I know I am trying to recover from Halloween yesterday/last night. Are you? We all celebrate differently, if at all.
And for anyone who doesn't, my pastor hubby had this to say to our church congregation on Halloween:
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Pastors Corner
Today is Halloween, so I'm going to keep this short: be safe and have fun. Seriously. Far too often we try to read to many things into days like this. Should we as Christians recognize and celebrate Halloween? Of course. Remember, as longs as you keep God centered in your life it's OK. Most "Christian" holidays as we know them began as pagan celebrations. Instead of trying to stop those celebrations, the early Christians simply "re-purposed" them. In other words, they gave them new meanings. Be creative. I'm sure you can do the same with Halloween.
Again, be safe and have fun.
Blessings,
Pastor Chris
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Halloween is my favorite! It really, ridiculously, is. It might qualify as an illness...but I enjoy every moment of it!
Just to remind you, you can click HERE to jog your memory of my Halloween passion.
Well, with a HALLOWEEN PAST FRESH IN MY MIND, I was pumped for Halloween even more so than usual.
Of course I had to have a perfect Halloween dinner to get things started. You can find out about the Boo Hash & Monster Mash Potatoes HERE.
Then my hubby & I got into our attire. We were so cute in our couples costume!
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| Tony "Dimples" Capezio & (the return of) Maisey J. Carmichael |
And the kiddos were ready, too!
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| Wendy Corduroy from 'Gravity Falls'; Captain Rex - Clone Trooper; post-apocalyptic soldier |
Only Lil Guy was trick-or-treating this year. That was weird. Teen Boy took Lil Guy out to get candy, then Teen Girl & my hubby stayed at home to help hand out candy. That was all a little weird, for sure.
However...I was so extra excited for trick-or-treaters this year! Seriously!
While we did our church's Trunk-or-Treat event, our car was parked by a really great couple who had these fantastic retro blow mold figurines! Ghosts & pumpkins & such...they all looked so good! And we went SUPER simple, but effective: just a couple of coolers with a spiderweb shower curtain as a table cloth, and then one of the brilliant ideas my hubby came up with to use at our house...trick-or-treat plastic pumpkins as luminaries!
As the evening went on, the really awesome couple came over & asked if we wanted more of those pumpkins. So we worked out getting several more so that we could have more than just 6 to light up a small part of our walkway to the porch...
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| Front porch on Halloween 2010. Yep...that's all, folks. |
So this year...we ended up with about 18!! And I will tell you that it looked amazing on Halloween night to greet the trick-or-treaters at our house!
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| See this pumpkin? It's huge...and I got offers to trade for it twice. That was a no-go. I love this pumpkin... |
*sigh* Yeah...it looked great! And...AND??? We got several compliments about how awesome the simple-yet-effective setup looked!
I can't tell you how excited I was to be able to extend our modest decor out to the end of the driveway! We are on a street that is mostly, and sadly, dark on Halloween. We began to figure this out. Why? Well, it had to do with the last couple of Halloweens...
After our 80 trick-or-treater count on our first year in the neighborhood, the following year was a Chiefs' game on Halloween. We only ended up with less than 40 that year. I was so bummed, but wasn't surprised. But then last year came around & I hoped for numbers to go back up...but...not so much. As we discovered that the neighborhood was mostly dark on our connecting street, we heard that the main streets at the top & bottom of our street was bustling with activity! *sigh* And we didn't have much of a draw. So we only had 40-ish again.
So, I was pumped with our extended line of luminaries! Maybe we could be seen for a bit of a distance. And guess what...GUESS WHAT!!!! Even though our connecting street was pretty dark...imagine my happy-dance-excitement when we had a total of...
76!!!!
WOO HOOOOOOO!!!!!!
Plus, we had very few duplicate costumes come to the door! Very creative & original all the way around. It was awesome!
The weather was a perfect, slightly damp & chilly Halloween night. Kiddos were out in droves! We had long time friends come by, a surprise of someone who we didn't know what happened to them & it was fantastic to be surprised by that, we had a family where the mom was Cinderella & dad was hardcore Prince Charming...so fabulous, and we had the cutest little Sully!
And not only did we get almost 80 trick-or-treaters of all sizes & ages (because that doesn't bother me...make an effort, say "Trick-or-Treat" or give a friendly "Happy Halloween" and I'm sold)! You know, there was a very tall guy that showed up as Spiderman...and Teen Girl gushed that she was so happy he came trick-or-treating. She said that he is one of the special ed students at the high school & that he is one of the sweetest kids you'd ever meet. So...watch who you judge who comes to your door. Just wanna throw that out there.
Also, not only did we get compliments on our walkway, but 3 girls (apparently also high-schoolers) who came as B-F-Fs who looked at me open the door...appeared amazed...and then the middle girl said,
"WHOA! I love your costume! And I remember you from last year...you were the Queen of Hearts!! And it was so awesome!"
Which was funny since I was actually Rosey Redd 3 Halloweens before that! *snort* I guess it made an impression on her...but surprised she realized who I was between Rosey & Maisey!
Rosey Redd - 2010 Maisey J. Carmichael - 2013
As we were running out of candy, and the witching hour was winding down, the kiddos were all home & getting settled, the dance party continued off & on in our entryway, the kiddos stopped coming to the door before 9:00. We had 76 trick-or-treaters on our doorstep in just over an hour & a half. It was incredible!
When hubby asked me what my original goal was...I was going to be happy to get 30 after the last couple of years. I was stoked, surprised, and humbled by the numbers we had!
And I love Halloween. Love it.
Also, Teen Girl said it was weird deciding to stay home for the first time...but she loved every minute of it! And she understood my point of view. Which is & can be magical!
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| Just hanging out & handing out candy...and loving it! |
I went & got a few more "luminaries" on clearance today to add to the ones we were so blessed to get from that hilarious & fun little couple...and I am so looking forward next year...as always!
Stay tuned...
God Bless, AM~Erica
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