Friday the 13th

What could be more perfect to start this day, Friday the 13th, with watching the original, Friday the 13th movie!?

Did you know that Friday the 13th movies, have their very own dedicated website!?

Friday the 13th Films

The very first one came out in 1980 with the intent to follow up on the great scary Halloween movie released in 1978!

There are 12 of these films:

Friday the 13th,

Friday the 13th, Part 2

Friday the 13th, Part III

Friday the 13th, The Final Chapter

Friday the 13th: A New Beginning

Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives

Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood

Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan

Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday

Jason X

Freddy vs. Jason

Friday the 13th (2009)

I stopped watching or got lost as to which one I left off at somewhere after The Final Chapter. I think I saw a couple others, bits and pieces of the others, no telling now as one seemed to blur into another for me.

But I distinctly remember going to the movies when the first one came out. (Yes, I am that old! LOL)

I was in 10th grade and my friend and her mom and I went to go see it one night, probably on a Friday night it was. I absolutely loved it too! It was scary for us kids back then and we jumped multiple times and they even screamed a few times or at least made some startled gasps and noises!

The best part however, was afterwards....yes, after the movie was over and my friend's mom had to drive me home.....muuhhahahaaaha....

You see, I lived back in the woods along a small creek in Pennsylvania. The winding road went up and down and around and there are no street lights, only the eerie glow of the moon peeking through the trees and shining eerie shadows into the night. I was in the backseat of their car and my friend sat up front with her mom. As we got to a particularly dark area of the road, I leaned forward and whispered in that low sing-song chant that we all know is probably one of the spookiest, scariest sounds, at least back then it was....

CH-CH-CH-CH-CH-AAAH--AAHH--AAAHHHH!!!!

Oh man!! They jumped and laughed and fussed at me!! LMAO! It was sooo funny! :)

Ok, so you had to be there...back in 1980....ahahaha...

So just what is that sound suppose to be? Here is an explanation from IMDb of how they got that sound effect:

"Composer Harry Manfredini has said that contrary to popular belief, the famous "chi chi chi, ha ha ha" in the film's score is actually "ki ki ki, ma ma ma". It is meant to resemble Jason's voice saying "kill kill kill, mom mom mom" in Mrs. Voorhees' mind. It was inspired by the scene in which Mrs. Voorhees seems to be possessed by Jason and chants "Get her mommy....kill her!" Manfredini created the effect by speaking the syllables "Ki" and "Ma" into a microphone running through a delay effect."

Although Kane Hodder is best known for playing Jason, having played him several times, I got to meet Derek Mears, who played Jason for the 2009 remake when I was at Scarefest last year in Lexington, KY!

It is wild to see Kevin Bacon in this first movie. I forget he is in it.

This movie only took 28 days of filming. After I saw it, it kinda gave me the woogies next time our family went up camping at Schroon River in NY as the beach with the floating dock and lake with the woods all around, felt very similar to the setting of this movie. But unlike the movie, we never had a serial killer coming after us, just a friendly game amongst us kids of Kick the Can and Uno and Checkers.

Of course, I wouldn’t recommend this movie for kids at all. The teens are having sex and it’s pretty obvious and although it is an 80s movie, it’s still pretty bloody and graphic.

Possible reasons why people think Friday the 13th is unlucky, check out this link:

http://gizmodo.com/why-people-think-friday-the-13th-is-unlucky-1306401570

I know of several hotels that refuse to have a 13th floor or even a 13th room.

Despite all of that, many people I know now, including myself, find that 13 is actually a lucky number and I believe it is really about psyching yourself out. If you think it’s unlucky, it will be or you will attribute anything and everything towards the unluckiness of the day.

Believe it is lucky and it will be. Power of positive thinking.

Of course, I wouldn’t go camping at Camp Crystal Lake on Friday the 13th…. ;)

Or would I? 

Now if you are wanting a good scare and are here in the DFW area, just for your fright pleasure, Moxley Manor Haunted House is open tonight for the first night of the season! Check them out! Even if you have visited before, check them out again for it isn’t the same as what you remember….this haunt is always creating and updating and twisting and turning so that each time you visit, you just never know what might be lurking around the corner, waiting for you…..muuuahahahaa!!

Happy Friday the 13th!

Bugs n Hisses!

Witches' Night Before Halloween by Lesley Pratt Bannatyne

While attending Scarefest last year in Lexington, KY, I stopped by many vendors' tables and talked with the people. At one table, there was a nice lady there, Lesley Pratt Bannatyne, selling a few books she had written about Halloween.

As I am always on the lookout for good books on Halloween for kids as I have been collecting some of the classics, both Halloween and other award winning books alike, this one caught my eye.

 

Witches' Night Before Halloween

Illustrated by Adrian Tans and I have to say the animations are just adorable! In every pic, as is his signature at least in this book, is a frog! Love it!

The book is about things that witches do to prepare for Halloween and all told in clever rhymes!
It's a very cute book I thought for Halloween. :)

For some reason, I just couldn't put it down nor walk away without it.  She signed it for me also! :)

Bagging the Candy!

I recently was watching one of my favorite Halloween shows, The Halloween Tree, with my grown daughter (and later with her boyfriend's help) as we were bagging the Halloween candy. (500 bags!!) Each year you see, I get ziplock bags and a lot of candy and I bag the candy into equal portions so that each kid who comes to my house, trick or treating on Halloween night, will get the same amount of candy. Also, since I am bagging it all, I know exactly how many bags I have and therefore, when Halloween is over, I just count the bags that are left and I will know exactly how many kids came by on Halloween night. This helps me to prepare for the next year. Last year, I had 343 kids come thru the Haunted Cave! They came from as far as Euless and downtown Fort Worth! Simply amazing! From Euless it is over 20 miles away! They had heard about my place and came up! I was so touched. But I refuse to ever run out of candy and so I am always prepared!

Here is just some of the candy about ready to be bagged:

I have added a Halloween sticker and a jumping spider to each ziplock bag as well. Usually it's a spider ring or some kind of little trinket.

I also do put together gift bags (100) of extra items and I have stuffed animals and such for the little kids who can't eat candy so much. I collect the stuffed animals usually after Halloween is over or from garage sales or some that I won in arcade machines or on the boardwalk at Seaside, NJ. The gift bags are limited and normally I have them outside for kids to take but they swarmed last year hahahaa so I will be keeping them with me to hand out instead. I also give away seek and find pc games I've played once or old movies or Halloween music cds. Straws, puzzles, pencils, stickers, tattoos, bubbles, mini notebooks...are just some of the items in the gift bags.

We also have small water pod bottles to hand out and glow bracelets for the first 100 kids. I am fixing up the plastic container I had bought for a party to hold sodas and thought it would be good to use it again for Halloween for the water. It was red, but faded to pink in the sun! DOH! So I am in the middle of spray painting it and will blog a post of how I did it to make it look like flames coming up as a cauldron! :) This is the water so far:

There will be cupcakes, cookies and some extra candy as well possibly, depending on how hot Halloween ends up being. I'll take pics as it gets closer to Halloween as I make them.

Halloween is always a huge to-do for me. While checking out this year at a grocery store, a cashier told me it was too dangerous for her to hand out candy at night, so she turns her lights out that night. She just shook her head at me to see me having so much candy and the bagger men said the way to cure having to buy so much candy was to turn the lights out. DOH!
I told them, no, not likely I will do that as my garage becomes a haunted cave! :)

I found this so sad. I feel lucky in that my neighborhood is safe and we do not have any problems on Halloween night. I can't ever see me turning my lights out and not having some type of setup for the kids.

Why do I do this? some might ask....

I will tell you...

It is for many reasons. First, to see the kids' faces when they come in their costumes and watch them face their fears in order to get candy. And this one night out of the whole year, they get to dress up and be whoever they want to be. They can be their hero, Thor, Spiderman, Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman or a fairytale princess, butterfly or any cartoon character they wish! They can be fairies, mermaids, wizards, witches, mummies, werewolves, vampires....anything their own creativity and minds can think up!

I am also there until the very end, around 9:30 or 10 pm even to be sure all the kids who are going to come have come. I remember a couple years ago when a kid got out late and he was so sad that everyone else had turned their lights out long ago and they had run out of candy and his bag was so empty. I felt so bad for him. So I took his bag and filled it with a bunch of candy that I had left over and I gave him two fistfuls of the giant pixie stix too and he ran down the street full of glee and yelled back over his shoulder, "Never stop doing Halloooooweeeeeennnnnn!!!!"
Hahhahaa! I loved it! That just made my night to have been able to put a smile on his face like that.

No other holiday am I able to do something like that. My turn to give back just as the many parents and adults had given candy out when I was a kid and to my own two kids, now it is my turn to give back to the kids of today.

Halloween for me is not about evil or sinful things or anything negative at all. It is a time for the kids to be who they want to be. Get together with friends and laugh and talk and see all the crazy and scary setups, go to local haunts, and see how giving people really can be.

And now, lately, I have begun to do what I used to do as room mom for my kids when I brought in goodies for the kids and had holiday parties, teach. I used to teach the origins of the holidays, dispelling fears. For Halloween, I helped kids to not be afraid of ghosts, for those who came along during Halloween, when the veil between the worlds is the thinnest, that those ancestors are their own and would they be afraid of their grandmother? No. So I have included in our video projections, some history of Halloween and I will be continuing that each year, including more history of the different countries and their beliefs and holiday celebrations, making Halloween a truly fun time for the kids and educational at the same time, and even more so, giving them the memories to carry with them for a lifetime! :)

Do you know, I have a haunted cave where kids come thru to get their candy and many, when they see the wonder of the black lit cave as parts of their costumes light up and glow from it, they come thru again and again and are so honest when I went to give them candy, they tell me, "No thank you, you already gave me candy, I just wanted to come thru again!" :)
You have to like kids who are that damn honest. You really do.

So yea, so long as I have at least one kid to come knock on my door, I will never turn out my lights and I will 'never stop doing Halloween! :)

The Halloween Tree by Ray Bradbury

Can you believe it? That great cartoon movie is from the book authored by none other than Mr. Ray Bradbury himself!

The Halloween Tree is my very favorite Halloween cartoon movie for kids and adults alike. It is a very enjoyable movie and it explains why the kids are wearing the type of costumes they are and they are taken back in time to places that they originated at, loosely, I will add for some of them.

This movie also shows the love of friendships made and what a group of friends would do for their friend Pip. It is so heartwarming and wonderful, I find myself still tearing up towards the end.

I have always wanted to create a Halloween Tree similar to what you see in this movie, but I'd need a lot bigger tree than what I have for it!

This movie has become a great classic to watch at this time of the year and a most treasured favorite! If you have not seen it yet, be sure and catch it and I hope you do enjoy it as much as we do! :)

Dr. Seuss - It's Grinch Night!

Everyone is familiar with How The Grinch Stole Christmas, but not many know about Dr. Seuss' It's Grinch Night!

This came out in 1977 and it was once released as "Halloween is Grinch Night!"

It's about how the Grinch is plotting to terrorize and scare the people of Whoville on Halloween and how one kid wanders out to the 'Euphemism" and ends up facing his fears to help save his family and town from the scary shenanigans of the Grinch.

It's a cute animation and is an Emmy Award Winner. :)
Here it is on Youtube:

For those who can't get enough of the Grinch, it's a great addition to your collection and for the kids' Halloween collection!

I watched it again just yesterday with my daughter as we put together the Halloween cupcake boxes for all the cupcakes we are to give away on Halloween Night.

I like to put the cupcakes I give away in these cute little cupcake boxes. They hold one cupcake each and have an insert to hold it upright and stop it from sliding around in the box. It does allow for quite a lot of room at the top for your icing and decorations. I got these from Oriental Trading Company. I also have regular black and orange boxes and some other Halloween iconic cupcake boxes.  Sometimes you can get them on sale as well! :) 

Since it is so hot outside here in Texas still, it's hard to work out in the garage so I like to do as much as I can inside the house and really enjoy the buildup for Halloween while watching Halloween specials and shows and movies while doing something like putting these boxes together or bagging the candy or filling the gift bags. As I watch different movies or shows, I'll put up a review here of them. :)

In the meantime, if you like the Dr. Seuss movies/cartoons, you can pick up not only Grinch Night, but a single dvd over on Amazon that includes Green Eggs and Ham, The Sneetches,  The Zax, and Grinch Night! The Sneetches is one of my favorites as well!

Check it out:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00009ZVNO

~*Bugs N Hisses*~

Wanda

Oriental Trading Company Freebies Again!

I just wanted to give a shout out to The Oriental Trading Company for their freebie page here:

http://www.freefunhalloween.com/halloween-recipes/

Check out their links at the top as well for more fun Halloween ideas!

I often visit Oriental Trading Company around this time of the year to order some of the free novelties and trinkets that I give away in my candy bags and gift bags. Some of my favorites to give away is the plastic jumping spiders and the scaredy cats for the little kids who are too scared to go into my Haunted Cave. :)
I get an assortment of items, stickers, tattoos...etc. I love to get the glow in the dark items if I can as they are the most fun for the kids.

So do check them out! Also, if you think you will be purchasing from them often as they are great for party decorations as well, be sure to sign up and collect points so you can get discounts or coupons in your email for later purchases! :)