Intentional Stones

Halloween, Australia Style

Our neighbors were delighted at the invitation to a Halloween Party.  This year's Halloween enthusiasm came from Adam.  (You might be surprised at this, since most years, I am the one creating the awesome plans and over-complicated costumes.)  I just played along and made simple decorations with the kids and food.



Adam did the inviting, the greeting, watermelon purchasing and making up games.



Yes, you heard me right,

Watermelons. 

Well, it's spring here, you see, and carving Pumpkins are kind of a rarity.  It was great fun discussing the difference between Pumpkins in Grocery stores.

Australians maintain the entire hard squash family under the title of "Pumpkins."  So you'll see an awesome selection of pumpkin toppings on pizzas, pumpkin risotto balls, and, of course, pumpkin soups everywhere you go in the fall and winter. 

So Adam went to the store, where late spring watermelons are cheap and bought four of them for the party.  Our guests brought more, and one even brought a pumpkin!

We bobbed for Apples, did Tricks for Treats

(this awesome idea was from my Neighbor) barbecued for our first time here, ate candy and played all evening.  It was lovely and we made new friends. (Yup, Adam did his thing of waylaying friendly looking people on the bike path) We were not alone as we introduced neighborhood people to each other, too!

The next day, Halloween proper, the kids were a little disappointed that they don't do trick or treating here.  But my kids took the initiative, Persephone created a wonderful costume out of the extra card stock from the decorations and visited our house and the Neighbors (who brought the candy the night before) as Lady Liberty

Definitely next year we're going to be working together more on the costumes. 

I'm feeling completely between the holidays this year.  Please understand that my holiday thinking is very strongly influenced by nature.  Halloween (or Samhain, in the celtic calendar) is a time of harvest and falling leaves.  Here, in the Southern Hemisphere, the flowers are finishing their blooms, the bees are humming loud, the animals have found their mates and the summer days are just around the corner.   Just right for May Day! (Beltaine)

We celebrated that on Sunday in the Capital Gardens, and it was simple and perfect.

My takeaway lesson from Halloween in Australia?  Simple is much more fun and you Can trust people to come together to make a fabulous time. 

Halloween/Samhain

My favorite holiday, time for letting your inner self become your outer self, and letting your wishes show on your face.

Halloween is the Witches new year.   Just like January first in most of the western world, it's a time of new beginnings.  The veils between the worlds of the dead and the living are the thinnest.  And we remember our revered dead.

Also, it's the celebration of the last harvests and thanksgivings before we square away our homes for the long winter.

Most years I get caught up in the costumes, the pumpkins, the decorations.  Our family prepares our first meal of thanksgiving for the year.  One can never be too thankful.

This year, the decorations are a little more simple- cotton webbing, a little decoration on the door, lighted lanterns on the walkway, carved pumpkins.  Costumes were purchased and I'm going to focus on cooking and making it a lovely day.

-Simbelmyne

I feel free!

I woke up in a terrible mood, and since I didn't make anything yesterday, I quickly whipped up a pair of earrings to go with a beautiful pendant I picked up in the Outer Banks last year.
The sun goddess is very long and elegant, so I chose 4 inch long ear chains, and I was lucky to have kyanite ovals the right color intensity to match her kyanite sun.

I've been overthinking this Halloween issue.  And today I gave in and hit the Halloween aisles. 

I picked up a witchy costume for myself (from the reduced items, though it seems to be perfectly intact), and the clone trooper my eldest loves so dearly.  Both costumes will require some slight modifications.  Mine's just a little too plain, and his is too big.  My daughter will be experimenting with her fairy nature, I'm not sure exactly what she'll come up with out of all the costumes she has.  And my littlest will be Pablo, the Penguin from Backyardigans, in a Yeti costume.  You'll understand better after all the design elements in place.

Halloween truly was gumming up my brain.  I couldn't think about anything else, and I didn't have any ideas.  I feel creative and succesful again.  It is such a relief. 

Having solved the costume problem, I visited the book store.   I found books on silver wire fusing, another basic jewelry making course that has photos and practice exercizes!, a book on making celtic knots with cord-that I'd like to use for playing with wire, as well as for making cord necklaces for pendants, and a book on Practical Casting.  (All book information is in the "Intentionally Chosen" list, please check them out)

I've solved the problem of lighting my walkway for trick or treaters- simple metal and glass lanterns with patinaed metal cutouts of pumpkins glued to the glass sides.  LED tealights will keep the little ones from burning themselves.

We started carving the pumpkins

And I must be watching too many crime shows, since skulls were the first thing I thought of when I saw this odd shaped pumpkin.

Note to self

Do not throw away the boxes the size of a child.  We need them for Halloween costumes.  I need a place to store this stuff.
Granted, the cardboard halloween costumes in the past haven't been the most successful.  But I shrug that off as a symptom of rushing the job. 

This year, biggest kid wants to be Metroid Prime.

I'm not sure which colors he'll choose.

my girl wants to be a sparkly witch- this one doesn't need to be made, since I got smart last year and raided Target when the costumes were half off in November.  But I'd like to make her a magic wand and cauldron to match.

And the littlest has yet to make up his mind.  He usually doesn't know until a couple of days before the holiday, so I need to make some sort of neutral base costume that we can convert easily so that he has something to wear. 

What I have learned from last year is not to put too much emotional investment into the kids' costumes.  I worked really hard on the littlest's only to have him refuse to wear it.  It was the cutest polar bear made from a white wool felt coat and sculpey nose and claws, rawr.  I was so upset I didn't go trick or treating.

Halloween crafting begins.

I know it's early yet, but one of my biggest stressors each year is getting all of the Halloween stuff done.  I like all the costumes and stuff to be home made.  Since costumes are my absolute favorite design challenges.  

Anyway, I've decided this year to have the kids design and make their own costumes as much as possible, and since we usually have crafting day on Friday, with friends and food and fun.  I thought it was a perfect way to tackle it one step at a time.

So, this week, crafting day fell on my Daughter's birthday, and she saw my bag of inspiration from the craft store.  And couldn't be stopped from choosing treat bags as this week's craft!

Simple bags, with similar construction to the reusable shopping bags the stores all have now.  With foamie cutouts in all sorts of halloween shapes.

I can't wait for next week
An excellent start.  

-Simbelmyne