LOCAL: Halloween Party Prep!

Omigoddess! How many are coming? We ask each other as the time draws near. Andy, at Bloomingfoods, stopped me to say he’s coming. Mariella will bring her kids. Rhonda, Corbin and their kids, several other kids. The kids are enticing my son Colin, always the Pied Piper, and I’m going to give him the honor of taking the lead in telling the scary (true) stories. (His are even scarier!). I have a new function, which you’ll soon see. . .

Lots of others. at least 19 signed up on facebook. How many altogether? Will we have enough food? Feverishly, we prepare more, more . . . Our last guess is about 30.

Prep begins:

Last night, caramel apples, Katarina in the lead, with podmates Leah, Bradley and Brie.

My does that girl love to cook!

You know, I really can’t convey to you just how wondrous it is for me, a 72-year-old crone, to live with such creative young people. So much fun! Over this past year my solitary habits have started to melt away inside this light-hearted harmonious interplay weaving its tapestry around us, spreading love into the world.

Last night’s prep was just the beginning. Today, Brie, who is taking the lead on this entire whingding, and has been looking forward to it for months, got an early start.

As the day wore on, one by one her list did get crossed out. I helped by tidying up the front porch, and (finally) sweeping the back porch:

I also bought a few $2 masks for those who come without.

Meanwhile, Brie was doing her beautiful thing, her astro chart’s concentration of planets in Leo shining forth. Note the skeletons in the doorway:

Last night, besides caramel apples she and Kat also cut out sacks for the paper lanterns:

She unfurled a purple table cloth for under some of the goodies.

“Where did you get the props?” I ask, while sweeping the floor.

“Mostly from the Dollar Store.”

Last Sunday evening we held a pod meeting, our first in many months. Older people — most of whom live alone, and who hear about what we’re doing (two old women living one each in two houses with four young people) and are intrigued — ask me earnestly: “How often do you hold meetings?” I look at them puzzled. As seldom as possible!

While going through our agenda, Kat was sitting on the floor decorating a pumpkin with leaves, using extremely smelly glue. Rebecca (the other old one) finally asked her to open the door, and then, a few minutes later, I exclaimed, “Just stop!”

“Okay! Okay!”

Here it is. Sweet pumpkin.

This morning Brie dragged out the terrific collage we all put together at the Witchy Woman’s Equinox Celebration. Remember that? Seems like years ago, and it was only in September! She hung it in the defunct greenhouse.

Here’s her finished canvasses. First, the patio area:

Complete, of course, with materials for our traditional chalk art:

Living room (in case party spills inside, which it probably will, despite fire outside. It’s nearly November!)

Coffee table decoration:

In this entire panoply, there was only one hitch. That was the ugly scaffolding (because the top of the chimney is about to be completely redone.)

In permaculture, we have a principle that goes like this: “The problem is the solution.” I.e., when something just can’t be ignored, and it seems to ruin everything, instead, reimagine how it might contribute to the whole.

Sooooo . . .

I decided to make a little enclosed area out of the scaffolding, inside which my witchy self will give people “mini-readings.” Funky, of course, made with clothespinned sheets:

In order to get inside you have to brave the poke plant obstacle course, following the carpets, and then squeeze in between the scaffolding and the stonework:

Aha! Do you dare?