Where have all the years gone?

Years ago I used to get so excited to put up the Halloween decorations and always had them up by the first of October. This year I was considerably slower and it wasn't until I had gone to both of my girl's homes and seen their cute Halloween decorations that I decided I needed to get mine out.

Over the years I have amassed five tubs of Halloween decorations and costumes. And yes, I still have it all. After looking at the cute, classy decorations my girls had in their homes, most of the items in my five tubs looked a bit old and shabby. None of them could be classified as classy and most of them wouldn't be considered cute by anyone but me. Most of my decorations where purchased on sale at Drug Emporium (that tells you how old they are), made at homemaking meetings twenty years ago or by my elementary age children. I have a dried apple faced witch that Lonica made in girl scouts, five starched ghosts we made for family night, a paper mache pumpkin jar Preston made and this little mummy he wrapped years ago.
One summer when I had both my feet operated on, the kids and I sat and painted this Haunted House and all the little figurines that go with it. Needless to say, the paint job isn't the best but the kids got so excited every year when we would get it out. They would remember which parts they had painted and would carefully set it up as if it were a real work of art.
While none of my Halloween decorations would fetch even a quarter at a garage sale, they are priceless to me and I will keep all five of my tubs full of Halloween memories and let my kids go through them some day.

Here is one more memory of a year with a little ghost, a waitress, a mummy and a news reporter. When children are little it seems like the day will never come when they will be gone but it comes much faster than a mother could ever imagine.

P.S. Jason would never recommend anyone be a mummy for Halloween -it takes a long time to get wrapped, it's very difficult to run from house to house without your costume falling off and most important, it's very hard to go to the bathroom!