We made it to the end!  Well, maybe.  I can’t know for sure if you’re going to read the whole post but I’ll give you the benefit of doubt.  If you read till the end, there will be prizes and confetti and strippers.  Okay, that’s a lie.  I’m sorry.

Welcome to the last installment of This is Halloween.  This series has covered each year we have spent Halloween Week in Orlando.  Here’s the recap of 2013.  This was the 4th year we went to Universal and Disney World for all the Halloween festivities.

The following video of Halloween Horror Nights 2013 only covers the scare zones, not the houses.  And of course, I don’t expect you to watch a 10 minute video but you can fast forward through it to get a good feel of the theme for 2013.  If you’re a Walking Dead fan, you’ll love it.  2013 scare zones were all Walking Dead, all the time.  I don’t watch the show but I did recognize most of the iconic backdrops.

I did not go through any houses that year, something I really regret now.  At the time, though, I felt like shit.  I would find out the next day at the emergency clinic that I had bronchitis.  Not fun.

If I had it to do over again, I would go through two houses that year – American Werewolf In London and Cabin In The Woods.

I remember as a teenager thinking that American Werewolf was the best horror movie of all time and the special effects for 1981 were mind blowing.  Cabin In The Woods is my favorite modern horror movie.  One of my favorite movies of all time from any genre is Army of Darkness.  AoD bridged the distance between horror and comedy in a way I had never seen before.  Cabin wasn’t that campy but it had just enough humor to make you almost forget it was a pretty gnarly horror movie and in that way, it reminded me a lot of AoD.

There aren’t a lot of pictures from that night, as E and Landon split off to do the houses.  Gracie and I did our best to hide from the zombies on the streets and were mostly successful.  I mainly spent my time feeling up Lard Lad while Gracie took pictures.  That’s the kind of Mom I am.

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For Mickey’s Not So Haunted Halloween Party, we decided to tackle all new Harry Potter characters, except for Harry Potter, of course.  Landon was The Chosen One himself, Gracie made an awesome Luna Lovegood and could even talk exactly like her, E was Mad-Eye Moody, and I was Bellatrix Lestrange.  Again, not many pictures were taken because I had bronchitis and the antibiotics hadn’t kicked in yet.  It was still a great night.  E was the most popular character this time around and was stopped a few times by people asking to get a  picture with him.

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Did I mention I had bronchitis?  Because I did.  I’m a trooper like that.

Thank you for sharing these memories with me!  I will upload a picture of us in costume sometime in the late afternoon/early evening hours right here on the blog on October 30th so check back often that day.  Get your finger limbered up for the refresh button.  If you want to save your finger from refresh button fatigue, follow me and you’ll get an email message every time I post a blog.  Or, if you prefer, I can post my blog link to your Facebook wall every hour on the hour.  Your choice.  Personally, I’d just hit the damn little blue “Follow” button somewhere on this page and be done with it.

We’ve had a few snags this week in the costume prep department but I think it will still all come together in spectacular fashion.  Have a great weekend, y’all, and Happy Halloween Week!  Be safe out there.