All Hallows' Eve (Halloween) Fun: 2016

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I know some celebrate All Hallows' Eve (Halloween and the eve of All Saints' Day) and some don't, but our family does, but we also make sure to keep the "hallow" ("hallow" means holy) in Halloween by celebrating the Feast of All Saints' Day on Nov. 1. (my annual All Saints Day celebration post coming soon)

Here are some links for some Halloween history:

The Catholic Origins of Halloween by Father Augustine Thompson, O.P.
Reclaim Halloween @ Catholic Exchange 
Halloween and Catholic Evangelization @ Catholic Sistas
Halloween: Don't Be Spooked, It's Catholic by Birgit Jones 
Who's Afraid of Halloween? by Danielle Bean
Halloween is Catholic? Yup by Melanie Jean Juneau
It's Time for Catholics to Embrace Halloween by Fr. Steve Grunow
Explaining Halloween to Catholic Kids-How it Goes With All Saints' Day, or "All Hallows Eve" by Lacy at Catholic Icing
Soul Cakes: The Holy Inspiration for Trick-or-Treating by Ryan Scheel
Little Teaching: All Saints Day! (And All Souls Day...oh, and Halloween) by Leila Miller

Here are some of our Halloween 2016 highlights....

In the morning, I made "spooky" themed pancakes for my children using Halloween themed pancake molds.

During our school day on Halloween we did some pumpkin art with small, white pumpkins, crayons, hot glue gun and a hair dryer.

My preschooler enjoyed coloring her pumpkin with crayons as she watched her older siblings glue their crayons on top of their pumpkins and then use the hair dryer to melt the crayons.

My children really liked how the crayon wax sprayed and melted on the paper we had down on the table.  It made for some beautiful art too!

In the evening, we took our children trick or treating with friends.

My son was Davey Crockett, then we have a Minion, Little Red Riding Hood, "Nerd", and Sophia the First princess.

My husband made the Minion goggles after we looked on Pinterest for ideas.  He bought safety goggles, painted them gray and then used the metal rims of two Mason jars for the front of the goggles.  He painted the rims gray and hot glued them to the front of the goggles.

After we got back home, it was time for the traditional sibling trading post exchange.  One for them, 5 for my husband and me. ;-)

My 12 year old daughter and her friend carved this pumpkin and I shared it with our orthodontist on Instagram and he thought it was "Awesome!" for some reason. :)

And here's another pumpkin, or a "Trumpkin", that we saw at Trader Joe's....

It was a memorable and fun  All Hallows' Eve! 

Tomorrow, Nov. 8, is Election Day, of course!  I love the Saints' lives and reading their words of wisdom, especially this week.   My latest EpicPew post, 40 Saint Quotes To Get Your Mind Off Politics  will hopefully inspire us and give us hope!  If you missed my first EpicPew post, 26 Reasons You Should Leave the Catholic Church Immediately, be sure to read it because you certainly can't always judge a post by its title! ;)




And I will sign off with this prayer....

God bless America!