Let's Talk Halloween! AKA Samhain

Halloween!

It is that time of the year where there is pumpkins and artistic creepy stuff EVERYWHERE. Scary stories and spooky fun for the young and the old and definitely one of my favorite holidays. I was not in the spirit so far until last night, I normally am in LOVE with October and everything that has to do with the supernatural. If it has the creepy factor you know it is Norma's thing. So Project Norma is actually going well. I woke up having the need to carve pumpkins, watch scary movies, put up decorations, make creepy recipes, and having scary story sleepovers.
So I decided to write about it instead and I want to start today as the official day of Today's Share! Today's Share will be stories from you. I have asked a few people what the do for Halloween and what was their favorite memories growing up. I will feature you in a segment below of every post from here on out. So send me your stories at normaackerstories@gmail.com! Because I like sharing stories as much as I can. I will share your first name only or I will not share if you don't want me to. I can share what you want me to, that's up to you! So send me what you do every year! What is your favorite costume? (Send a pic if you have one!) What are you doing this year? Send anything related to Halloween!

This will be a whatever kind of post. Something short and fun in between other posts.

Quick History of Halloween

Historians have dated the origins of Halloween to about 2,000 years ago. The Celtic people have believed that Samhain was the date where the veil between the world of the living and the dead was at its thinnest. They believed the Druids and High Priests /Priestess have been able to get more accurate readings about the future the night before the New Year (November 1st). November 1st is the first day of harvest, the time of the year that everything starts to wither and die. They believed the spirits will come and cause mischief in the mortal world. They started to dress up to ward off spirits while they did their bonfires to celebrate and worship their deities. 

In the 18th Century Pope Gregory III established November first as "All Saints Day" and calling the night before "All Hallows Eve" later known as Halloween. 

Over the years more practices have arose from the holiday and knew celebrations emerged such as "The Day of the Dead".  

(If you want to read more about it there is a link below labeled Halloween History)  

HiHistory.com Staff. “History of Halloween.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 2009, www.history.com/topics/halloween/history-of-halloween.

My Halloween Traditions

I will start this month's theme by sharing some traditions I do almost every year in a summary. I will get more into depth in other blog posts as the month goes on. 

I start off with carving a pumpkin with the family on October 1st. I didn't do one on the 1st because of some lame reasons but I will get to that soon! We will all get together and carve our pumpkins to Halloween music, scary stories, and lots and lots of food. We start to plan the years Halloween costumes and plans. 

In my family we make it a big deal that EVERYONE should dress up. Adult or not, we all get into the spirit. We dress the animals too if they would let themselves and we make it a point that it will forever be a ongoing tradition in our family. 

We make Halloween themed food like cupcakes, pancakes, noodles, etc throughout the whole month. We come up with different recipes and find some on the web. 

We watch a scary movie once a day leading up to Samhain! From the good old classics to the new Annabelle movies, they are all being enjoyed in the month of October.

Finding new Creepy Pastas and Urban legends is always a fun hunt. We search for more scary tales to share for years to come.

My family decorates on Halloween, but not as much as I would like. I decorated last year and made the front door of my apartment a graveyard. I want to make that a must from now on. My house has skeletons and creepy things all year round so it isn't difficult to keep that going. 

I also cast a circle bringing in the New Year with a good old New Year ritual and a warm fire with my familiar. We make my deceased loved one's their favorite food and put it out with a lit candle for them for All Saint's Day /Day of the Dead. 

I cannot wait to show you pictures and go into detail about my love for the season! 

Today's Shares: Connor's Family 

My featured share of the day is Connor, his Mum, and his Nan's (Nin) Halloween stories!

I have asked them a few questions to get the ball rolling and they have gave me some silly answers 😀

Connor started off by sharing what he liked about Halloween:

"I like the candy and Horror films that come on TV. I like how everyone gets into the spirit. I used to love Halloween. I love how everyone gets creative with their pumpkins. I saw good ones around here this year. I like how my girlfriend is Wiccan and does ritual things. I like how she gets into the spirit more than I do."

His Traditions: 

     "We used to dress our dogs up for Halloween. We used to decorate the house with cobwebs, pumpkins, spiders, and the "DO NOT ENTER" tape. We used to go trick or treating obviously. No one did tricks here, just treating.  "

His Favorite Costume: 

    "I liked going as a zombie. That was my favorite. I like to rip up my clothes and put blood on. I didn’t do that fake thing, I actually got pigs blood and…I am just kidding! I liked the face paint and dressing up. "Favorite Halloween memory:

   "I went out with my best friend in a totally different area, like 30 minutes away and came home and counted our candy together at his house. My mom and I would take my dog Moschino out trick or treating sometimes. No one would mess with us because she was a big dog." 

What he plans on doing this year:

   "I plan on getting dressed up with my girl, doing special effects masks, and go out and impress others how crazy we look. Go out and get a couple drinks, play some pool. I doubt we would play pool because it would be hard to see with her mask!"

Connor's Mum and Nin gave simple answers to some questions we gave them:

1. What do you like from Halloween?
Horror movies and eating all candy myself -  MUM
Spookiness-  Nin

2. What traditions do/did you have?
Decorating all of the house
 With Halloween thing- Mum & Nin

3. What was your favorite Halloween costume? 
 Connors Mikey costume from monsters INC -Mum & Nin

4. What was your favorite Halloween memory? 
Dressing the dogs up -Mum & Nin

5. Favorite Halloween movies?
Nightmare on elm street  -Mum  
Hellraiser  -Nin

Thank you for Sharing! 

Plans This Month?

I will be posting Halloween crap all month long! I will post about the scary story/ Urban Legend of the day. Halloween costume of the day that I find or that you send. I will post loads about random stuff so stay tuned!

Urban Legend of the Day: The Vanishing Hitchhiker 

A dozen miles outside of Baltimore, the main road from New York (Route Number One) is crossed by another important highway. It is a dangerous intersection, and there is talk of building and underpass for the east-west road. To date, however, the plans exist only on paper.
Dr. Eckersall was driving home from a country-club dance late one Saturday night. He slowed up for the intersection, and was surprised to see a lovely young girl, dressed in the sheerest of evening gowns, beckoning him for a lift. He jammed on his brakes, and motioned her to climb into the back seat of his roadster. “All cluttered up with golf clubs and bags up here in front,” he explained. “But what on earth is a youngster like you doing out here all alone at this time of night?”
“It’s too long a story to tell you now,” said the girl. Her voice was sweet and somewhat shrill — like the tinkling of sleigh bells. “Please, please take me home. I’ll explain everything there. The address is ___ North Charles Street. I do hope it’s not too far out of your way.”
The doctor grunted, and set the car in motion. He drove rapidly to the address she had given him, and as he pulled up before the shuttered house, he said, “Here we are.” Then he turned around. The back seat was empty!
“What the devil?” the doctor muttered to himself. The girl couldn’t possibly have fallen from the car. Nor could she simply have vanished. He rang insistently on the house bell, confused as he had never been in his life before. At long last the door opened. A gray-haired, very tired-looking man peered out at him.
“I can’t tell you what an amazing thing has happened,” began the doctor. “A young girl gave me this address a while back. I drove her here and . . .”
“Yes, yes, I know,” said the man wearily. “This has happened several other Saturday evenings in the past month. That young girl, sir, was my daughter. She was killed in an automobile accident at that intersection where you saw her almost two years ago . . .”
-(Will post a link to the Website it was on as The Vanishing Hitchhiker)

“The Vanishing Hitchhiker.” Snopes.com, Snopes, 23 Oct. 2016, www.snopes.com/horrors/ghosts/vanish.asp.

Featured Costume: My Daughter as Little Red Riding Hood 

Let the Celebration Begin! 

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