BOO!

Halloween has come and gone and, all told, we got about two dozen trick-or-treaters. More than last year but still not a very impressive turnout. At least this time around, they were all appropriately young and cute and in costume.

I also tried my hand at decorating, but that was less than impressive too. The plastic Target pumpkins in the window were cute enough and the cat helped set the mood (pity he isn't completely black):

But the lights left a lot to be desired. See, we don't have any outdoor electrical socket, so we can't use lights that need to be plugged in. The closest plug is in our breezeway, which would require running the cord under the door and also having to actually go out there to turn everything on and off. So I decided last year, while shopping the after-Halloween sales, to try out solar-powered lights. D laughed at me. And, apparently, rightly so.

Nothing happened. Absolutely nothing. After stringing the cute little orange LEDs around our light post and staking the panel into the ground, making sure that it wasn't covered with grass, I expected at least a dim glow. But even after moving the panel around on various days to test different spots, we got no results.

We have a lot of trees in our neighborhood, so even though our house faces south and we have had some sunny weather, maybe there's just too much shade to power up the lights? But the instructions say that even shade and cloudy weather will charge the lights. So the question is, are we doomed to never use solar-powered decorations or did I just buy a dud?

Either way, Happy November!

(Oh, and don't forget to take this poll from last week!!!)