Cider and pomegranates.

Here’s a quick Halloween/Samhain rundown for you, my pretties. It was on a Monday, which is a pretty blah day for a holiday, but we do what we can, yes? Since we didn’t have lots of time to prep, we kept our celebration short and sweet and very tasty.

Red’s pumpkin, Robert O’Lantern.

Like last year, we set up our candy-distributing station in the front yard, in front of our firepit. It wasn’t too chilly, and the fire kept us warm. I tried to toast a marshmallow, but the firepit’s screen made it tough and sticking my hand into the flames didn’t work out so well either. So my s’more was a little half-assed, but still tasty. In case you’re wondering, Bug Bites are the perfect size for s’mores, and they come with cute little insect cards inside!

Red and I have acquired quite a taste for mulled cider during the fall. I use the recipe in Kristin Madden’s Mabon: Celebrating the Autumn Equinox. It’s basically a bunch of pumpkin pie-type spices and some brown sugar, simmered with your cider or unfiltered apple juice. While we drank it straight on Samhain, it’s also very delicious with a slug of spiced rum (Sailor Jerry, represent!).

Here be cider.

In keeping with the theme of seasonal snacks, we nibbled on some pomegranate seeds. While Red and I seeded the pom (not as hard as you’d think), I told him the story of Persephone and why pomegranate seeds are an appropriate Samhain snack. I have an abiding love for Greek mythology thanks to this book, which was a very influential part of my childhood.

Here is a more fun version of that myth, which you should totally read. In fact, you should read everything on that blog, then come back here so we can geek out about it. Red doesn’t think it’s as funny as I do, but then again he did normal-kid stuff, not hole up in his room reading about satyrs and centaurs and Zeus transforming himself into animals so he could get his freak on.

He is not thinking of turning into a swan in order to get into my pants.

Um, yeah, and we gave out candy, then went to sleep.

Final CSA roundups coming soon! (Soon being relative in blog-time, but you know.) Plus, this weekend is Thanksgiving with the Turkeys at Poplar Spring, so there will be epic awesomeness afoot. Kisses!

If it’s a day that ends in y, I’m probably wearing the panda ears.

Trick or treat, Burnout-style.

Did you celebrate Halloween or Samhain, my darlings? I hope so, if only because dressing up and eating candy every now and again is good for the soul.

Red and Lucy and I had a pretty average Sunday. Laundry, dishes, naps—you get the point. Samhain is one of those holidays I always intend to celebrate grandly, but the mundanities of life tend to get in the way. So I’ve been contenting myself with simple observances, which leave me less stressed-out and just as connected with the divine.

Once the sun set, we built a fire in the front yard:


I arranged a few seasonal accoutrements on our front steps:


As you see, we didn’t get around to carving or even painting the pumpkin. That’s okay, though. It will last longer this way. The skull is my friend Horatio. I found him in a shopping cart near the Dumpster outside my apartment a few days before I left Boulder. I had sworn not to accumulate anything else, but I made Horatio a deal: If he was still there the next day, he could come with me. He was, and he did. Red bought me the cauldron at the Maryland Renaissance Festival a few years ago. Every witch needs a cauldron, and this witch has a man kind enough to find her the perfect one.

With the fire burning well, Red and I cracked open a few hard ciders and handed out Skittles to the neighborhood kids. (Yes, Skittles are vegan now! So are Swedish Fish, but Red kept those in the house because he loves them.) Lucy stayed inside with her Kong, because even though she wouldn’t bother the fire, I could easily see her knocking over a wee princess or Spider-Man in her quest for affection. I wore my panda ears. Actually, I wore them all weekend, which is not as uncommon as you might think. Here we are in New York, the day I bought them at the Rubin Museum:


We had fixings for s’mores, but didn’t get around to making them. Rest assured, there will be s’more action in the near future: We have a fresh box of graham crackers, plenty of chocolate, and a container of Sweet & Sara’s coconut marshmallows at the ready. We did share an ABC Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip cookie—I love you, ABC, but you gotta stop with that “each cookie is two servings” bullshit. No one eats half the cookie now and the other half later. Okay, maybe I’ve done it once or twice when trying to be virtuous, but it just feels wrong.

Once the trick-or-treaters tapered off, we spent a few minutes talking about the changing of the year (Samhain is the pagan New Year), then I dropped into the fire pieces of paper on which I’d written things I’d like to banish from my life. I poured a little cider out for the ancestors, then we covered the fire and went inside to warm up. Lucy was very glad to see us.

Happy November, everyone. (It’s World Vegan Day, in case you were wondering!) Tell me all about your Halloween/Samhain/Día de Los Muertos/Secular Day of Candy and Costumes festivities!