With Halloween a mere week away, I spent the weekend getting ready. In addition to carving my two pumpkins I got at Pumpkin Hollow last week, I also made some pumpkin spice cookies, and a spooky cookie haunted house (without a roof). The roof on the house refused to stay put so there isn’t one, but the pumpkin spice cookies were delicious. I can’t take credit for them though because I used a mix, but I did top them with cream cheese frosting and a dash of pumpkin pie spice.


Last weekend I met some friends I hadn’t seen in a while at Pumpkin Hollow in Piggott, Arkansas. We all used to work for Pumpkin Hollow in college and met up to meet the newest member of the PH team, Mabry. After some daytime fun in the pumpkin patch, we headed to Holcomb, Missouri for some Strawberry’s BBQ, then back to PH for Horror in the Hollow. After dark, Pumpkin Hollow becomes a haunted wonderland including three haunted attractions: “Forrest of Fright,” “Bubba’s Butcher Barn,” and “Mad Skull Mine.” After taking pictures with some “spooks,” we made our way through the ghastly locations, but not without our annual “RIP treatment” including line cuts and a ride in a hearse. No month of October is complete without a trip down south to Pumpkin Hollow. I am now officially ready for Halloween!

Pumpkin Hollow Reunion 2010 (Me, Julie, Emily, Mabry, and Brooke) Horror in the Hollow (Me, Julie, and Emily) Bubba's Butcher Barn  Pumpkin Spice Cookies Slightly altered haunted house made from chocolate graham cookies. Carved pumpkin.

This past weekend, I once again accompanied my mother to another storytelling festival. This one was labeled a ghost storytelling event so I willingly went. Because this event was in Cape Girardeau, home to my favorite antique store (more on Annie Laurie's here), we had to stop by there first.


I was able to introduce my mother to Annie Laurie’s for the first time and we ended up spending an hour and a half in the store. She bought jewelry to complete her Halloween costume and I bought another clutch/change purse and a fall scarf to accent my True Religion snake skin purse.




Inside Annie Laurie's Antiques

 With our lawn chairs in tow, we then headed down by the Mississippi River to hear ghost stories. They were serving hot apple cider and kettle corn so I thought this was exciting. It was the perfect October night.

Cape Girardeau

I had forgotten how theatrical storytellers could be (my previous storytelling adventure here) and how the stories wouldn’t seem true at all. The first storyteller was a guy who told a long drawn out story about a witch on a mountain. This story actually kept my interest for most of the time he told it. He played the guitar and sang a couple little numbers and then he was done. The next storyteller was a woman who entered the stage playing bagpipes. That was my first clue that she was going to annoy me. She proceeded to tell several short stories that almost sounded familiar. By the third story I leaned over to my mother and said “these are songs that she’s turned into stories.” One story was about a fiddle player who sold his soul to the devil (“Devil Went Down To Georgia”). Another story was about a dead husband who tapped his dead foot when he heard music and his foot turned to dust (“Dem Bones”...a song my mother was familiar with). At intermission, we were told that the second half of the “show” would be really scary stories. I anxiously waited for the next part to start, but was horribly disappointed when the second half was just as weird as the first.




The old man came back out and sang/told a story about what I can only guess was a vampire slayer. A majority of the beginning of this story was about how old the storyteller felt so he went on a hitchhiking trip. My disappointment continued when the lady came back and sang a song about a “scary” mother-in-law and a wax baby with glass eyes or something like that. I was so confused by the end of this story that my mother had to explain what had just happened.

Because it was late and cold, we left shortly after that story. This storytelling event was better than the last, although I would’ve liked to hear stories that were actually interesting.

I’ve said before that I love fall. My mood always lightens in the fall. There are so many things about fall that I love. I decided to list them to remind myself how much I love this time of year.




*Pumpkins

*Halloween

*Thanksgiving (or should I just say Thanksgiving FOOD)

*The leaves change colors

*St. Louis Bread Company’s Pink Ribbon Bagel

*Pumpkin Spice Latte at Starbucks

*TV shows premiere their new seasons

*Going to Pumpkin Hollow

*Homecoming season

*Going to Haunted Houses

*The weather gets cooler (normally…not this year apparently)

*My birthday (I still love my birthday)

*Going home in early fall and seeing the cotton in the fields

*Making popcorn balls and pumpkin bread

*Football (yeah I know…weird right?)

*Baseball playoffs

*I see my family more

I love October.  It's my favorite month of the year.  The air turns chilly, the leaves start to fall, and Halloween comes around (and my birthday).  I've always loved Halloween because it's also my birthday.  My mother was always great at making a national holiday my day too.  When I was younger my birthday party and cake always matched my costume.  When the trick-or-treaters rang the doorbell, I assumed they were there to see me on my birthday.   

I liked to help my mom get out all of our Halloween decorations and help her place them throughout the house and yard.  Our yard was a spooky wonderland that was featured in the newspaper several years in a row.  Everything from a fake coffin to a witch riding a flying bicycle could be found in our front yard. 

One year when vandals tried to ruin our decorations, my dad dressed up like a pumpkin headed dummy and sat in the front yard among the other decorations.  When the assailants returned to finish the job, my dad jumped up to grab them.  Needless to say, they never returned. 

These days, I do my own decorating.  I have almost has many Halloween items as I do Christmas.  Some things I've had for years.  My collection grows a little every year.  One of my favorite places to get Halloween stuff is Dollar Tree.  Last weekend I transformed a normal apartment into a smaller scale of what my mother used to accomplish. 

Halloween village.

Halloween village.  This haunted house music box is from the old James Cohn Department Store in Kennett, MO.  I've had it for years!

The spooky fireplace.

 

Bowl of tiny skulls from Dollar Tree.

Mantel over fireplace.



Glitter skull, black bird, and black roses from Dollar Tree. I got this Halloween tree for my birthday from Mr. and Mrs. "Neighbor" Barnett when I was 10.

I put spider webs on just about everything.