Halloween Happenings!

Each Halloween, I try to recapture that childhood feeling of excitement for this holiday.  I strive to straddle the line of cuteness and originality, as I did here, at the tender age of five.  That's hard to do when you can't quite fit into those "Thrifty's" plastic costumes.

PS, I think that kid next to me is actually carrying a prop bomb.  Try bringing THAT to the annual school parade nowadays!

Getting into the "Fall" mood is hard to do when you live where fall weather is an everyday occurrence!  To "enhance" the Fall experience, I bought some colorful veggies.  I even roasted them.  AND SURVIVED TO TELL THE TALE…the tale being that they were delicious!

 One day, I even went all Martha Stewart on my own ass and made skeleton cookies. YES, I DID.

Note to self:  Next time you bake, don't wear an iPod.  You may miss the sound of a full bottle of soy sauce tipping in the refrigerator, and won't notice anything until you happen to turn and see brown liquid seeping from the bottom of the fridge.  All over the floor.  And then be forced to sponge up soy sauce as your royal icing is slowly hardening on the counter.

But I digress…so I bought the annual pumpkins to carve for my annual carving party, only to have raccoons attempt to beat me to the punch.  I tried several methods to keep them away:

The "Thing" approach:

The "Creepy Doll" approach:

Neither really worked, but eventually they gave up and left…only to make room for an invasion by SLUGS...

 As the Halloween day approached, Creepy decided it was time to invite its kin to hang out:

 and then the carving began:

The pumpkin carving party was going quite well, until I noticed a bit of bullying going on in one corner.  Had to put a stop to that nonsense.

Eventually all pumpkins were carved and accounted for - from Hello Kitty to Toy Story Alien to Screaming Cat to Groucho to Jack Skellington - with a few bats and owls thrown in:

 Of course, what is Halloween without costumes?  Here we have the "Who Wore it Better?" contest:

Creepy as Cowpoke:

 DP as Cowpoke:

 or Killer Diller as Cowpoke:

Personally, I vote for Killer Diller, because she has the whole "screw this noise" look down pat.  She OWNS that hat.

 Halloween night and the pumpkins finally enjoy their hour of glory!

As did the Creepy dolls…I wonder if they were scaring away the kids?  We only got like 20 kids this year.  I say no, it was not the dolls. Couldn't be.

But all good things must come to an end - and so must the pumpkins. Left to rot.  Organically. 

Funny, the raccoons don't seem interested in them now.