For all your Halloween items, the Suite Co-op store is the place to do all your shopping. By buying here, you'll help to keep Suite free.
Gardeners tend to be choosy people. They want to do a good job with their Halloween decorations, and the same is true at Christmas. Now there is a powerful landscape program that will let you know what your outdoor Halloween and Christmas deocrations are going to look like before you ever do them. "3D Landscape for Everyone" from Upperspace is available as a download. It has many sophisticated features, but is very user-friendly. Regardless of your computer experience, this program will not disappoint you. It even has a nighttime 3D viewer that will let you see your holiday lights and decorations at their very best. You can choose plants, garden art, ponds, sprinkler systems, and swimming pools for your designs. Then you can save and print them for later use.
One of the age-old Halloween customs is bobbing for apples. How did this holiday and its zany customs originate?
Halloween is an intriguing mixture of Catholic and pagan practices. It combines elements from the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain, the Pomona day of the Romans, and the Christian All Saints Day.
Bobbing for apples was a divination ritual. The first person to bite on the apple will be the next one to marry. In this case, the goal is to bite into an apple floating in water or hanging on a string.
Another method of peering into the future involved peeling an apple in front of a mirror with the aid of candlelight. As a girl did this, she would see her future husband appear in the mirror to replace her reflection.
The length of the peel foretold one's life expectancy. A lengthy one meant you would be blessed with a long life.
Why was the apple chosen for this? According to Celtic myths, the apple is associated with female deities that control the success of love. The area around the core of the apple is in the shape of a star with five points, or a pentagram. To see this, you'll need to cut a fruit into half crosswise. This particular shape was a terribly important symbol for the Celts, and represented the Goddess.
