Happy Halloween!

(Yes, this will be a very long post!)

 

 

We started on October 1 decorating the house inside and out.  As usual, we covered pretty much every surface, but my two favorite decorations this year were the bar over the mirror and the fruit bowl centerpiece.

 

I carefully wrote out Pliny's Book 7, Letter 27 in Latin in dry erase marker on the surface of the round mirror above the bar, then hot-glued on some dark-colored butterflies.  I also draped black feather boas over the deer antlers above the mirror.

  

 

 

For the fruit bowl, I just picked up some fake fruit at the dollar store, spray painted it matte black, and then put it in a suitably Gothic-looking bowl along with black rubber snakes and black velvet spiders.

 

Beatrice was a vampire this year.  Last Halloween, after a run-in with an animatronic pirate on a neighbor's porch, Beatrice decided she wanted to be something scary this Halloween, so that the pirate would be afraid of her.  She also got really into character and refused to eat food with garlic in it on Halloween night.*

 

Arthur insisted he wanted to be a ghost, but as soon as he put the costume on he hated how it covered his face (I warned him!) - he then considered a mermaid, a witch, and "a cat who is a scientist" before settling on a wizard.

 

 

William was a very excited baby bat.

 

And of course, my awesome space girl costume:

 

On October 17 we had a little pumpkin decorating party for the kids (though it quickly turned into a dirt digging party in our unfinished back yard).  In addition to the usual crowd, Beatrice's new school friends Amyah and Emmy joined the party.

Henry and Callan decorating their pumpkins

Adrienne and Cylas

Lesley and baby Rhys

All month long we did Halloween crafts and activities.  One of the best new ones we did this year was having the kids build a "haunted fort" under the dining room table and then tell ghost stories and watch a scary movie down there.  They built the fort out of black plastic table cloths, cobwebs, plastic spiders, and white pillowcase ghosts, plus a few odds and ends from the dollar store.

 

 

Lilli helped the kids carve apple head witches and make bodies for them out of empty wine bottles.

 

Baking Halloween cookies

Building a giant rope spider web in the backyard

Vampire paper dolls

We went to an outdoor showing of the Winnie the Pooh Halloween special at the library with our friends Kaitlin, Paul, Callan, and Rhys.

 

We also took the family to the very impressive Rise of the Jack o' Lanterns show at Descanso Gardens.  Pictures don't really do it justice, but there were thousands of expertly carved pumpkins on display, including these life-size dinosaurs made entirely out of pumpkins:

 



On October 24, Beatrice's elementary school had a big school-wide party and fundraiser, the Halloween Hullabaloo, complete with a giant inflatable slide, a maze, a haunted house, and carnival games.  I was the chairperson in charge of the bake sale, which wound up being a pretty big job.  Luckily, Lilli was in town that week visiting me and she was a tremendous help with everything from baking this gorgeous cake the night before as a prize for the cake walk, to setting up the booth and selling hundreds and hundreds of baked goods the night of the event.

 

Lilli's gorgeous cake

The following night was our big Halloween party. Then we recovered with some more low-key events the following week, including watching the original Friday the 13th at a drive-in movie theater downtown. William and his friends wore their costumes to baby music class, and they had a special Halloween edition of library story time - they even gave each child their own pumpkin to take home.

Scarf dancing while dressed as a bat

Library story time pumpkins

Arthur working on his craft at the library

On Wednesday night we carved pumpkins - Beatrice designed the face for the giant pumpkin she and Arthur picked together at Underwood Family Farm and Dev carved it.

 

 

 

I did some scientific-illustration-themed pumpkins, a spider and a moth (I also did a bat but it didn't turn out as well). 

 

Then, at last, it was Halloween! Both Beatrice and Arthur had costume parades at school.  Dev and I went to St. Mark's to help out - our fourth Halloween costume parade at St. Mark's.

 

Arthur holding Mr. Richard's hand



Arthur with Ivy Harris and Ivy Robb



Arthur and his best friend, Henry Harper

Beatrice got out of school an hour early so we took her out to lunch - here we are in our matching vampire costumes.  I also went to get a flu shot while dressed as a vampire, which cracked me up.

 

That night Dev took the kids out trick-or-treating while William and I stayed home and handed out full-size candy bars.**

 

Heading out

We also took the lights and fog machine from our party in the backyard and set them up front for the trick-or-treaters.

 

William is amazed by the strobe lights and the fog machine.

 

Sorting through their haul***

 Later we also dropped by two parties - one at my friend Amy's, the other at our next door neighbors' - and only then did we bid farewell to the very best time of the year.  I can't wait until 2015 . . .

 

* Beatrice usually picks her costume 9-12 months in advance, but once she chooses it, she never waivers.  She has already decided that next year she wants to be Jack Skellington from The Nightmare Before Christmas.

 

** I still remember the full-size candy bar house in my neighborhood when I was a kid - being the neighborhood full-size candy bar house is my bid for immortality.

 

*** Every year the kids excitedly collect a ton of candy, eat a few pieces right away, and then totally forget about the entire thing by the following day and never mention the candy again.