Happy Halloween! (and Blogger issues)...

I just love Halloween! I think that it started with my mother, who adored this holiday. She would make us cute little Halloween cupcakes and cookies (all month, I think), and decorated the inside of our house and also the porch even before it was a popular thing to do. She had such a sense of fun about the spookiness and the colors and the dressing up, and it just rubbed off on my sister and me. So, now we both do up Halloween in a big way at our own homes, and I'm sure that it makes our mother smile.

DH, who's always up for a good time, immediately caught on to the sense of Halloween fun in our family, and we started collecting vintage Halloween decorations and party favors when we were first dating (which is a good thing, because they are much pricier now). He has happy memories of dressing up for Halloween in grade school in Kirkwood, MO, and then after school having a Halloween parade for all of the parents, going right down the middle of the street in front of his school. Doesn't that sound like a happy memory? We never had parades like that here...I'll have to admit being a bit envious! ;-)

We found the vintage Halloween mask above at one of our favorite antique malls here in town, and also the vintage papier mache luminary. That little noise-maker was the very first Halloween piece we bought together. The doll below was a fun Marshall's find this year.

I just love this little "Crystal Fortunes" card. It has fortunes for boys on one side and girls on the other, and would have been fun to use at a Halloween party. DH found several of these at an old (OLD) party store downtown that was closing several years ago. They had quite a few vintage party favors and decorations from years and years ago, and DH was able to buy the entire lot for $10! I don't know how someone hadn't discovered those before, as they are quite collectible now...lucky DH! Since he had multiples of everything, he shared his find with my sister and my mother.

Another vintage paper mask in my mother's favorite character, a black cat! and more noise-makers...I think that the noise-makers are our favorite thing to collect. The old owl lantern also was found on one of our antique adventures.

This sweet-looking witch was also in DH's great find at that old party store. We had 6 of those in that lot, so my sister and father also each have 2 to use with their decorations.

We found this cute box of Halloween cookie cutters at a Gallatin, TN antique mall during our first antique-hunting trip to the Nashville area about 20 years ago. I didn't have the heart to open them and use them, as the box is so sweet.

This little guy is another Marshall's find...

Each year, we've thought about not decorating, but our college-age boys still expect us to go all out. I'm glad that they haven't outgrown the fun yet. Someday, I hope that they will be enjoying some of these things at their own homes.

My younger son is sweet and thoughtful about bringing me little things that he finds when he's out, and he bought me this cute guy on the bike on sale this week. I think that he's a nice addition to the den, don't you?

And remember this Halloween banner that I saw at the Collierville Town Square earlier this month, and shared with you here? Well, it made its way home with me!

My sweet daddy bought us this cute wood decoration on sale at Kirkland's. I think that it reminded him of how my mother decorated our home each year---I know that it did me. As fun as all of the decorations are, I think that the ones from people you love are the most special, don't you?

Whether you celebrate a light-hearted, fun-loving Halloween or have a joyous celebration of Fall and the harvest season at your home, I hope that it's the best one ever!

I tried and tried this afternoon to get this post to publish and then visit all of you, and I couldn't get blogs to load..they would either lock up, or throw me out completely. I don't know if it was a Blogger or server issue, or just my own internet acting up. Hopefully it will be more cooperative tomorrow!