Fall Fest.....

I am feeling a bit sad this morning.  I have been thinking about how I could pull off throwing the Fall Fest I have been doing since 2005.  Yes, I did skip one year and skipping a year isn't the end...really.  Yet with each year my little nieces and nephews, not to mention my son, grow up more and more.  If I skip a year will the pleasure of coming to Auntie Ellen and Uncle Tim's party fade away?  Will they become busy with other things they would rather do?  I knew that would be a possibility in having the Fall Fest that I could have them interested for only so long.  Kids do grow up and they have friends who may have Halloween parties or school activities that will take precedence over our family party.  I really do understand this.

It just is hard to maybe see it pass away when that day comes.  


My Love has been the Wizard every year since the beginning.  The little ones never ever knew this.  My Love was so excited to plan what the Wizard would do and say.  We have a teepee that the girls were given ages ago that my Love decided would sit on the front lawn.  That teepee....it has been to Burning Man and it has endured the cubby area below the house with all the musty smell absorbing it's canvas fabric.  A dead rat was found in it one year requiring a thorough cleaning and airing out.  I think that has given it it's character.  With the help of R., father and son set up a spooky entrance as well as decorating the walk to the teepee.  Each year we have added a bit more or changed how one gets to the teepee. 

All of us go to visit the Wizard.  My Love pretending he is the Wizard is in all his glory.  Each child sits before him usually one at a time, a Persian carpet spread on the floor of the teepee, the Wizard on a throne.  Between them is a crystal globe and a lantern off to the side casts shadows on the canvas walls.  The kids faces entranced with this man before them.  Sort of like a Santa without the 'Ho ho hoing' yet with a magical slow waving of his arm's in gestures, telling a fortune, asking questions of them.  Yes, there was magic.  A couple of my nephews have figured it out and have become more bold with their seeing the Wizard.  How long before the magic for them ends?  He wears a deep blue velvet robe, tall blue and silver hat and full gray beard and hair, each year the beard taking on a bit more tangled and dreadlocked.

We sit outside earlier in the evening, before the Wizard appears having seasonal appetizers and wine.  Later is dinner with me always fixing for the kids Mummy Hot Dogs and Curly Fries.  The kids some years have carved pumpkins and played games.  Lots of photos are taken as all are asked to come in costume!  We spend much time thinking of what or who we will be this night the month before.  The excitement of dressing up and seeing what everyone else will come dressed in makes my Love and I anticipate the evening ahead.   Even R. who clearly is feeling too old for much of this now, gets into it in the end.  That is what I had hoped.  That no matter the age there would be this tradition of family getting together for a night to be silly, a night to laugh at each other.  

So why can't I do it this year?  My wrist mainly.  I can't cook without much help.  I feel like all I do is ask for help and I am getting tired of asking for help.  How much should I keep asking my Love to do?  The man is tired.  He has been working at his job and coming home to do more work here of what I can't do.  Can I really throw a  party?  I just don't think I truly can.  By now I would have set a date, I would have started planning, and having my Love bring down boxes of Halloween decorations to put around the house.  Planning would have come up as to how we would decorate the front yard the decision of how spooky to make it for the little ones who I don't want to scare.  

I will be okay with this skipped year.  Maybe just have a Halloween dinner with our sister and brother by marriage as we did last year.  Watch a scary movie...plan for next year.....