First, respect to the creators who can creatively capture their creation process. For me, the space to be creative is given in tiny windows of opportunity and always seems to turn it into something like a tornado—me being tossed in the whirlwinds of trying to actualize an idea. All the while questioning if (and how) I should capture the process of it all for an IG reel.
Rewind to Saturday—it is one o’clock in the morning, and I am in my PJs, looking like a mad scientist trying to re-create Green Hill Zone from the Sonic the Hedgehog video game. Ash was super excited about Trunk or Treat this year at his school. We didn’t go last year. I tried to get him to ease into it this year––go but not participate. However, he strongly felt Sonic deserved a place in the trunk festivities, so I obliged.
His birthday this year (which I realize I did not do a dedicated blog post about) was themed Sonic, so because I could reuse the large Sonic cardboard cutout again, I agreed it would be an excellent choice for Trunk or Treat. The plan was to create Green Hill Zone in the car’s trunk–simple enough, right? Of course that was a rhetorical question because nothing is ever simple.
I had approximately one week to make it happen. I Amazon primed a few things—six-inch Styrofoam circles (which, thank goodness, did not melt when spray painted), a plastic ocean printed table cloth, invisible hanging wire, and a lightweight vinyl sky backdrop! The letters, grass prop, spray paints, and card stock paper I collected between JoAnn Fabrics and Michaels.
It was stressful, but in a fun way. A huge thank you to my sister for coming over and helping me paint Styrofoam, cut construction paper, and pass out candy to what seemed like a thousand kids! Our first Trunk or Treat would not have been a success without her! We got a lot of votes, and even some kiddos requested to take pictures with our car, but we still did not snag first place for car design (it must have been rigged because ours was definitely the best, in my opinion). Next year though…
Wishing you a safe and creative Halloween.
