Sorry for such a delay, but everyone has been super busy, myself as well as my several photographers, so I’ve just barely gathered all the party photos and taken all my catchup photos. I still need to prepare some video to give you the full idea of my decor in a separate post, so my first tale told will be the party experience!
I say “experience” because this year was not just a party. In addition to the 6 ghosts and 7 moving portraits featuring the Verdigris family of Castle Brittahytta, Miss Hermione G. Wells was in the Library Laboratory explaining why she was not in person at her own party and why she needs your help, but that was just the beginning! The main event was an interactive mystery with an intricate plot told in 7 short acts over 2 hours, using two projectors and two VSA controller boards in the giant glowing-green-ecotplasm-powered steampunk device to show the “mad scientist” transmitting from Europe, the dead psychic medium leading the seance from inside an astral gateway vortex, and five ghosts summoned inside the large crystal ball using the energy of all the party guests participating in the seance…and there was even live interaction 
with Sir William Crookes and the Glowing Ghostly Guardian! You can get an idea by several photos here, but to understand and appreciate the full show experience, you will need to be patient for the full video I will be posting soon. In the meanwhile, some comments from party guests included “You really out-did yourself!” multiple times, “Loved solving the mystery!” and “Awesome main event! It was like being at a full scale amusement park!”
Of course our most ambitious party yet had to be threatened by the worst Halloween weather I have seen in 21 years! Couldn’t the California drought have continued for just a few more days? The only days it rained were the day of my party and Halloween day…*sigh* Definitely a lesson in worrying about what you can actually control, admittedly not a strength of mine, but also a lesson that my metal patio roof isn’t as watertight as it looks, since really forceful rain can push the overlapping roof pieces apart dumping water onto my normally 
dry patio! On Friday the wind was terrorizing me so badly I was literally frantic, and I was asking on Facebook for everyone to pray to anything they believed in for the afternoon to dry out to safely run electronics for my party, so Louie came to the rescue with a couple pop-up canopies for the backyard so we could still use the much-needed space for food tables and seating. Thank you so much, Louie! I think I will now be investing in a couple of those canopies for myself!
By party morning the wind had stopped but it was soaking wet everywhere. I thought I had covered all the electronics enough, but unfortunately two power circuits died overnight and wouldn’t come back just from GFCI reset because a couple power strips got wet from ground splash back, and they controlled all the front 
yard & roof lighting plus those ghosts, the patio fridge and all the lab lighting! Ghoulish Glen came over before noon, used my hairdryer to dry out what was the riskiest, and waited for others since the rain had stopped by early afternoon. He had the knowledge & his circuit tester to isolate the bad connections to remove them from the chain. Thankfully the fridge was back running first so the party food was safe, and he had everything running again by party time…hooray!
With all that weather mess and the extra delay of putting up the canopies the night before, plus unable to set the tables early as I hoped, I was way behind on food prep even though I had scaled back my menu this year intentionally! My dear friend Tash, featured each year for Annual Halloween Shopping Weekends, came by herself this year all the way from Truckee, so she arrived at 3pm and said she was my “minion,” tackling anything I asked, no matter how dirty the job! There is no way this party would have happened without her and Ghoulish Glen both helping on party day! Thank you both so much!!!
With them both helping, I got the last unused steampunk junk stashed in the garage, and barely jumped in the shower at 6pm! The biggest food project that couldn’t be done by others was a plot point, so I got my makeup, wig & most of my costume on by party start time, but no crown or cloak since I was still doing food prep. That ended up working well, since I didn’t match any of the ghosts not in full costume, so I didn’t have to be in character, and I was another part of the 
mystery until my big reveal in full costume in Act 7! The first act of the main show started at 8pm just as advertised, I switched the big TV from the portrait to the patio webcam feed, and I was out watching the audience and the show along with my Scream Team, excited that the guests were intrigued and loving it! Then I was back in the kitchen busy frantically mixing up 6 different flavors of jalapeño jelly green ectoplasm slime test tube shots before they were required at the end of Act 6!
A few guests were driving to the party in an absolute downpour of rain with wipers on full blast, but thankfully we only had a couple drizzles during the party, and the wind stopped by around 5pm so we could reset all the towers & spires yet again barely in time. After all our bad weather luck causing delays, we pulled it out in the end, all ghosts and portraits worked, the castle stayed intact as needed, and the main event worked, but I didn’t get many photos of my own, so I am very thankful both Tash and Cat did such a great job taking photos! I never would have seen any of the Creepy 
Cuisine if Tash hadn’t been taking food photos! Only 56 of us for this party compared to 80+ last year ended up being a blessing, since that made sure everyone who wanted to could watch the main event, either live on the patio or in the living room on the patio webcam feed on the big TV and speaker feed coming all the way from the back patio. Very glad that all worked, and even all three webcams stayed working all party, at least on the local network!
We had a ton of fantastic costumes despite the weather, too many to post individually, so check out the full gallery below. I am so glad everyone could show their creativity, and that Cat was able to get most of them 
documented for posterity! Costume prizes and Creepy Cuisine are traditions, and even though I thought Ogle the Owl must be getting old by now, a longtime guest told me how much she looks forward to it, and several newcomers loved it too! The problem is I have so many owls by now that it was too hard to edit my collection down to 21 on party display, so maybe next time it will be an undisclosed number of owls & see if anyone finds them all? 
We 
also had two new contests related to the main show. Studying Spirits was to find the true names of all seven spirits haunting the castle using the portraits and other family heirlooms around the castle, and Exploring Ectoplasm Essences was matching the flavor profiles to which ghost’s ectoplasm collection location. I made Edible Medals again and had extras, so a runner-up was awarded in each category as well, using the loudest cheering for the costume awards. Here are the winners!
Scariest Costume: Kevin S as Silence from Doctor Who, Billy as Skeletor
Most Creative Costume: Lori as R2D2, Comic Suit Kip
Ultimate Costume: Firefly Family, Gangster Family
Supreme Spirit Savant: Keith & Doug
Exceptional Ectoplasm Essence Explorer: Ashlyn, Erica
Outstanding Owl Ogler: Eleanor, Angie, Katie, Mike
Creepy Cuisine: Scary Jerry for Toxic Cupcakes, Tracia for Coffin Cakes, Kevin C in absentia (and Kip because I still had cookies)
Since the main show ended about 10:20pm, after the awards several people started leaving, but that was the “how did you do it?” question time! There were actually more story questions than technical questions, which surprised us. We admit the story was probably a bit too involved for a party, when sometimes people would end up talking or laughing over plot points, let alone a bit complicated for people imbibing alcohol, so next time we will work on a less intricate mystery….but overall the feedback was 
positive and people liked the story! Go Ghoulish Glen our Ghost Writer! 
The very last people to stay around waited and watched the portraits to see our new surprises for this year. Queen Ergelise left her piano portrait in search of her sister Sarina over the fireplace, and in the hallway Queen Meresinine aka “Merry” sneaked into the 
Pumpkin Queen’s portrait to tease her. They must have just barely missed her the first time, since it took over 20 minutes of watching, but they were rewarded! The full gallery for this post is below, with photos from Tash, myself, and I’ve included some of Cat’s here, but to see all of her fantastic photos, either go to her professional website for the full glory, or go to her Facebook album to see comments along with the photos. Thanks to everyone who braved the weather to come celebrate with us!
I had a record number of overnight guests, and it was a lovely Sunday morning after the storm, so we ate our waffle and baked egg brunch in the backyard after I had only 90 minutes of sleep after doing dishes into the wee hours! I was so exhausted after they left that I took a 3-hour nap, then only had time for a quick peek at my own photos Sunday night while I did laundry and packed, since what do you do when you’ve just pulled off the most ambitious Halloween project in 21 years? You go to DISNEYLAND! 
Stay tuned for that amazing trip, then back to more detailed party decor!
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