When you think of a family activity, what comes to mind? A week-long beach vacation? A trip to Disneyland? A weekend camping trip? The holidays?
Most people think of Thanksgiving and Christmas when they hear the term “the holidays”. But in my family, including my very close friends, the holidays start with Halloween — the best holiday of all. You don’t have to shop, fight the crowds, and no one is grumpy. What’s not to love?
This week, I’m focusing on the family aspect of Halloween and how you can gain quality time just by getting into costume and maybe trick-or-treating. It’s one night a year, and you can be anything you want!
We have years of memories dressing up together…
2008: Our son was a death ninja, so I dressed up as a grim reaper and my husband dressed as the devil. He was brave enough to use face paint. Me not so much, so I used eyeshadow to give myself a more deathly look.My son went through a stage for about five years where he was nothing but a different type of ninja for Halloween. We truly embraced it in 2009 and all dressed as ninjas!2010: I had three costumes that year for work and parties (coming in later posts), so I decided to just dress festive for Halloween night. My son was a white dragon ninja, of course 😉2010: Family reunion on Halloween. We had a coven of witches that year! I hope we can do that again because it certainly made the pictures more interesting, and everyone seemed to have fun!2011: My witch dress, complete with socks and boots. I actually wore this dress to my high school freshmen homecoming. A good dress can be worn for many occasions!My son’s Scorpion ninja that complemented my witch. It was also the last year of the ninja lol. Although, we’ll see this year…2012: The first year we did our own thing lol. Mario, the grim reaper (inspired by the premiere of Lil’ Horsemen), and Bellatrix Lestrange from Harry Potter. Mario received all the attention that night, and somehow my son and I still managed to go dark. Great minds think alike 🙂
As the 90s broke, it seems we stopped going for the store-bought costumes, and I personally started wearing costumes my mom made.
While the idea of “homemade” costumes makes a lot of people think they’d be lesser quality than the store-bought stuff, I think the pictures below prove otherwise.
With a great combination of love for Halloween and masterful sewing skill, my mom provided me with the best costumes of my childhood. Always perfectly complimenting whatever I was into at the time and giving me something wholly unique from all the other kids stalking the streets for candy. Again I THINK they are mostly in order…
Circa 1990. Michelangelo. Like most boys my age, I friggin’ LOVED Ninja Turtles. In fact, I still love Ninja Turtles. My mom made this one from a pattern I think she got at Hancock Fabrics where she worked. The “muscles” were all filled with poly-fill, as was the shell, so it was all plush. I played with the foam-covered plastic nunchucks for YEARS after this… This might be my favorite childhood costume. Ninja Turtles really impacted me, and this was the closest I got to being one. And look at how cool it is!Circa 1992. Grim Reaper. This character must be a theme in my life! I don’t recall how I decided on this one, but my mom liked it because it was just a big robe. It did look pretty cool though. Again, it was also HOT and required several breaks during trick-or-treating. Halloweens in Tennessee might be cool or might be as hot as August. I think this was one of those warmer years…Circa 1993. Batman Returns Batman. I distinctly remember this as being the Batman Returns costume because of the way the abs section was styled. This is the only picture I could come across of this costume, but it was by far the most awesome Batman costume ever. My mom sewed the whole thing out of vinyl pleather, which in addition to being a pain to sew also weighed a ton. The cape, mask, torso, all pleather. The additional side-effect was that it was like a sauna-suit, and I had to take breaks to air my head out periodically. Still, I remember hearing several times that year that it was by far the best Batman people had seen. And as usual…people saw a LOT of Batmen…Circa 1990. Ares. My Costumes weren’t JUST for Halloween. I was only going to include Halloween, but this was too cool not to put in. I went as Ares to Greek and Roman Day (at a Catholic School…which is weird now that I think of it). Again my mom made this and I put the shield together. The helmet looks way cooler than I remember.
Having my mom make costumes had a lasting impact. Just going and buying a “vampire” costume was never good enough. To me, anyone could do that. I had more fun finding weird stuff to put together a unique kind of costume. It might still be a vampire, but it would be MY vampire, not Rubie’s Costume Company’s. The lasting impact of this would come back in my future costumes and will be seen in my next post!
It’s my favorite time of year. From Oct. 1 to Oct. 31, I watch horror movies, read ghost stories, and wait to jump out of my skin. My son, who does not care for the scare but loves Halloween, helps me get into costume and loves to dress up. He’s a teenager now, but he loves to go out one night a year and become someone (or thing) else.
That’s the beauty of costumes. Costumes transform you into something you can’t be every day. They allow us to explore our creative side and toss reality out the window, Whether you go cute, sexy, or fierce, something about dressing up frees our spirit. I also have a blast shopping with my family and friends to coordinate and pick the perfect costume.
Halloween doesn’t have to be “evil”. In fact, I witness vandalism and evil almost every day of the year, especially if I watch the news. People who enjoy the holiday the most have fun and get excited, and do their part to make it their own. It’s really no different from any other themed holiday, but if you play your cards right, there’s a lot more candy!
This week, we dug out the old pics and posted some of our best childhood costumes. Oddly enough, my pictures have yet to be found. But have no fear! My son was willing to help and allowed me to post some from his younger days. I promise, if/when mine turn up, I’ll post them 🙂
Pre-costume but too cute not to post. A love for Halloween starts early.I’m pretty sure this was the costume that year. A little Winnie the Pooh.The next year, I was a vampiress and he was Blue from Blues Clues. What am I looking at? Look at the bottom of the pic, and you’ll see 🙂Yep, that’s him! He was a little Blue 😉A few years later: Batman Beyond and much less serious…
Be sure to check in this month, as we post more costumes and celebrate the awesomeness of the season!
Fall is my favorite time of year. The crisp air, just cool enough to be comfortable and maybe require a light jacket, but not the bitter frozen temperatures of winter. The sound of dried, fallen leaves blown by the wind. The strange orangey glow of an autumn sunset. The smell of fall is indescribable, but one that is always one that is the most indelibly tied to memories of haunted houses, costume shopping, and playing with my Freddy glove replica.
I’ve love Halloween and since I was a kid. I always dressed up as something (minus about two years in high school and the four years of college). I can’t remember them all, and there were a couple years where we had to skip trick-or-treating. One notable incident occurred when I was 5 or 6. Living in Las Vegas, it rained horribly and drowned out the annual Halloween excursion. Instead, we rented Nightmare on Elm Street1 & 3. As a 5-6 year old, I was terrified and it had a lasting impact. I mean I couldn’t even be safe ASLEEP according to that film! I always credit that experience to my current stoicism. I was scared of essentially everything for the next 2-3 years. And have never really been scared since…
The times missing trick-or-treating were rare, however, and most of the time my sister and I went through the neighborhood, dressed as SOMETHING, collecting our bounty, and being scared by houses with good displays (one kid dressed as Jason, stood perfectly still, then ran after kids when they got close!).
Unusually, I never dressed up as monsters or anything scary. I was always something fun or goofy. In the 80s, it was all about fun. Here are some classic 80s costumes from my Halloween past! Some of them may be out of order, the dates weren’t always clear, but it’s mostly right!
Circa 1984. I’m a pumpkin. I don’t remember the costume…but I DO remember that candy pail. Apparently I chose to coordinate to match that year. I loved that pail, but they never hold much candy.Circa 1985. Of all my lil kid costumes, I remember this robot the best. I have no idea why. Something about that gold mask…Circa 1986. My sister and I as matching skeletons! I remember seeing this same thing in the Karate Kid later. It was just a black shirt and pants with glow-in-the-dark bones on it. I used them as pajamas later. I remember now it had a skull mask that cut into your eye sockets…Circa 1987. I LOVED dinosaurs. In fact, I STILL love dinosaurs. I wore this costume to play dinosaur for a couple years after I wore it for Halloween. Oh and, ahem, RAWR!Circa 1987 again. The dinosaur showing the foam plates on my head. My sister was a black cat that year! As an aside, I LOVE the Real Ghostbusters loot bag.Circa 1988. I have to admit I have no idea what I am here. My mom doesn’t even remember. I’m apparently some kind of Halloween video game robot. That’s my best guess.Circa 1988. These are my body-popping moves.Circa 1988. Just to show it had more weird stuff on the back.Circa 1989. I’m supposed to be the Joker here, but it might come off a little too regular clowny. I also remember I tried to use spray on hair dye that didn’t work because of my black hair.
We’ve all seen Scream and hopefully everyone has read “15 Signs of a Horror Movie Fan” written by the fairer half of RevPub. We all know the rules for surviving a horror movie and have all had those, “I’d never do THAT if I was in that situation” moments watching a slasher film.
I’ve been in a few moments that made me think maybe I was that idiot character dropping the weapon and turning my back instead of pummeling my momentarily weakened pursuer into sausage filler. I’ve tempted fate by saying, “What’s the worst that could happen?” and I’ve been with a friend exploring the supposedly haunted second floor of my office when she yelled out “HELLO?!” and I responded, “Are you crazy?! Have you seen ANY horror movie ever?!” But there was one incident where I really failed the “How to Survive a Horror Movie” test.
I was dog-sitting for a co-worker in his home in a rural area. I went early in the morning and early in the evening to ensure he got his food at regular intervals and got to go on regularly timed run-arounds and walks. I let him out the back door when I noticed a deep gouge in the grass. Almost like something huge, heavy, and long had sat there for a long time. I leaned down, with the dog still on the leash, and saw the depression in the grass was about 10 inches wide and stretched from the back door all the way to the side of the house, around the corner and out of sight; probably some 20-30 feet in full length. I took two slow steps and reached down to find long strands of shed snake skin strewn about within the trench.
Not thinking, I tugged the leash and said, “C’mon, boy let’s see where this leads” and started around the corner following what could only be described as the path of a MASSIVE snake. As I pulled the leash the dog whined slightly and reluctantly followed. I said, “C’mon…!” and dragged him along the giant snake path. As we rounded the corner and I brushed leaf-heavy branches out of my view I said to myself, “What are you doing… You’ve just become the idiot in a pre-title sequence to an AWFUL horror movie…” Realizing my stupidity I turned around, took the dog on his walk around his regular path and took him back inside.
In retrospect it was likely the place where one of those large, black, plastic drainage tubes laid and the snake skin was just there by chance.
The Horror Movie expert in me, however, feels I narrowly survived being eaten by a massive super-python that night. And only the dog was smart enough to try to avoid it.
Have you ever been in a horror movie-type situation? Did you act as you always thought you would, or did you become a bad Friday 13th stereotype like I did on this one occasion?
If you answered the latter, don’t worry; even if it did briefly seem like you were about to become a slasher film statistic remember that someone has to survive long enough to frustrate and beat the bad guy right? Just because you made a mistake 20 minutes after the title card, doesn’t mean you won’t survive to see the franchise psycho off for this particular installment! Let’s just hope we all survive the first 15 minutes of the sequel!
Someone does have to be that “final girl” (I’m looking at you Raven) I just hope I’m there for the credit crawl…
Because maybe they can only truly understand each other…
As I said in my FIRST ghosty-post I’m a cynic who starts from skepticism until I experience something that forces me to accept a different conclusion. Most of the time I search for other explanations before coming to “it’s ghosts!” or “it’s bigfoot!” Though I start as a skeptic once unexplainable evidence is presented I am willing to accept the supernatural explanation.
If nothing else just so, in the movie of my own personal ghost story, I’m not the guy everyone hates yelling “It was just the wind!” to the characters you’re supposed to like.
Sounds in the Dark
I work in a creepy building. Most of it is typical office space, but there are eerie places; “the stacks,” entire floors which consist of rows and rows long dark aisles of books or boxes. Policy is you turn off the lights when you leave a stack area so I’ve gotten into the habit of only turning on the lights I need so I never accidentally forget and leave lights on. There are rumors that our second floor, where our manuscript documents are kept, is haunted but I never really believed it. I couldn’t imagine what ghost would want to spend its ethereal eternity amidst old boxes and books. I attributed the spooky stories to the fact that the second floor looks the creepiest. Most of our other stack areas have small castle-turret style windows. The second floor has none, so it’s just the glow of the exit signs and whatever lights you turn on.
The main aisle of the second floor with the lights out, how I usually see it.
Over the years I got used to wandering around in the dark up there, counting steps to switches and navigating in the dark. There used to be one gate I could get into without a key (had to know the trick!) so I would always use that door no matter which end of the floor I was going to.
One afternoon I needed to retrieve something from the second floor so, as usual I went to two, entered the gate I could break into, and started my way down the main corridor in the dark. I needed to go ALL the way down to the other end, but I didn’t mind the dark and quiet.
I was maybe a third of the way down the corridor when I heard the distinct sound of a box being pulled from a shelf…then replaced. I stopped to listen, there are many sounds on that floor, machine room sounds, vents, noises from floors above, but none were as easily identifiable (I’ve pulled hundreds of boxes from these metal shelves, I know that sound…) as this…or as close. I started walking again and heard it again, box sliding off the metal…then sliding back on. It was coming from the 1st range…the range I was going to. I heard it at least two more times as I got closer. I flipped the switch on the 1st range and peered cautiously around the corner.
Nothing there.
I went through the possibilities… Either another staff member was pulling boxes in the dark, replaced everything, jumped on the ceiling, and skittered away when I arrived…or…it was a ghost. “Ghost” was actually the most plausible explanation in this case! And least frightening…
Since then I’ve heard other sounds, including high-heeled shoes trailing along a few feet behind me as I navigated the ranges. A friend and I also went ghost hunting on the second floor (with my android ghost app once!) and we both heard disembodied shuffling right behind us down a dark corridor we’d just come down. Despite this I never feel unsettled or afraid…more fascinated.
Now I look forward to going to that floor. You never know what you might find in the strangest places.
A coworker walked down the corridor after I opened the shutter. Looks like a ghost to me!
Revenant Publications 