Halloween high jinx

Mwuhahahahahaaaa!!! The real horror came for me on Tuesday about tea time when I looked out of the window at the pottery studio where I was teaching and saw thick white flakes tumbling from the sky in a wild vortex that made me giddy to look at it! Snow!!! You know, it doesn't matter how old you are, at some point during the first snow fall of the winter, you'll either send, or receive a text saying 'It's SNOWING!!!' Hee hee! Well, you do in Britain anyway. Snow is pretty sparse where I live, I'm right in the centre of England here and we don't often get the right weather conditions for snow. Anyway, late October is really unusual for snow here in the UK, and having gone to Uni in Staffordshire where Alton Towers is, I knew that if it was snowing here, it was going to be arctic up there! As a Fresher,  my first year halls of residence were a block of flats on top of a hill, and about halfway through the first term, it snowed so hard that the snow drifted right up against the flats; we were on the fourth floor and the snow drifted up past our window and up to the eighth floor. We were totally snowed in, which we didn't really mind, no lectures and lots of getting together to keep warm parties. Anyway, I digress! Having decided that the weather was going to be on the chilly side, I decided that I was going to go all out on the layer front. Three pairs of socks, my thermal walking boots, a thermal vest, a fleece, a cardi and a coat, thermal gloves and a lovely warm woolly hat and I was very well prepared for the day ahead. My students however, were not. Some of them were only wearing tees, hoodies and trainers! They may thought I was wearing too much when we left Northampton, but I was the one who was toasty and warm all day long, thank you very much! There were some students shivering the minute we stepped off the bus and the sun was still out then!

Alton Towers was pretty cool as always. It's pretty much the biggest theme park in Britain and is set in the ancestral home of the Duke of Shrewsbury, so the grounds are pretty amazing. Alot the original buildings are still there, some of them have been adapted to accommodate various attractions. At this time of year, the Scarefest is going on, all the rides are horror themed, and the park is decorated with Halloweeny decorations.

 

Pumpkin adorned graveyards crop up all over the place...

 

But you can still escape them in the beautiful grounds.

 

No snow up here today, but it was still bitterly cold.

When I got home, I stripped off a few layers, spent a little time with M who was getting excited about the evenings football match that the lads were coming round to watch, then I went over to Mums to spend a crafty evening together. She cooked for me and I stopped over the night, and we spent the evening chatting and card making. As you can see, we probably spent more time chatting than we did card making, but never mind. I got a little carried away with the glitter I'm afraid! There is a saying...'Glitter is the Herpes of the craft world - once you've got it, you can't get rid of it...' (I can't remember who said it originally, but if I remember, I'll let you know!)

Here's my hoodie. Remember I said I'd made progress? I'm going to let Chiana model it for me because she can't hold the camera *lol* It just looks bunched up round the bottom because the circular's not long enough to let it all spread out, but you get the idea. I'm going to start the waist shaping now, then the bottom is finished off with an i-cord piping. Then it's the sleeves and hood, and I'll be done! Hurray!

 

 

Tomorrow, I have a hospital visit and an afternoons pottery teaching, and then I'm off with the girls to a Halloween Belly Dance and Burlesque night.

I'm not completely sure what I'm wearing yet, but I think it might involve a pair of these tights....

Whatever you're doing, have fun, and Happy Samhain! The origins of Halloween lie in the Druid celebration of Samhain, a time when the boundaries between the world of the living and the world of the dead become thinner. It's the time of the year when ancestors and other departed souls are especially honoured, so I'll be thinking of my Dad and my Uncle.