Halloween Party

Every year three of my friends and I (and our husbands) all pick a holiday to host a party. The four we choose from are Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Valentine's and this year we ended up with Halloween. It started as a problem as I had no halloween decorations to start with, but my imagination and the internet soon helped with that (namely Martha Stewart...). Here's a few pics from the party for your enjoyment.

The table centerpiece was a vase of flowers and a crow covered in cobwebs made from strings of hot glue. It's hard to see the cobwebs in the picture though. The candles on either side of the vase had red wax dripping down them to look like blood. Yeah, that was a little spooky... but effective :D

Nothing's more inviting than a coffin shaped napkin and a tombstone with your name on it:

The menu consisted of green grog (lemon lime punch with lime sherbert, and spiked if you wish), stale crackers with moldy dip (spinach dip), worms in sauce (spaghetti), spiky beans with nail clippings (green beans with slivered almonds), stale black bread (dark colored honey wheat bread), and spooky silhouettes (gingerbread cutouts in halloween shapes).

We had all the lights out and curtains closed with candles lit everywhere. bwahahahaaaaa

Actually, the lights had to be on for pictures, so you can't really tell...

Here you see the "spooky silhouettes"...

... and the green grog. Notice the mouse silhouette on the right side- they were all over the kitchen. Remi was not amused.

OK, don't make fun. Here's Mark and I in our costumes. He was a werewolf and I was a Native American. I claimed that together we were "Dances with Wolves" but neither Mark (nor others) bought it.

Jonathan was a surgeon and Graydon and Heather were Jellyfish. Katie was a spelling bee and Dawn was Mrs. Christmas. Unfortunately Seth and baby Owen couldn't join us, they were out of town. 

So all in all a good party. We ate, drank, and were merry. We also watched the 'Burbs, which turned out to be somewhat funny and spooky enough. I'm thankful to have such great friends!

Hope you have a Happy Halloween!!

Fall

Well it's officially fall- I know this not because the solstice has passed, nor because Old Time Pottery has Christmas decorations out, but because Columbia is no longer 98 F. Celebration is in order!

I love fall. I can walk to class sweat-free, drink hot drinks while wearing scarves, and light some cozy candles while I study. More importantly, it's time for baking, crocheting, decorating for the holidays, and celebrating our October anniversary.

Mark finds an apple

Mark and I went apple picking for our 3 year anniversary (see previous post...). It was packed! This was the first year we went on time, so it was fairly crowded and there were apples left on the trees.

The next day I went ahead and made apple pie. Mark really likes apple pie, I like it only a little. But every year at this time I manage to make him one. This one was completely from scratch. My favorite part is the pie crust... I like doing the lattice top and brushing it with milk and sugar to make it shiny and brown when it's done. Sorry, I don't have a finished product picture (you can blame Mark).

filling the pie with fresh picked apples

lattice top

making the crust pretty

I finally broke down and bought "official" fall decorations. The past couple of years I've been using this fake leaf garland, trying to stretch it out as far as possible (i.e. break off leaves and scatter them in different places, not so appealing...). Now I have real decorations, even some for halloween and thanksgiving! I get a excited about these things:

fall flowers,pumpkins, leaves

my first Thanksgiving decoration

all is complete with a cider candle

Happy October! 

3 lovely years

It's our anniversary today.

Every October 5th, among other days, I get to reflect on our satin brown, pale pink, and dark rose colored wedding (did you notice the blog color scheme?) It involved lots of woodland-fairy like greenery, twinkling lights, and japanese lanterns hanging in the Wyche Pavillion downtown Greenville. I loved our wedding: the flowers with the quirky spiral stems poking out, the chocolate covered cake with deep colored raspberries on each tier, the stephanotis flowers in my bouquet and Mark's boutonniere... But my favorite memory of all is standing at the altar with my best friend, Mark, who I can no longer imagine living without... ::sigh:: ... I think I'm in love.

Isn't he handsome???
It's been a very happy three years with my hubby.

Happy Anniversary, Mark