being the Morton Salt Girl

Happy Halloween!

I did think to take a few pictures of the set up for our Halloween party over the weekend. Of course I did not think to take any pictures during the party. I should concede the fact that I get too busy playing host to worry about pictures and hand my camera over to Jake. That didn't happen this year. A few other people took pictures so I may get them at some point.

You got a lot of commentary from me about my decorations this month, so I won't get into that again. I used some of my black tablecloths for craft fairs for the dining room table. We already owned all of the party supplies that we needed from previous events this year.

We also served hot food in the kitchen. This is a rundown of the menu:

• Fresh fruit. During summer, I usually serve a variety of fruits, but I kept it simple with grapes this time.
• Raw vegetables with hummus.
• Crackers and cheese. We have been somewhat obsessed with smoked gruyere for the past few years and had a couple blocks on hand so I served that.
• Pumpkin cupcakes with cream cheese cinnamon frosting. I meant to dye the frosting orange but I forgot. This recipe was still just as amazing as I thought that it would be.
• Milk chocolate and dark chocolate candy packs with the googly eye toppers.
• Barbecue pulled chicken sandwiches. I coat chicken thighs with a chicken rub and put them in a slow cooker for 6.5 hours on low. The chicken will shred really easily. Then I mix it with barbecue sauce and heat it through on high for 5 to 10 minutes. (Sometimes we also make Kristy's Caesar variation.)
• Macaroni and cheese. This was primarily in case we had kids in attendance, which we did not. The adults still enjoyed it.
• Hot cider. I more or less followed this recipe. This was one of the biggest hits of the party. For Jake's birthday, the biggest drink hits were Sprecher beer and root beer so we did those again, too.

We ended the party with a fire in our backyard fire pit and made s'mores. I haven't had s'mores in years, and it was pretty amazing.

And as promised, I did make sure that I got a picture of my Morton Salt Girl costume.

I did not thrift any of this so it was a little bit of an investment, but I will be able to wear all of these pieces on their own and pull it together again for future costume events. My best advice about creating this costume is so shop for yellow shoes and dresses in the spring and summer. I had no problem finding a coat, but it is really tough to find any footwear (even boots) and dresses that are yellow in the fall. Target had the white tights. None of the stores that I checked carried plain white umbrellas, but I found a white umbrella online that was marketed as a wedding umbrella.

We get a lot of trick-or-treaters in our neighborhood and passed out six bags of candy on Sunday. All in all, it was a much more eventful and fun Halloween than I've had in years.

How is Halloween 2012 going for you?