Halloween 50

This morning I awoke to discover fifty pink flamingos in the front yard!  And right behind those flamingos was a sign that read:  "50 Years Flown Away."

Yes, they flew by rather quickly.  As you yourself probably will discover some day, or perhaps you already know.  It doesn't seem real.  I think the one thing that helps it not seem real is the fact that I haven't ever really "grown up."  That being said, this sort of thing seems rather surreal.  

Surreal or not, according to the birth certificate, there it is.  And according to the fifty flamingos in the yard, it must be true.  The flamingos don't lie.  How funny to see them all lined up there in the yard.  In fact, they stayed there all through the day, and into Halloween night, which was fun for the kids to see.
 

We had a rather full day today, one where we kept busy doing those things I like to do this season.  One of those was making cookies!  

We did our traditional pumpkin cookies for a little while, making funny faces and abstract faces too.  We made nicely decorated pumpkins, and then some ugly and funny ones too!

Madison and I spent a good deal of time on these, and that's one thing we just seem to do every holiday.  Looking back on this blog, you can see all the cookies we've made over the years, and it's been fun.

Okay, I do like this one.  Madison made an actual graveyard out of a pumpkin cookie.  It might be a little difficult to eat, perhaps.  But perhaps not for Madison, who likes eating these afterwards.  We line them all up on the tray, and then pop them in the oven to cook up.

It's fun and relaxing!  Madison and I were enjoying a bit of this on a beautiful day today.  It was a beautiful day too, with the rain all gone and the weather nice and sunny.  Tonight, the moon was full as trick-or-treaters would be out in hordes, breaking out from the containment our governments have inflicted upon us.  There would be no holding back our neighborhood tonight.  Everyone has been posting online that their house would be welcoming to visitors, with or without masks, in order to hand out treats!

But I'm getting ahead of myself, because the next thing we did was carve a few more pumpkins!

That's right!  We did some more work on pumpkins this afternoon.  Madison's in the front was a little more simple, but I was hoping to do something with Mary Poppins, and that was a little more elaborate.

The plan was to do something even bigger, with buildings and even Burt jumping in the background, but time was fleeting by this point.  So I made do with Mary flying through the clouds - you can see the parrot umbrella handle there, and of course the bag she's carrying. 

Before the evening began, we light them up and put them out on the front porch to help decorate the area.  Every year we have visitors compliment us on our creations as they come up to trick-or-treat.

These pictures I usually take at the end of the evening, when it is dark and they are all lit up.  We leave for trick-or-treating before it gets dark though, because there's a long evening ahead, one filled with adventure and special Halloween candy!

This year, we had Nana on the porch to help out with passing out the candy.  Both she and Mom were there to greet the kids, and we were prepared this year again with a huge amount of candy.  We don't see the amount of kids the main stretch of the road sees, where we were heading off to, but there's still a good bit of visitors each Halloween.  And with all the conditions of this year, and with the weather conditions as they were tonight, all was perfect for everyone, for a night of trick-or-treating.

Mommy and I posed for a picture together - doesn't she look great!  I love that sweater vest she found.  And of course, I've been using the David S Pumpkins costume for a few years now.  It's just perfect for a night like this!  We posed for one last picture before it was time to venture out to our next great trick-or-treating adventure!

Our friends from Lumpkin County dropped by, the Wellborns.  They don't live in a community like ours, so they joined us once more in our driveway so the kids could have a place to go for a guaranteed big haul of candy.  And yes, there was a huge haul of candy tonight.  It was pretty epic.  

The neighborhood was decorated, the full moon was out, and there were hayrides, movies projected on big screens, smoke machines, and creepy music all around.  Kids were running all over, zooming from house to house as parents staggered behind with the ones who tired out too soon.

It was super fun.  We were out there for a few hours, until the kids were good and tired, and things were starting to wind down.  But that took a long time.  We were out there walking from house to house, and so many kind neighbors were there, and in the spirit of things.  One garage had a miniature haunted house in it that the kids dared to venture through to get some candy.

Madison took all these pictures, as this year I was determined not to drag a camera around.  Instead, I found myself helping out as I always do, carrying a few of the kids' heavy candy bags for them.  Some of these candy bags were about as heavy with candy as the kids themselves!

Here's Madison's costume for the night.  She was looking sharp, and the good news was that this year it wasn't as so cold outside.  We all returned home, and said our goodbyes to our trick-or-treating friends.  Mom and Nana still had some candy left, but the visitors were dying down somewhat.  I was at the front porch for some of those later stragglers, but soon enough, the evening's fun was ready to close down.  It's always a bittersweet moment there on the porch, as you wish all the fun wouldn't end.  But it was chilly outside, and the girls were inside counting up candy, and maybe getting a few of their favorites.  Halloween candy is a sacred thing!  Fortunately, Madison has enough to last for a month.  Or maybe at least two weeks...!

It was a good Halloween.  We've been under duress a bit lately, but it was a blessed day today, a well-deserved one for the kids, and a memorable one for the rest of us.

"There's nowhere to go but up."