After the Party........

......... It's nearly 1:30 in the morning, and I'm wide awake after another unbelievable Charades party. I don't know if Halloween had anything to do with tonight's madness, but it sure didn't hurt. We were all in rare form with Charades, and it seemed that everyone wanted to just keep on playing.

The costume hit of the night for the adults was our friend L, who came dressed up as Paul Sr. of Orange County Choppers. L already has the mustache and goatee, and his daughter drew some faux-tatoos on his arms, which everyone could see because he came in the door with a sleeveless tee-shirt on, just like Paul Sr. The likeness was incredible, given that L has nearly the same physique and hair as the owner of Orange County Choppers.

For the teenagers, the best costume was worn by C and her friend L--- one costume which they shared--- half of the costume was an angel (L) and the other half was a devil (C). The devil half was in red, complete with devil horns and a red pitchfork. The angel half was all in white, with a halo and a star-topped wand. To complete their costumes, C's face was painted red, with a fake green nose, and L's face was painted white, with a fake white nose. The noses were attached with some sort of costume glue, and both were over-sized and totally outrageous. Being that the girls shared the same costume, they had to walk together, sit together, eat together, and play Charades side by side. They looked like one huge person, with two heads. Every time you looked at them, you just couldn't help but laugh.

C and L came with three friends of theirs... three boys, all in costumes-- a 1960's hippie with dreadlocks and a peace-sign around his neck, a wizard complete with flowing robes and a long white wig and beard, and Bat-Man. All the kids played Charades, they all brought food for the potluck dinner-- one of the boys likes to bake and he made a cake for everyone.

The foods on the buffet table tonight were outstanding.... meatballs with olive eyes, creamed-cheese green eyes, vegetable casseroles, chicken casserole, homemade cornbread, chicken and pasta salads, Tex-Mex vegetable salads, turkey & swiss & artichoke pinwheels, homemade chocolate cake, Italian cream cake, homemade banana pudding, strawberry and cream cake, chocolate eclairs, a layer cake decorated with spiders, pumpkin cheesecake, three-cheese pumpkernickel breads. And I know I must be forgetting something.

Everyone loved the party games....... they all liked picking out books by the covers only, and when I told them they'd find either a bookmark or a surprise on page 31 (chosen for the date of Halloween), that made it even better. (The surprise was certificates for free ice cream at our local ice cream shop.... I had those in six of the books.) The guessing game for the number of orange Tic-Tac mints in the pumpkin jar was a hit, and the kids had fun with guessing the number of spiders in the treat bag. Prizes went to the winners, the ones farthest away from the correct numbers got the mints and the spiders.

I had light-up Halloween pendants for everyone, and the ones with pumpkin-stickers on the backs of their pendants got special prizes........ and I did the same game just for the ladies, with fancy Halloween headbands for each of them to choose, just one with a pumpkin sticker and a special prize for the winner. I found those sparkling headbands just last week and decided to include them with this party rather than save them for next year's Halloween party, as I'd originally planned to do. Lots of special gifts tonight, plus the usual party-bags for everyone when they left at the end of the night.

I had two tables set up in the living room for tonight's party, and that worked out really well because more people could sit around the tables instead of holding their plates in their laps. Plus we had the small table set up with extra chairs in the breakfast room, so that was extra seating also. Four tables in all, each with ivory tableclothes and pumpkins in the middle of each.... the living room, dining room, breakfast room all looked very festive. And of course, as with all the parties, everyone goes to the kitchen and wants to hang out there.

We had hot apple cider tonight..... which everyone loves here. I usually make that for our Christmas Open House, but thought the hot cider would be nice tonight since it was cool outside (about 60 degrees). One of our neighbors told me that she could smell the aroma of the hot cider as soon as she walked in the front door. I added cinnamon sticks to the cider, and red grapefruit slices studded with cloves..... delicious.

Another Halloween.... another party..... we all had such a good time. These parties are a lot of work to put together, but it's all worth every minute. Our friends walk in the door with a smile on their face and they leave asking when the next party will be.

And Halloween isn't really over...... the kids will be Trick-or-Treating on Monday, and I've got lots of goodies waiting for them. I hope the weather is as nice on Monday for the kids as it was today for us. And soon after the Halloween decorations come down and go back into the holiday closet, down will come the Christmas decorations... a little bit at a time.... so by the time Thanksgiving comes, this house will be dressed up and ready for the Christmas tree which we put up and decorate right after turkey-day.

Time to call it a night...... I'm the only one in the house who's awake.... my husband is sound asleep, so is Gracie....... so are all the cats. What a great night this was...........!