunt was a sweetheart for thinking ahead and it would appear she bought out the local pumpkin patch with the number of pumpkins she had hidden throughout the yard. She offered a pumpkin to every kid present, from 3 years old to 20 years old, it did not matter; as long as they were a grandchild or a great niece/nephew, they deserved a pumpkin.

At the end of the night as we lingered to say our goodbyes, one of my cousin’s kids decided it was a great time to experiment with the dry ice (don’t worry; he wore rubber gloves to stay safe). He began with dry ice in cups filled with warm water, soon moved on to bowls and eventually the experiment took on larger proportions in the kitchen sink. Here’s the creepy results…

See the spider on the side of the bowl to the right? Eww…that’s all I can say.

Whether you enjoy Halloween as a holiday or not, I hope you enjoy the fun it can bring among family and friends. Making memories is what the holidays are about and I see no reason not to use Halloween as a great reason to create enjoyable memories.

I hope you are also creating your own fun memories with your family and friends.

Trick or Treat!

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“The End” Means another Beginning

Ghouls, Ghosts and Goodies

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