In case you're wondering....

.... there are just 21 days left till Halloween, and 76 days until Christmas.

The inside of our house has been decorated for Halloween since just after Labor Day. I usually start that early because we have a lot of Halloween decorations and what's the use of putting them up just for a week or so........ I like to put everything out early and enjoy it all for a good long while.

Except for a couple of years, when moving got in the way of Halloween, we've always had a costume party as close to October 31st as we could get.  Saturday nights are best for parties, so we try to arrange parties on the weekend closest to the actual day, without going past the day.  Everyone gets into the Halloween spirit early in this state anyway, because Texans seem to really enjoy celebrating Halloween, nearly as much as they enjoy doing it up for Christmas.

I have to say that I miss the trick-or-treaters, though.  Living this far out in the country, and with very few little kids around here, no one goes door-to-door in costume.  I miss seeing the kids in their costumes for Halloween..... and we always had a lot of costumed kids at the Clear Lake house.  There were Halloweens at the old house when I gave out small toys and games and puzzles, Halloween pencils and coloring books and crayons..... I figured the kids would get enough candy, so I wanted to give them a surprise instead of more sugar and chocolate.  The kids loved it.... and all of the parents would thank me for not giving them more candy.

Oh well...... those were good memories, and I'm glad I have them.  As for this Halloween...... I'm putting together a costume for our party, and of course adding a city-spin to it, as I usually do.  My City-Witch costume is my favorite, but I've already done that the year before last, so it will be a few years until I take out the black dress, the feather boa, and the black velvet hat with purple feathers, the black rhinestone sunglasses, and all the sparkling rhinestone jewelry that only a city-witch can wear with pizazz and flair.  And last year's Minnie Mouse costume also had a city-touch to it..... rhinestone Mickey Mouse jewelry, red and white satin polka-dotted 'ears,' red high heels with black stockings, red satin top with a black satin skirt...... a City-Minnie for sure.

You can take the girl out of the city... but you can't take the city out of the girl.  (And in my heart, I'm saying "Thank goodness!")