Hello hello! Sneaking another October post in under the wire!

It’s been a busy few weeks.

I’m volunteering again for the elections. Ah the power being an election judge… I can’t do without it I guess? Even with just a midterm election that’s mostly just school bonds? Sigh. Either way I reward myself with the same thing- ANOTHER DRESS FROM ZURI, YAY!

I’d like to think I’m doing this out of civic duty… but there might be dress-based ulterior motives if I’m really honest. It is, and I can’t stress this enough, a huge pain in the ass.

I worked last Saturday and I had to do an all day training before that. I have to set up machines tomorrow and work all day Tuesday 6am to 8 or 9pm…. good times. There had better be entertaining people-watching is all I can say.

Earlier this month we got the ofrenda up:

Why do I title that ofrenda 2.0? And hey didn’t we used to have more paper flowers? Yeah- those are related.

So do you know how insaney fast paper flowers catch on fire?! Well now I do! After the incident we no longer have candles anywhere even near the arch and the arch is less securely attached to the table (for ease of inferno chunking into the yard, if ever required again). Lessons were learned, lemme tell you. Lessons like : “Turns out I freeze in a fire” and “the smoke alarms still work.” 0 of 10, would not inferno again.

We’re fine, fyi.

Also ofrenda related, my neighbor read my book and said she was inspired to set up her own ofrenda (something that touches me profoundly when people tell me that) and so I took her to San Antonio Historic Market Square to stock up on supplies.

And while there I got… this!

My new calavera/(skull)! I love it so much.

Considering that Halloween is before Dia de los Muertos I am getting out of order here, but we did jack o lanterns last night as well.

Also Halloween related: what is up with Halloween decorating lately?! There are so many houses around us with a yard FULL of zombies and such. I think about all of that the same way I do those 4′ lit up deer figures that people put out for Christmas: WHERE DO Y’ALL STORE ALL THIS DURING THE REST OF THE YEAR?! Is there a dedicated holiday shed? Does no one think it’s weird to store bins of bloody hands and zombie heads right next to bins of the three wise men in their garages? I can’t get on board. Pumpkins that can get tossed and coiled up Christmas lights we can store easily is the extent of it for us! (Aside from the bins and bins of Dia de los Muertos stuff with, like, colorful skulls and skeletons- who I think I am being all judgey I really couldn’t tell ya.)

Onward and upward for the day though- gotta finish the 7th grader’s costume: iron on letters for a t-shirt that will say “Costume Judge.” She worried she was too old to be dressing up and trick or treating (a concern the 15 year old doesn’t share) and so thought this would be a good compromise. In true, “what a beautiful heart this kid has” fashion she also has a bunch of first placed ribbons and large gold star stickers to hand out to kids we run across as we trick or treat. I just love it so much. She even made sure that I ordered her all first place ribbons as she didn’t want anyone to feel bad if they didn’t get first place. She’s decided she’ll declare: “Oh I can’t decide, your costumes are all so good- you ALL win first place!” if she runs across groups of multiple little kids all together. I KNOW, RIGHT!

Happy Halloween and then Dia de los Muertos after that!

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