The Ultimate Halloween Party

by Bethany Sanders Oct 15th 2008 8:00AM

As my daughter reminded me this morning, there are only 15 days left until Halloween. Halloween falls on a Friday this year, perfect for trick-or-treating that runs past bedtime, but also a great opportunity to throw a Halloween party.Before you start thinking, A Halloween party? Now I have to entertain in addition to making costumes, baking cupcakes, and buying candy?, consider this. A Halloween party is a great way to enjoy time as a family, spend time with busy friends, or avoid going door-to-door, if trick-or-treating just isn't your thing.A Family PartyA party need not include guests. Instead, send invitations to your kids inviting them to a family Halloween bash, right in your kitchen. Here are some ideas for making this night of family fun more memorable:

Come in costume ... the young and the young at heart. Your kids will appreciate your enthusiasm.

Start with dinner, appropriately gruesome for the holiday -- try spaghetti and eyeballs, bat wings, and a cauldron full of witches brew.

Now it's time to have fun! Carve a pumpkin and have a seed spitting contest; load the wagon with hay and go on a "hayride"; or have a candy scavenger hunt in your backyard.

End the night with an easy craft (try one of these), then curl up in bed with some popcorn to watch a Halloween movie together, like The Nightmare Before Christmas, Beetlejuice, or It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown!. Or finish of the night with a not-too-scary book for little ones like Go Away Big Green Monster!.A Bigger BashFeeling up to a bigger party that includes family, friends and/or neighbors?

Try some of these ideas:

Consider a theme: Think pumpkin carving, monster mash, haunted house, or even fall/harvest.
Hold a Best Costume contest, with plenty of categories so that everyone can receive a prize.
Keep everyone busy with a game or two. Try Zombie Tag or Spider Relays, get them giggling with Mummy Wrap, or set up a pumpkin bowling alley.

Don't forget the creepy cuisine! Kaboose has an excellent list of simple spooky recipes, while those with a little more experience in the kitchen (and time on their hands) might want to try some of Family Fun's more involved recipes. Remember -- the little touches mean a lot. Freeze water inside plastic gloves, then peel and float these "hands" in your punch bowl. You can also freeze gummy worms in ice cubes for a slimy surprise!

Time to wrap it up? Settle everyone down with a craft. Buy mini-pumpkin gourds and supply paints, glitter, and craft supplies for decorating. Older kids might like making a candle-"eye"-bra. Or send everyone home with their own yummy-mummy treat cups. The most important part of your Halloween party should be your child's participation in the process. They can make invitations, plan and put up decorations, gather materials for crafts and games, and help out in the kitchen, all the while building excitement for this spooky night of memory making.

If you buy a costume online in 2008...

Many Americans are looking forwards to a little celebrating this Halloween. With all the turmoil we face in these times of new presidential candidates, and financial downturn, this Halloween is going to be one of the best ways to shake off the bad JuJu we are facing in the "real world".

If you are looking at buying a Halloween Costume Online you should know when you have run out of time for getting that perfect Halloween Costume shipped to your home from the online retailers and shops.

As of October 7th, 2008 9:12AM, this was reported from Spirit Halloween

Halloween is fast approaching! For guaranteed delivery by Halloween (10/31) orders need to be placed by 12PM (noon) EST on these dates:

10/20 via Ground Shipping
10/27 via 3 Day shipping
10/29 via Overnight Shipping

Halloween is less than a month away so now's the time to get the best Halloween Costume to enjoy the festive spirit of the season!

AND.... Remember that Halloween falls on a Friday this year. The chance to get some fun in before returning to the "real world" is fast approaching. Don't let another minute go by without knowing you are getting a great costume to share the best part of Halloween. Fun and Fright can be had all around the Country, but it comes and goes fast. Get in on the fun and get a costume to enhance your fun this Halloween.

Great Halloween Sales for 2008 "October 7th"

Thanks for asking. We have received a very large amount of replies to our ad posted just a while ago.. I will be creating something for anyone who asks, but right now I am putting the requests in order and dealing with each one individually. Look for our email, and reply quickly once received.I am unable to guarantee that the 15 costumes will not go fast. If you do not get a chance to buy one, I have put some clearance links below for you to look through while I get your list together. Thanks..

Costume Craze 60% Off clearance

Shindigz Clearance (click on the clearance tab)

Spirit Halloween Clearances

Halloween Costumes 4 U

Extreme Halloween Network

Growing Up Halloween Pt. 5

The Separation

Once again the sound of footsteps were close by. "Francis..where did you go?"... That was Eric, Francis was glad that one of the brothers was close by because for as fast as it all happened, this trip in the field was causing alot of delay in their walk to school. "I'm right here Eric, where's Keith?" Eric was close enough now to be seen. "He was right in front of me." "I don't know, he must have missed you and went right on by..KEITH!" The air was still cold enough so that any breathing added to the thickness of the mist. When you shouted, a large growing plume of condensed breath could be seen to push and blend with the surrounding fog. While both Francis and Eric had reconnected in the mist, in the field that was supposed to be a morning short-cut, they still had to gather up Keith, and get along with their walk. What was supposed to be a short mornig excursion, had turned out to be a pain in the neck. Without figuring out exactly what had happened in the mist so far, Francis and Eric looked to call out to Keith until the three of them were together again.

The Battle of Napoleon's Field

"Keeeeeeeeeeeiiiiiiiith." "Keeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeith." Over and over the called went out the the missing member of this small troupe. The mist was still coming in it appeared, as even though Eric and Francis were only steps apart, if one more step were put in between the two friends, the other would slip away into the fog. "Eric...." Francis wanted to stop. "Let's stay here for a second and listen for him." "Keith!!" The two sat as still as they could. As if the more frozen they became, the etter chance of hearing Keith's call back to them. 10, 15, then 30 seconds extended into a minute and beyond. Standing still allowed for Eric and Francis to absorb what was happening to them in an otherwise friendly landscape. The idea that one of the three had just disappeared into the fog after Francis was taken far away without moving, in an instant he was gone, and now he feared that what may have happened to Keith was a fate even worse than a transformation of position. "Francis, I'm starting to think something bad is happening." While his voice was sure, Francis could tell that the Younger Lang brother was unable to understand what was happening to himself and his friends. "Let's just find Keith, and we can laugh about it later." Keeeeeeeeeeeeeeith!" Francis let out a long shout of voice and fog from the deepest parts of his lungs. As the least puff of air was extinguished and another fresh breath taken as a replacement, Francis felt a sudden urge to run. Run like he never ran before. Using his feet and arms to cut through the fog which obvisously had it in for these three young New England boys on a crisp Autum morning in October. The longer it took to get back to where they began, Francis feared they would be farther away from where they wanted to be. But before the next loud call to Keith, his close friend now lost, a loud explosion was heard just a few hundred feet from where two friends stood wanting to find the lost member of the group.

Lt. Lafleur, French Captain of the Gaurd

Linkedinwords for Halloween Costumes

Category "Costumes", "Halloween" - Powerfitz offers the world a better way to get a great Halloween costume through the use of the 4Seasons Halloween Costume Shop Online Mall.

4Seasons Halloween Shoppe

Get a great scary costume, spooky costume, Hollywood costume, favorite costume and much more from:

http://www.powerfitz.com/fall.htm

The D.I.Y. Halloween Contest for Halloween 2007 starts now!

4Seasons Halloween Holiday Store is located HERE. Shop for unique costumes HERE.

Child Deluxe Dinosaur Costume * Adult Sexy Fairy Costume * Adult Plus Premium Vampire Costume * Adult Premium Gothic Vampire * Bunting Fireman Costume * Bunting Policeman Costume * Bunting lil Soldier * Child Punk Skeleton Girl Costume

Searching for great Halloween information and news, the Holiday Netter reports a great Do it Yourself contest from Makezine.com. It includes a great way to interact with a great community of Halloween enthusiasts who are working on D.I.Y. projects.

Visit the Contest Page HERE

Here is an idea what the contest is all about:

Makers and Crafters, it’s time to enter our 2nd annual ghoulishly fun Halloween contests! Anyone, anywhere, can enter all or just some of the contests. We’ll have lots of updates and posts regarding all these, but this announcement is to get you started and planning and has more information about where to enter, and our friends @ Instructables and Popular Science.
We’re calling this year’s contests DIY HALLOWEEN. Last year’s were so big, with thousands of entries, that we even published our first MAKE: Halloween special edition on newsstands right now!
THE DIY HALLOWEEN CONTESTS!Entering is easy: just upload your photos to the DIY HALLOWEEN Flickr photo pool and tag them “DIYHALLOWEEN.”
Or email them to make.magazine@gmail.com
Or put them on Instructables in the MAKE group with a tag “DIYHALLOWEEN” and the "DIY HALLOWEEN" group. When you enter your projects on Instructables be sure to check out their "how to enter" guide too... If you enter your projects there you're automatically entered in the MAKE contest(s)! - Link.
When you take photos, take the best pix you can — see suggestions below — basically we want your high-res photos for a future MAKE Halloween issue!

Hack-o’-Lantern contest: Decorate a pumpkin any way you see fit, or unfit. It’s that easy. Then upload, post the project or email your photos, as described above. We’ll also post a roundup of ways to decorate a pumpkin as it gets closer to Halloween.

Costume contest: Dressing up? Making your own costume? As long as you “make” something, you can enter. Any costume with homemade elements on it, in it, or used with it is OK. Take your best photos and upload, post the project or email them. We’ll continue to post fun costumes and how-tos as well.

Decorations, Haunted house, gadgets, and more contest: Decorations at home, work, wherever, a haunted house, lawn gadgets, anything Halloweeny. If you’re one of those makers or crafters who goes all out and makes their surroundings spooky in some way, take a photo! Throughout the contest, we will spotlight some of our favorite Halloween-related projects to inspire folks.

Food contest: The grosser the better. Brain jello molds, meat heads, rat cakes — we saw some of the grossest food creations last year, let’s top them this year!

Trick-or-Treat contest: This is the easiest one, no photos necessary. If you have a blog, a website, or anything online, just post a link to the Halloween section of MAKE. We will pick 20 people we see linking to us. It works best if you have a blog-like site; we’ll be using the Technorati service to track who is linking to us and our internal logs. You can post a link to us in your sidebar, a link about this contest, anything, really. Do a post about DIY Halloween, it doesn’t matter to us, but we can see it best if it’s on a blog, and making it fun always helps (extra credit if it’s a spooky story).
Prizes!Besides the glory and fame of being a winner of the DIY Halloween Contests, we’re going to give away some stuff. We're working on the complete list (check back soon) but the grand prize is going to be a trip to Maker Faire San Francisco!
The other prizes so far include just about everything found in our Maker store - kits, books and more!
DeadlineHave your entries in before Sunday, Nov. 4, 2007, at 1:59 p.m. EST. We’re giving you a little time to take photos and get them up post-Halloween, but you can enter any time, starting now. Contest is open to anyone on planet Earth or surrounding orbit.
RulesWhen you enter, you’re giving us permission to use the photos in a future MAKE issue. That’s pretty much it. The winners will be contacted, so please make it easy to find you (using Flickr or Instructables works great since we can email you through those sites).

Remember you can enter at any time just by tagging your photos on Flickr with “DIYHALLOWEEN” and adding them to the DIY HALLOWEEN photo pool, or by emailing them to us (make.magazine@gmail.com), or by putting them on Instructables in the MAKE/DIYHALLOWEEN group with a tag “DIYHALLOWEEN.” To enter the Treat-or-Treat contest, just post about DIY HALLOWEEN or the contest on your blog. And lastly, if you want to use MAKE and/or CRAFT logos in your projects or posts, get ’em here (MAKE logos — CRAFT logos).
SuggestionsTake good photos, because if you win, your project may appear in a future issue of MAKE! Try to shoot high-res, at least 4 megapixel. (Our photo editor likes at least 300dpi @ 4"x5" or larger.)
Also: It’s a great idea to do a how-to; if you show you made something, you’re more likely to win. You don’t need to, but — it’s a good way to win :)
SO! What are you waiting for? Scare us! Inspire us! Humor us!
*Extra Credit: Halloween eventsKnow of a great Halloween-related event that MAKE should cover? Tell us about it ASAP at editor@makezine.com, and we'll consider sending a photographer to the event!
And if you attend a great Halloween event this year, please take your camera and send us your good-quality photos, 300dpi @ 4"x5" or larger.
Posted by Phillip Torrone Sep 23, 2007 05:00 PM

Help save Halloween!

4Seasons Holiday store is open for Halloween costume shopping now. The store can be found HERE

Halloween is in trouble. Each year editorials in magazines and newspapers and on television warn of dangers to children. And each year more communities "ban" Halloween.
So what? Who needs it? What is Halloween anyway? It's just an excuse for big kids to make trouble, little kids to eat too much candy, and candy companies to peddle their wares. Bah, goblin-bug!
Or so I thought until, despite all the warnings, I took my wife and son Sean out last Halloween. Sean was happy to see all the ghosts and gobblins around the neighborhood. He could hardly contain himself when after a proper approach and "Trick-or-Treat", how happy he was at the smiles and words of praise and handfuls of candy that greeted him. He wouldn't let me take him home either, watching all the doings intently.
The same as previous years, many of the people we visited were folks we only see at Halloween even though they live just a few doors away. Most of them, the elderly especially, had bought supplies of candy and were waiting. Most gave out two or three times as much per kid as they had originally intended, because there were so few kids out. And they were as delighted to see the kids as the kids were to see them.
When I got home, I couldn't help but wonder what had gone wrong with Halloween. And it occurred to me that it wasn't just a handful of crazy people who were endangering this tradition and the joy it can bring to little children and adults as well. It's apathy on the part of everyone else, the failure to recognize that Halloween plays an important function in our society, the unwillingness to speak out in defense of Halloween when the media were so unanimously against it.
So what's so important about Halloween?
Maybe at one time Halloween helped exorcise fears of death and ghosts and goblins by making fun of them. Maybe, too, in a time of rigidly prescribed social behavior, Halloween was the occasion for socially condoned mischief -- a time for misrule and letting loose. Although such elements still remain, the emphasis has shifted and the importance of the day and its rituals has actually grown.
Nowadays people often don't know their near neighbors, much less the neighbors a few blocks away. For little children these strange houses and strange people are a source of fear and anxiety. Children have been taught not to trust or talk to strangers, to beware of them. But on Halloween that prohibition is lifted; and, with fear, but impelled by curiosity and greed for candy and other loot, little ones ring doorbells at houses of strangers to find time and again that these strangers are really friendly people like the people they know well. In the course of the evening they gain confidence in themselves and in their neighborhood and come away not only with bags full of candy to be enjoyed for weeks after, but also a warm feeling about their neighborhood and people in general.
As for adults, especially the elderly and those who never had children or who haven't had young children at home for some time, children in the neighborhood are normally a source of anxiety and distrust. What mischief and vandalism might this strange new generation growing up with television violence be capable of? On Halloween night their fears too are exorcised, as wildly and imaginatively costumed kids parade to the door, a reminder of what they themselves did as children -- a common link of experience.
Looked at another way, Halloween is a time that reconfirms the social bond of a neighborhood (particularly the bond between strangers of different generations) by a ritual act of trade. Children go to lengths to dress up and overcome their fear of strangers in exchange for candy. And adults buy the candy and overcome their distrust of strange children in exchange for the pleasure of seeing their wild outfits and vicariously reliving their own adventures as children.
In other words, the true value and importance of Halloween comes not from parading in costumes in front of close friends and family, but from this interchange with strangers, exorcising our fears of strangers, reaffirming our social bond with the people of the neighborhood who we rarely, if ever, see the rest of the year.
So when you hear all those warnings about pins and poison, use caution and common sense. But don't just abandon a tradition that you yourself loved as a child, that your own children look forward to months in advance, and that helps preserve our sense of fellowship and community with our neighbors in the midst of all this madness.