Boo!

My mom dresses her house for just about every holiday. I do not. I barely do Christmas. Last year we put up a fake tree and then waited so long to decorate it that the boys ended up decorating it themselves with blocks and legos. Not that I'm complaining, I thought it was great!




But it turns out that Tommy really loves to decorate and organize the house. He often lights candles, to make things more "homey". Or, to give me a heart attack. It's hard to say which.






So I couldn't resist the other day when I found a Halloween themed vinyl table cloth for just a few dollars. We have been keeping the table decorated and set, and Tommy lights the ghostly and pirate-y candles. They love the 'goblets' and the frankenstein dishes and bowls.




I think it looks smashing! I'll never forget, one of my first years of teaching, when there was a smackdown in the staff meeting (that almost went to fisticuffs) over whether we should have a Halloween parade. It was shocking! ... the first time. It happens every year, it turns out. It just boggles my mind, but it's quite controversial. Teachers want to sweep the whole thing under the rug, because it makes kids completely spastic from start to finish. Parents want to squash it completely when it rubs their religion the wrong way.

I fall completely on the other side, you probably would not be shocked to know. I hear people all the time, talking about how kids just grow up too fast, and this is one of those totally fun, super sweet kid traditions that I just love so much. I don't love the 8th-graders-with-their-pillow-cases-full-of-candy. I don't love the skanks at the bars dressed like kitty cats.

But put a second grader in a Darth Vader costume? Or a kindergartener dressed up like a cowboy? I could just swoon! Bobbing for apples and blindfolded youngsters sticking their paws into cold spaghetti (eeewwwww! intestines!!) or peeled grapes (eyeballs!), and I'm just beside myself.

I know it's so old-fashioned, but that's how I roll.

And, speaking of scary.... I swapped Gram's hoosier and the china cabinet. We had our kitchen remodeled four years ago, and that cabinet has not been moved since we placed it in there after the floor was laid.

Here is what I found under that china cabinet. It's pretty, am I right? The cobwebs aren't included here, of course, but I think you can get the general gist of things without the spiders.