All things Halloween

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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Shall we have a Halloween thread, a one-stop extravaganza where esteemed Dopers can come in and browse through for treats, tricks, shivers, and what-have-you? Sure, why the heck not?

Halloween’s only a couple of weeks away! What’s your favorite Halloween-y recipe? What’s the best prank you’ve ever pulled? Do you have a good spooky story, either “true” or fiction? Random snippets of Halloween trivia or history? Costume or decorating ideas? Haiku, sonnets, limericks? Favorite Halloween movies? Post’em all here!

I’m going to make these yummy looking things, and we’ll have popcorn and caramel apples while we watch “The Brain That Wouldn’t Die” or something cheesy like that. I usually have to work on Halloween, but this year it falls on my day off, so I’m really looking forward to it.

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Holy crap, I wanna try that recipe.

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I love Halloween. Halloween is my most favoritest holiday ever. Halloween rules so much that it makes me talk like a toddler (see previous sent. :wink: ).

My house was on the news for several years because I would decorate it so much. I would get (at least) 50 bags of the fake cobwebs and do the roof, the plants, the sides of the house, the wrought iron fence, the grass, everything. It was awesome. Unfortunately, the gardeners requested that I don’t do it this year :frowning:

But to make up for it, I am turning a forensics tournament into a big, fat Halloween party (hey, debate tournaments don’t have to boring, ya know). We are going to decorate the place where all the kids hang out, decorate where all the judges/ coaches hang out, and serve all kinds of “spooky” food. The point of this is: thank you for that link! It gave me so many ideas!

The “brain” shrimp dip- does anyone have an idea for something that might work that isn’t so… fishy? Maybe a cheese? Tomato? Anything? Most people aren’t big on the seafood, so an alternative would be awesome.

My other thing: I’m trying to find a costume. I have had a great idea for the last few years, but I am not entirely sure how to execute it. What I am thinking is: get a standard pilgrim outfit from the Halloween store, find someone who can sew to “skank it up” some (maybe lift the front hem to above the knee, make a low cut neckline that I can wear a corset under, etc), then sew a bright, red A on the front. This is a great idea in theory, but I simply am not sure how to get it done.

Other options are the old standards: a nun (‘cuz it’s ME and I mean, c’mon :D), a devil (my name is Angelique. . . my nickname is Angel), or I saw a cute lil’ red riding hood costume here. The only issue with the LRRH costume is that it is a bit expensive for a cheapie costume from the net that probably wont even fit right.

Wow this post was long and babbly :smiley:

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Its my favorite holiday too. When little, me and my gf would decorate the bedroom, pull the blinds down, pretend to be witches. I can still “feel” the excitement in the air that night. Unless it snows.
This year, I’m gonna be a punk bunny-punk outfit, with bunny ears and tail.

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I have to work this year, but I work in a Library so get to give out the treats to the kiddies. Having collected pins and broches for 30 years I have a large array including five spiders. I’m buying several yards of a light filmy grey material. I’m going to pin the spider pins and a couple fly pins I have on the material and go as a spiderweb.

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I just hope I get to actually wear my costume this year. My wings are still in the packaging, and I have glitter face paint and hair spray all ready to go. I think I might at least get dressed up just for the heck of it, parties be damned.

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I absolutely love Halloween! It’s one of my favorite holidays. The best part is that it’s a huge holiday in my office, too. My supervisor has already warned the newbies that they won’t be getting any work done that day.

This year I’m dressing as Supergirl from Justice League Unlimited. This is the first time I’ve dressed as a cartoon character, but so far the costume looks pretty good. I cropped an old white T-shirt, sewed on some Navy trim and added the “S” emblem. Last weekend I got my old black boots out of the closet and painted them red. I also bought an incredibly cheesy blonde wig at the local party store. All I have to do is sew the skirt and the cape and I’m finished.

DiosaBellissima, I love your scarlet letter idea. If I lived closer to you I would help you with the sewing. But I’d be happy to help by e-mail if I can. My address is in my profile.

Does anyone know of any easy and inexpensive Halloween costumes that are appropriate for an office party? My supervior comes up with horrible costumes every year, and I’m trying to give her some ideas. (She was miffed that no one got her amish costume last year. The khakis and the green flannel shirt kinda negated the effect of her black hat.)

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I love Halloween with all of it’s cool colors and all. There’s something about orange and black in the fall that’s pretty cool.

I’d love to get a great Halloween music CD if I knew of one. Several years ago I visited a Halloween website that had the coolest music, a “swooooshing” type of sound using stringed instruments (I think), and the effect was like the very air was haunted. I tried to relocate the site in order to email them to learn which CD it was, but I had no luck finding it.

Of course, the big downer with Halloween is that some hatefreaks obsessed with money and fame use the date to harm animals and people, and that’s heartbreaking. Just read the book “Michelle Remembers” if you want some insight into that.

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I love Halloween. If I can finish in time, this year’s costume will be a variation of last year’s (conserving material and work). Last year was a series of nested Wizard Of Oz costumes- tornado, tin man, scarecrow, lion, and finally Dorothy. This year, I’m using those big styrofoam pool noodles for frames and doing the classic ‘one guy works multiple mannequins’. I’ll be wearing the Dorothy costume-it’s the lightest, coolest, and least encumbering. Tin man, Lion, and Scare Scrow will be connected to me with rods. Their limb will move when I move, and we’ll follow the Yellow Brick Road in perfect unison.

If I run out of time, I’ll wear the clown outfit I’m making for street performing. It’s a top hat and matching tuxedo coat with tails. I found big bright buttons. One set is molded into hands. The other set is shaped like balloons. Each set has a button for each color of the rainbow, allowing me to express my support for the gay community in general and gay people who want balloon animals in particular. I’m sure I have a t-shirt and shoes that will work well enough to wear to the ball.

For the past several years, I’ve been attending the Henri (pronounced Henry) David ball. Costumes range from minimal cost and effort to customed tailored things topped with ostrich plumes and working neon signs.

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I love Halloween! My old house was a big Victorian mansion and we kept a permanent string spiderweb on the front porch, so it was like Halloween all year long. It even reincarnated through several paint jobs. That’s 20 years of Halloween! Kids thought our house was haunted, and it was a good descriptor for people trying to find the place.
Sadly, the house we moved into has nothing that can support a spiderweb.

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I love Halloween too! I love the spookiness factor, all the Halloween movies, pumpkins, Halloween colors, candy corns, haunted houses, etc. Plus it’s right around the time of year that it starts getting cool outside, and there’s a certain smell in the air.

My story: my mother never used to let my brothers and I go trick-or-treating. It was a combination of reasons: she didn’t think it was safe, we didn’t live in a neighborhood so we’d have to drive to someone else’s neighborhood (or go trick-or-treat with friends), but mainly because she’s religious and she didn’t think it was right to celebrate on such an “unholy” holiday. (sigh) She would buy us each a big bag of candy to make up for it - after Halloween, discount prices - but for obvious reasons, it just wasn’t the same. Also, since we didn’t live in a neighborhood, we would never get trick-or-treaters. The one year someone came to our door, we didn’t even have any candy to give them.
We still give her a hard time about it.

Another story: I used to love The Rocky Horror Picture Show (still do, but as a youngun, I just thought it was the coolest movie ever). Of course they show it on Halloween every year on some channel, so Halloween night I was planning to watch it at my house, while a friend watched it at her house, and we were gonna get all excited and call each other during our favorite songs, etc. Well, my dad, who is ultra-conservative, decided he wasn’t gonna have that. His explanation: it’s a “cult” movie! And he didn’t want his daughter into anything having to do with “cults!” ::snicker::

Thankfully, both of my parents have loosened up a lot since then - and I think these days my dad understands the meaning of the term “cult movie.”

I’d be interested to hear from someone who doesn’t love Halloween and why.

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Well, here ya go. I hate Halloween. It’s a holiday about death. In a season of death.

364 days a year we tell children not to take candy from strangers. And not to beg. So what do we do now? Tell them to beg candy from strangers. Yeesh.

Sorry about the negative words, but LoganDear asked.

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I love Halloween. Especially this year because I am getting married. The only creepy recipe I have to share is the one I am making for the wedding.
Wash some latex gloves to get the powder out of them then fill with any kind of juice used in your favorite punch recipe. Freeze the filled gloves and when they are frozen add to the punch bowl.

I will let you know about good costumes after the ceremony because we are asking all the guests to come in costume.

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I love Halloween. It’s so neighborly and fun and fall-y. And there’s candy, and costumes, and dry ice, and what more could you want?

We’re being a family of pirates this year. This means that I have to sew 4 pirate costumes in the next couple of weeks–eep! And why are we doing this? Because our last name ends in -ing, and we can sing the Pirate King song with our last name in it! We are total dorks, yes indeedy.

I’m supposed to be sewing the binding on the Halloween quilt I just made, so I had better go do that. Maybe I’ll post a picture tomorrow if it gets done!

mmmm…Halloween candy…

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OK, well, that took no time at all. Here is the result.

Good picture if you have DSL; 300K file.

Small version if you prefer the 100K file.

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Well, I can’t seem to get my wings on over my costume dress without help, which was not available at the time. So I just put my wings on over the white t-shirt I was wearing. Maybe I’ll be a “casual fairy” this year, instead of “silver dress fairy.”

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That is one cool quilt, dangermom, you should be proud. And we must see photos of the pirate family costumes!

We love Halloween here too. This year, I think we’re giving out body part candy, and have my husband dressed as a mad scientist giving it out. He has the Mad Scientist hair, complete with white streaks at the temples, and a Miskatonic University lab coat, so he’ll be perfect!

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Personally, I’m looking forward to the Ottawa Zombie Walk more than Halloween itself. But that’ll be fun, too! After years of living out in the country or in apartment buildings, I’m finally living someplace that’ll get trick-or-treaters AND can be decorated all spooky-like.

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I LOVE that quilt, dangermom. It looks great!

I’d love to be able to really go all out and decorate my house all scary, but it’s just not in the budget. I enjoy checking out other people’s decorations while me and the mini-Marli are out trick-or-treating.

Turner Classic Movies has a great line-up of movies that day, kicking off with Nosferatu at 0500 central time, and including The Haunting, The Birds, Psycho, and Poltergeist. I hope my husband gets our VCR working by then so we can tape some of them.

Ghost story time!

I work graveyard shift in the basement below the county jail. Supposedly the building is haunted by the ghost of an inmate that hung himself in his cell a few years ago. We call him Sam. Different jailors upstairs have described seeing a black male in an orange jail jumpsuit walk slowly down the hallway and disappear into the room where the hanging occurred. One jailor told me he was working in the office late one night and turned around to find the “ghost” standing right behind him. He yelled and Sam disappeared.

He likes to hang out in the basement with us, too, I guess for a change of pace. One ex-dispatcher claimed that she heard someone breathing behind her in the stairwell (our smoking area) on three seperate occasions; and each time we received a death investigation call shortly afterwords. Another dispatcher was down there just the other night; he came back rather quickly and said it had gotten so cold for a moment he could see his breath. We monitor the entire basement on security cameras, and we’re constantly just seeing something moving on the screen out of the corners of our eyes, which is gone when we look closer. (cue scary music)

One morning there were three of us down here sitting in the dispatch room. The door is a heavy metal security door, and next to it is a window into the hallway with a metal shelf under it. All three of us clearly heard three loud whacks! coming from the window, just as if someone had smacked the shelf with their open hand. There was no one there, and no one in the hallway.

Happy Halloween. :smiley:

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Those are my mothers initials! (your handle) I’m not joking! :eek: