Visit Powerfitz.com to find our Halloween costume shop HERE
If what's next on the calendar for you is the best holiday of the year, your a Halloween lover like many of us. Halloween comes at the time of year when activity is at it's highest point of the year. In Houston, the weather goes from balmy to better in October, what's happening in the house gets us thinking what a night on the town would mean for the family. Getting the family involved with a wonderfully fantastic night of trick-or-treating brings us back to a time when the nights were alive with people in the neighborhood.The fear of urban living continues to drive many good families into the shelter of their homes. More time is spent together but alone in the neighbor. What Halloween suggests is that the neighbor hood is still strong. Getting people out to meet the neighbors should happen more than the choice moments of childrens holiday dreams.What Halloween is what goes bump in the night. Nothing more than the truth be told about the fears of children. Taking on the roles of ghosts and goblins allow our kids to take on the roles that they might fear. Having fun with what scares you allows the realization that what goes bumb in the night might not be frighful at all.
Showing posts with label trick-o-treat. Show all posts
Showing posts with label trick-o-treat. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Friday, September 28, 2007
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:
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
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
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.
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.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Ghosts in the Graveyard Halloween treats for Parties
4Seasons Holiday Shopping Store has costumes for Halloween 2007!
Ghosts In The Graveyard
Preparation Time: 10 mins Serving: 1
Ingredients:
3 1/2 Cups Cold Milk
2 Pkgs. (4 Serving Size) Jello-Chocolate Pudding
1 Tub 12 Oz. Cool Whip Thawed
1 Pkg 16Oz. Oreo Chocolate Sandwich Cookies Instructions:
Crush cookies in zip style bag, with rolling pin, or in food processor.
Make pudding as directed on package using 3 1/2 cups milk; let stand 5 minutes.
Stir in 3 cups of the whipped topping and 1/2 of the crushed cookies.
Spoon into 13x9 dish. Sprinkle with remaining crushed cookies.
Refrigerate 1 hour.
Decorate with candy pumpkins, candy corn, milanos and spoonfuls of whipped topping for ghosts (pipe in chocolate eyes)
Ghosts In The Graveyard
Preparation Time: 10 mins Serving: 1
Ingredients:
3 1/2 Cups Cold Milk
2 Pkgs. (4 Serving Size) Jello-Chocolate Pudding
1 Tub 12 Oz. Cool Whip Thawed
1 Pkg 16Oz. Oreo Chocolate Sandwich Cookies Instructions:
Crush cookies in zip style bag, with rolling pin, or in food processor.
Make pudding as directed on package using 3 1/2 cups milk; let stand 5 minutes.
Stir in 3 cups of the whipped topping and 1/2 of the crushed cookies.
Spoon into 13x9 dish. Sprinkle with remaining crushed cookies.
Refrigerate 1 hour.
Decorate with candy pumpkins, candy corn, milanos and spoonfuls of whipped topping for ghosts (pipe in chocolate eyes)
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Listings for Halloween 2007 Costumes.
We will be placing the lists of costumes available in the upcoming days. Please review all the great costumes that you can buy for this 2007 Halloween Night. Costumes, get-ups, decorations, and party favors will be listed here at Holiday Reports from the Netter Blog.
Halloween 2007 is almost here! Have got the best costume this year?
With Halloween 2007 just around the corner, 4 Seasons Holiday Netter Reports will discuss the best way to enjoy the holidays. Our insightful collection of holiday information will help you to find the most creative and unique ways to celebrate all the different holidays each year.
Today we begin with the Halloween activities of 2007 that are soon to arrive. Continue to follow along throughout the year to see what's hot, and what every family needs during the upcoming holidays. Enjoy yourself, and have fun during Halloween with creative costumes, and unique creations that all your friends will envy.
Today we begin with the Halloween activities of 2007 that are soon to arrive. Continue to follow along throughout the year to see what's hot, and what every family needs during the upcoming holidays. Enjoy yourself, and have fun during Halloween with creative costumes, and unique creations that all your friends will envy.
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