After the party....

... and what a party it was--- no one wanted to leave, and we played Charades for the longest time ever (the ladies won, by just a few points).

But.... the party.... the costumes were amazing this year:

Best Costume (man) ribbon and prize went to LS-- he was dressed as a priest, but underneath his long black robe (which was slit up past his knees), he was wearing white boxer shorts with red hearts on them, and black cowboy boots. You couldn't help but laugh every time you looked at him.

Best Costume (woman) was LK-- she was the Queen of Hearts--- her costume was literally a large Queen of Hearts card, and underneath that she had on black tights and bright red shoes, plus a crown, and her necklace and earrings were Queen of Hearts playing cards-- and she carried a bright red pinwheel as her wand. Very colorful, and very different.

Most Original Costume went to a couple, R and C-- they were all decked out in their Renaissance costumes.... beautiful velvet and fur, with all kinds of magical-looking beads and ruffles and flounces and trimmings... they looked like they were on their way to King Arthur's Round Table.

Funniest Costume went to JT-- she fashioned a black hefty bag over her clothes, tied red ribbons at the ends of the bag so it fit over her shoulders, then she made a cute red sign that said "Bag Lady"-- which was made from a tiny red paper bag.

Cutest Costume went to DS-- she was a "Black Eyed Pea." She wore black slacks and a white sweater... the sweater had a big black felt letter P on it, and she used dark eye makeup to give herself a black eye. Too cute for words. --- All of the above got ribbons and prizes for their efforts.

Other costumes....CS came as a brain surgeon, L & J came as a doctor and nurse, VS was an Elvis fan, S and V were Rockets fans, KS was a lady vampire, and her boyfriend F was a pirate, SK came dressed as a fortune teller, D's friend A wore a long red Renaissance gown. Everyone else was either in black or orange, with bits of Halloween jewelry here and there.

The guessing game this time was a plastic treat bag filled with Hershey's kisses (136 of them)... VH was the closest, and for her prize, I gave her a feather-trimmed black velvet witch hat-- similar to mine, but with orange feathers instead of purple. V was ooohing and aaahing over my hat as soon as she walked in the door, so I was hoping she'd win one of the games tonight so I could give her the prize bag with that hat in it. V was so happy that she wore the hat all night long and kept looking at herself in the mirror every time she went into the dining room. --I had bought two of those hats (with orange feathers) for prizes-- I gave the other one to CS, who always, always, always makes such a special effort with the foods she brings to our parties. Tonight, she brought the bat-wings (chicken wings), and little meat patties with green olives in them so they looked like eyes, and one other dish that I can't even remember now.

The dining room table was so chock-full of food that we had to move the desserts to the breakfast bar in the kitchen. There were chicken casseroles, bat-wings (chicken wings), two kinds of meatballs, two potato casseroles, three pasta casseroles, a sausage and bean casserole, crab dip, chicken legs, two cornbread recipes, and I know I'm leaving out a bunch of things here, but it's nearly 2:00 in the morning and I'm getting tired. The pineapple/grapefruit punch was a hit-- I filled up the punch bowl twice...... and the hot apple cider is always popular for both the Halloween and the Christmas party. For desserts...... we had BC's chocolate cake, SK's pumpkin brownies, DS's peach pie, R&C's spider-web cookies--- and I'm sure I'm leaving something else out there as well.

Everyone went home with their party bundles-- a black porcelain candy dish in the shape of a spider web, filled with chocolate candy and Halloween cookies, and Halloween jewelry for the ladies.

I swear, we have never laughed so hard and for so long as we did tonight. We usually play Charades long enough to get approximately 30 - 35 points..... we played till we got to 80 points tonight. Amazingly long-- we just kept on going, even after a few couples left early because they live on the other side of town. The new people who were here tonight were totally amazed by our Charades group. One newcomer wrote in the guest book: "What a wonderful bunch of coconuts!"

And this coconut is fading fast.... time to wash off my purple eyeshadow (which matched the purple feathers on my hat) and get myself to bed. My husband, Blackbeard the Pirate, is already sound asleep. And, true to his word, as he always is--- he was shaving off his week-long pirate beard as soon as the last guest walked out of our front door.