We went back to Greenfield Village's Hallowe'en Nights dinner this year to celebrate Jon's birthday dinner. It was just as fun as last year.
The birthday boy
Warm cider with a noodle straw
Listening to a reading of Sleepy Hollow
Dr. Frankenstein trapped in his lab by a mob looking for his monster
Pumpkins now line the porch, and spider webs the shrubbery. We've had our traditional Irish meal in honor of the celts (who gave us Samhain), brought the candy bowl out of repose, and I've worn several pairs of orange socks this week.
We're on the second round of costumes. We've watched The Phantom of the Opera (The Lon Chaney version) and the The History Channel's Haunted History of Halloween.
Today was celebration day on Michigan's campus, the day of the Halloween party at the Exhibit Museum of Natural History and the Halloween Concert given annually by the School of Music.
It's really feeling a lot like Halloween these days.
Halloween, fall, traditions We've been to the Christmas event at Greenfield Village, but not to Hallowe'en Nights, and never to the special dinner before one of their period events. What a fantastic night! Dinner was delicious, and shared with many in the warm, inviting setting of the town tavern. It was served by reenactors who really seem to enjoy what they are doing, which held true not just for the period people in the tavern, but for everyone staging the event outside as well.
After dinner we walked along a jack-o-lantern lined path on a magical evening that thankfully held it's rain and wind until the night was over. We were stopped here and there at treat stations, but more exciting were the various story-telling spots and staged scenes: Hansel and Gretel, The Tell-Tale Heart, and, of course, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. The story tellers were so powerful it would be hard to express their talent in my own words, and the staged scenes (the headless horseman chasing Ichabod Crane, the mob hunting down Frankenstein's monster, the pirate ghost ship) were just just the right balance of humorous and spooky.
Costumes were highly encouraged, and we brought the train out of retirement for this one because he could easily slip it off for dinner. With Calvin chugging around dressed in the era of steam travel, Jon went as a conductor and I as a Victorian traveler. Very appropriate for Greenfield's own target time period, and I like to think that the costumes got us into just the right mood for the event.
We were spooked, but not scared out of our wits, by the spectre in the carousel, the man hiding among the trees, the suddenly living scarecrow, and the portal of the covered bridge. There was a barber shop quartet of jack-o-lanterns, death standing out in a field (watch out, he'll point at you!), and ghostly brides and witches, all followed by hot cider. We ended our evening with a telling of The Tell-Tale Heart just as the wind was picking up, and Calvin fell asleep on the way home as the rain drops just started to spatter down. Timing was our friend this night.
Happy Halloween.
We spent the morning trick-or-treating in Ann Arbor, followed by lunch at the Jolly Pumpkin (where else???). The event in Ann Arbor was sadly disappointing. A disappointing parade of uninterested kids strapped into outrageously expensive strollers being pushed from treat giver to treat giver by parents who were jabbering on cell phones. Where's the fun in that? At least two daycares worth of children were trudging along, kid tied to kid, while care providers walked into stores and declared that they needed 12 (or so) treats while the kids waited outside. I heard no fewer than three parents complain about the store that was handing out stickers instead of candy.
But Calvin and I had a great time, and a great lunch, and a great visit with the owners of our favorite book shop, one of which turned out to be a real Antarctica aficionado who fell in love with my little penguin and invited him back to view his Antractica collection some time.
The afternoon we spent resting and reading before making what we call Halloween soup (vegetable beef barley) and Italian bread. And, of course, trick-or-treating. This was the first Halloween that Calvin was really into the trick-or-treating activity. In the past he was curious, but not completely into it. This year it was hard to slow him down between houses, where I think his favorite part was actually saying "trick-or-treat", always followed by "thank-you" and/or "Happy Halloween". At one house he quite cheerily noted that "there's a dead guy in their front yard" (giggle, giggle).
We traveled about half of the neighborhood, collecting candy all the way, then returned home where he counted his candy, converting it to money, while snacking on grapes. He reveled in handing out candy to the later visitors. We read The Legend of Sleepy Hollow before bed. That's an all around great holiday.
