Halloween Ending 11-02-23

Our neighborhood has a parade on Halloween and on the 4th of July.   Sometimes KoKo and I sit on folding chairs in the  driveway and cheer them on.   But this year I just  went out  and took a  few pictures.  Didn't participate in Trick or Treat.  

But I could not resist taking pictures of the man riding a leopard!

He is standing straight up and his legs are the front legs of the tiger.

False legs with boots grasp the tiger and the back and  rear tiger legs are also false.  I wish I knew who the guy is so I could ask him some  questions.

This is not street regulation, but the family drives it around on  the  local streets quite a  bit.  They have decorated it  with  orange lights.   Run off  the  battery?

Here is a gutsy guy dressed as  a big  pink  bunny visiting my cross-the-street neighbor.  The arrangement  is becoming more common - place a  table loaded with candy and sit/stand  outside to monitor  the children's  intake.   Lots of  problems with just putting out a bowl or basket full and having some kid take the  whole  thing,  basket  or bowl included.  

Have no idea how  a firetruck  is arranged to drive in front  of the parade since  our neighbor fireman moved away.  It  is always there and even  gives a siren burst.  The pole is  located between our driveway and Mark-to-the-South's driveway.  

The  enormous   skeleton is out  for the season.  He'll stay up until the New Year with appropriate clothing. I suggested  putting him up for Easter  and I would  provide the bunny ears.   They  were  not interested!!

Here is his smaller friend  wearing one of the  bowties that  KoKo  gets at the groomer. There is  a baby skeleton hanging from the big guy's arm who has the bowtie from last year.

Same friend with a few skulls and a sign.  Add a little more each year!

Across the street they have three blowups and the lights that make floating ghosts and bats on the garage door.  We saw them last evening on our walk. 

But this morning about 8am they had been replaced by this blowup turkey.  The owner either came out in the night to change or got up very early before he went to work.   

So another whole year before we do this all over again.  Maybe we will do candy next year.  The mornings after the parades I take an extra plastic bag on our walk and pick up the candy wrappers and other trash.   This year there didn't seem to be as many.  However, in the parking strip beside the house that just went on the market for a million+250-dollars was a used disposable diaper.  The current state of our society is not great.  

 

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The Skeletons are coming out 10-19-23

There don't seem  to be  as many Halloween decorations in the neighborhood as there have been in the past.   More of the flying ghosts projected on garage doors, one even has spooky  sounds.   The giant skeleton is  up on  the next street, Brian.  Three doors north of us is a house with a lovely front patio with table and four  chairs. One year the skeletons were playing cards, and another year they  were roasting marshmallows.. This year they are just drinking, but  they have acquired both a dog and a cat!  And a huge sombrero.  

The little girl  is  sort of  hidden in the shrubs.

But, oh my goodness, the dog is on the table!  Horrors. 

Here is PaPa with his sombrero.  A Tijuana trip maybe. 

I contemplated moving a chair for a better  picture, but I don't know this family at  all, so it  would be really rude to rearrange their scene.  

I wonder if they intend for  this to resemble Michael Jackson. 

  Doubt  if he  would mind a dog on the table.

Not easily seen, the cat is pretty high up in the  tree. 

I showed KoKo the cat in the tree, but he wasn't interested.  Guess he didn't recognize it without an outer skin!

This is the same family a couple years ago.   Gave me a yearning for roasted marshmallows!  

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Not much to write about. 09-26-23

We go for our walks twice a day and sometimes that is  the only time we are outside. KoKo needs to go out back in the mid afternoon and due to  the coyotes who  roam night or  day, I go out  with him.   He only takes a few minutes, so there doesn't seem  to be much to write about.

I have been watching this fig tree growing on the next street. I had hoped the owners would share their crop. 

However, it looks like the birds are helping them selves.  Might not be anything left when they are  ripe  enough for people consumption.  There is also a  Fuyu tree  along our way and it is loaded, but still hard and green. 

This car was parked  nearby the other day  and I am  mystified what the black "tube" does, I've never seen such before.

 
It isn't a homemade  contraption, but seems to be made to fit the car. 

The vehicle  is a Toyota.  It is very shiny, so what looks  like dents is just reflection.

I guess the biggest news is that Halloween is just a month away and the decorations are going up.  Love these Shrek hands on the palm trees in this neighbor's yard.   They also have styrofoam headstones and huge fuzzy black spiders.  Brrrrrr!

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Walking and KoKo 11-22-21

I actually did some sewing today, but nothing I can share.  Mostly just working on UFOs and doing some repairs on quilts in TCQC.  Sleeves come loose, sometimes a few stitches on bindings are not secure, and loose threads have been missed.   I always put a TCQC label on the quilts and have been very lax the last year or so.  Out of labels and need to make some more.

KoKo and I do our two walks a day, some are longer than others.  There was a brush fire in Riverside County, which is about 40 miles away, and the Santa Ana wind was blowing toward the ocean, so we had smoke.  Didn't see any ash, but the wind was so strong I suspect it all just went out to sea.  I wore my mask, but KoKo doesn't, so we shortened our walk last evening.  Today it was still windy, but no smoke, so we did the full loop morning and night.  There are Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas decorations in yards.  I know a lot of people put up Christmas stuff the weekend after Thanksgiving, but I suspect some people are traveling so they decorated before they left.  

The giant skeleton is now wearing a fabric face, a coat and a hat!

Two black birds have been added - one at top left on his hand and one at bottom center on one of the pumpkins,  I guess black birds go with skeletons as well as black cats. 

This family took down their blow up ghost and the same day replaced it with a blow up turkey. 

Right next door to the skeleton in a basketball hoop.  He came down over the  week end, I kind of miss him. 

KoKo and Froggy are having a snuggle.  They do a lot of nose to nose snoozing.

A little more Halloween 11-02-21

 Missed a couple Halloween pictures on Sunday. 

This is pretty silly, but makes me laugh when i see it - twice a day!  It actually glows in the dark so if we walk late we still see it.  There are quite a few of these free standing basketball hoops around and this one is the only one I have ever seen anyone throwing balls.  So they do put it to good use.  

Great jack-o-lantern, eh?  Those scraggily teeth are toothpicks.  Very original.  Should I ever carve a jack it will have these teeth! 

And a look back....

This is a quilt I made for the monthly mini at Surfside Quilters Guild in 2013.  At that time I was still doing one monthly mini a year and this one was fun to make.  I haven't been asked to do minis lately, guess those days are over.  It is a pretty good fund raiser for the guild.  Tickets are six for $5 and one ticket is drawn for the winner.  

"Jack"  Del Thomas 2013  Approx 30" W x 24"L

I know I have posted this several times previously, but I do really like it!

https://delquilts.blogspot.com/2020/10/halloween-quilt-in-past-10-31-20.html

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Halloween 10-31-21

Lots of pictures tonight.  First of some decorations in the neighborhood.  Not so many this year, but they all went up early in the month.  

I posted an image of this guy on Oct 4th when he first appeared.  He is 12 - 15 feet tall.  I have added KoKo to this picture to provide a comparison.

Since that first picture this unfortunate child was added.  A little too creepy for me, but not as bad as a whole yard full of huge skeletons all the way down to cat and dog skeletons smaller than KoKo.  Br-r-r-r-r!

And here is KoKo with the skeleton's foot - about the same size!

Three houses north of us there is this skeleton family roasting marshmallows.  Again we have a child skeleton on someone's knee.  

At night there are blue lights and blazing coals (lights). 

This guy looks too happy to be a ghost.  The black bump at the bottom is a giant inflated spider.  Fortunately not lit so he isn't terribly scary. 

I like this row of "The Scream" ghosts made of corrugated fencing. 

Here are some of the skeleton animals.

Who appear in the front yard of this over-the-top display.

We don't usually do Halloween.  Just leave all the lights off until the Tricker-Treaters have finished their rounds.  However, this year some neighbors arranged a parade and asked us to set up a table on our driveway and greet the kids with treats.  I hauled out a chair and a bowl of quarters. KoKo wore his bunny ears, some of the time.  Great crowd of kids and parents, but they preferred the other side of the street and I only gave out 24 quarters.  NO leftover candy.  I always preferred coins over candy when I was a kid.  Of course, back then it was nickels or dimes.

They all gathered at the southern end of the street - SO many!

Neighbor Don led the parade in his Jeep.  Don't understand why, but he backed up all the way - at least to the corner five houses away.

Lots of costumes, even a dinosaur.  And see that tiny guy in blue at the far left - he was determined to walk/run by himself, but his dad was running close behind. 

This blue gal is one of those wind blown creatures used to attract attention at new businesses - they wave their arms and bounce on their skinny legs.  In the foreground is Muttley the dog who is always walked without a lease.  I am afraid someday a coyote will jump out and nab him for breakfast.  

The crowd in the cul de sac across the street, they were giving out candy by the handsful.  In the background one neighbor has put up a bounce house, but I didn't see anyone using it.  In costume?  Nooooo.  

Here is KoKo in his bunny ears.  He wouldn't wear them for very long, nor would he sit still for this picture. 

I had better luck with his back view. 

I think we will go back to no lights next year.  This was very tiring. 

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Halloween - again. 10-04-21

Halloween hasn't meant anything much to me since I was about 10, or maybe 14.  I don't understand the attraction so many seem to have with the "holiday".  Even before the 1st of the month the decorations were going up.  Some houses in my neighborhood will be heavily decorated by the time Halloween finally occurs the end of the month.  Odd. 

This fellow is very tall and I left the car in the image to show that he is actually taller than the palm trees.  Probably about 12 -14 feet!  He appeared about the 27th of September.  But I may not have seen him right away because he does blend in with the trees. 

Here is another giant, again 12 feet or more.  The wind rustles her/his robes which makes for special fright. 

This house is in the cul de sac across the street from us.  

Look  closely around the base of the tree to see silvery skulls and spikes, like cemetery gates, I guess.  

Tonight we had lightning and thunder and RAIN!  Not much, probably not enough to measure, but still refreshing.  Temp is supposed to drop from 90s to 70s for this week.  Feeling a little like autumn.  

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