Happy Halloween!!

One thing this middle-aged mom has really missed is being able to truly "celebrate" some of the different holidays. When our kids went away to college, I didn't decorate if they weren't coming home. As a matter of fact, I remember the first Halloween that they were away . . .I was sad.


Well, this year I was able to decorate to my heart's content because Laura wanted to have a Halloween party. She was in charge of the food and I was in charge of the decorations.


Here is the banner that I made using my Silhouette machine. I tried to post this picture to pinterest and I cannot make my computer do it!!!  I think it turned out well.  There are three people who live in our house -- Laura and I are two of them . . .the other person placed all the pumpkins in the fireplace for me - didn't that person do a great job arranging them? 

Funny story about the food - Laura decided to make Oreo balls. Now I've never made them but several friends told us how easy they were to make. Laura and her friend, Taylor spent two whole nights making those things. Laura said they were truly a labor of love . . and that she wasn't so sure about entertaining if it was so much work!! I, on the other hand, love having them in the kitchen. I loved their chatter and their laughter - those are two other things that I missed much while they were away at college!!!

I had planned to make some ghosts to use on the dining room table and I went to JoAnn's Fabrics to buy dowels and round Styrofoam balls and white muslin.  They had these yard ghosts on sale for about 75% off - I think I paid $6 for each one.  I couldn't buy the materials to make them for that.  So for the table, I removed the big bamboo pole and crammed the small pole down into a block of Styrofoam.

I made these bats on my silhouette machine.  The girls used fishing line and hung them for me and I loved how they fluttered around.

I had to work on the night of Laura's party but everyone was still there when I got home.  I was so excited to see all of the costumes.  Let me introduce you to Mr. and Mrs. Scarecrow . . .actually Gabe and Allison.  Gabe has now moved to Denver and we sure are going to miss him!!!  These scarecrow costumes are some of the cutest and most creative I have ever seen. 

Laura's costume was also cute.  She was a bumble bee.  She wanted to be something else and she bought the material and the pattern and the zipper and I cut out the fabric . . .and sat down at my trusty, very old Elna . . .and my  machine would not sew.  Actually, that is not the truth - you can't get it to stop sewing.  From the moment you turn it on, the pressure foot is moving up and down.  I can't decide whether to try to get it fixed or ask for a new one.  I already can't get bobbins for it anymore . . .not even on E-bay.  They don't make them so I've known for quite some time that as soon as I use the last one . . .anyway, I love that machine.  I have sewed soooo many things on that machine!!  The point of all that is that we ran to party city and bought the last wings, etc. a few nights before Halloween.

This is a funny picture . . .Amy's eyes are closed.  She was a flapper.  Nathan was a gypsy and so was his girlfriend, Kendall.  We kept asking them if we needed to count the china and silver . . . .I'm still finding red feathers all over my house.

Lamar brought his girlfriend, Marianne, whom we had never met.  She seems very sweet.  Lamar was a gangster/mob guy and she was a flapper.  I loved her dress and it looked so cute on her.

This picture makes me laugh.  Christie was "the pregnant woman who recently ran a marathon."  In this picture, you can see a corner of her pillow . . but she actually looked pregnant.  Dustin is sitting on the couch . . .he was the young man who rides his bike around and goes door to door.

I guess Evan was a doctor??? and Kendall was our other gypsy.  She looked cute!!

Here is Taylor . . .she was sous chef (helped Laura make Oreo balls) and decorator's assistant (helped me hang things that I couldn't reach!!) and movie provider - we watched old movies while they worked - Wizard of Oz and Mary Poppins.  On this night, she was a classic old movie star.  She looked great!!!!  Her "cigarette" is a dry erase board marker.  I laughed and laughed when I realized that!!

You can see Claire in this picture - she has on her mother's wedding dress . .. which was made of polyester . . .and she was the bride of Frankenstein or a zombie bride???  In the corner on the right. . .can you see Austin Powers?  He belongs to Glenn and he is voice activated.  We haven't had Austin out in a while and he was quite funny!!  He can actually scare the living daylights out of me!! 

Mark was "allowed" to stay at the party and he enjoyed himself immensely!  Here he is with Ed.  Ed is Amy's boyfriend and I think he was a boot-legger.

Halloween was a good time for this middle-aged mom. I enjoyed it immensely even though we only had four trick-or-treaters. Two of the four were soooo cute - one was dressed as a hamburger and the other was a princess. All in all, it was a GREAT Halloween!!