Raise Your Hand if You Love a Snow Day!!

Who doesn't love a good snow day? Waking up to sense the presence, the quietude of snow that lies untouched in the back yard? The illusion that everywhere things are good, pristine. Just a smattering of snow on the thin ice covering most of the pond. Underneath, the fish are dormant, in winter mode.

Inside the shed, spring tools wait, sleeping through the cold days and nights. Empty pots rest. Shovels lean against the wall and old seeds hide in the cracks and crevices.

The bench, while inviting on warm summer days, now sits empty, besides the occasional bird resting before bathing in the cold rushing water. The garden normally stark and bare in the November season, now white, snow adorning sticks and branches.

Snow resting atop Brazilian verbena as if it was meant to be. A new look for the purple stalk. Simple, yet lovely beyond words.

It's My Mom's Fault...Honest

It all started in the mid 1960's. I believe my dad was president of the Mt. Baker Club House in Seattle and "someone" decided the clubhouse should host a Halloween party for the kids. Since my dad traveled a lot,  my mom let her creativity run rampant and recruited all her relatives in the city to help. I didn't know my mom was the witch or my cousin Doug Frankenstein until I was 17 years old! It was a party to beat all parties! Slightly frightening scenarios, eerie music, ugly creatures, and just enough 'scare' to be fun and create memories.

And thus "it" was started. Mom went batty over Halloween. We hosted haunted houses in our basement in Seattle or in the garage in Issaquah! We decorated with tombstones, creepy medicine, bats, spiders, and all things creepy! Mom would dress up in her witch costume and having soaked her real leather gloves in water all day, she would grasp the trick-or-treaters hands in hers and nearly cause heart attacks in the under ten set!

{Pepto Dismal, Crustex Nail Remover, Sludge, you get the idea}

{This is a new one...each family member has their own!}

{Matilda in all her glory, she's aged well}

Matilda stood in the living room window. She is the dressmaker's dummy mom made in college of herself that is dressed each year with a black skirt, t-neck, gloves, an old fashioned paper mache pumpkin head, wig and hat. She's been a regular for the past 50 years or so during October.

Once all at mom's, I now am the keeper of all Halloween crap. It's been passed down. Is it genetic? I even, as of my last birthday, in October of course, have inherited the original leather gloves. Who else would want them? Mom knows I do.

I have however taken it one step further than my mom. I created a Halloween dinner menu unlike any other. Yummy! Appetizer: Dragon Scales and Booger Dip, Salad: Poison Ivy Leaves with Scabs with a light toss of Runny Mucus, Entree: Maggot Stew with Moldy Bread and for Dessert: Brownies with Orange Pus. Oh yeah!

Now you might think I'm a bit touched in the head, but fear not! I've just been creating memories for my kids, those that dare visit, and looking to the future with darling little cookie monsters, like Ali.

{Granddaughter Ali---so dang cute!!}