It's Halloween! It's Halloween! The moon is full and bright/ And we shall see what can't be seen On any other night. Skeletons and ghosts and ghouls, Grinning goblins fighting duels/ Werewolves rising from their tombs, Witches on their magic brooms/ In masks and gown we haunt the street /And knock on doors for trick or treat/ Tonight we are the king and queen, For oh tonight it's Halloween! -Jack Prelutsky

     I don't wanna brag, and I know that technically Elvira (is she still alive? What does she really look like now?... a scary thought) is the official Queen of Halloween, but the neighborhood kids crowned me with the title, so I'll wear it once a year, anyway.

That's my house in the corner (and me in the pic as the Evil Queen, beside the Spells and Potions table I painstakingly recreated from Snow White). Each year, I spend about 6 months planning to deck it out in its spooktacular Halloween finery. A local artist  hand-paints the window silhouettes, I obsess over the interior and exterior decor, and I prepare for the adult Halloween party of nearly 100 guests. 

And I do mean obsess. Each year has a theme, to be honored in the party invites, decor, and often our costumes (when I say our, I mean me and my poor unsuspecting husband...). I guess it's because I do the whole full-size candy bar/lightstick/haunted trail thing on Halloween night (fog machines, haunted organ music, things peering back at you from windows) that the kids call me the Queen of Halloween. And I love it.

So move over, Elvira.