I’ve been having a hard time getting in the Halloween Spirit over the last few years, as you may have read. The idea of getting into costume seemed more like an unappealing hassle instead of something fun to do for one night a year. But having a husband whose favorite holiday is Halloween, I had to put my All Hallows Eve annoyance aside, and help him celebrate his favorite time of year. For weeks, my husband had been looking into “fun” things to do for Halloween week. Yes, a whole week of Halloween activities. You can guess my, um, enthusiasm. Our plans for the holiday slowly came together, yet our “couples costume” was still non-existent. We had parties to go to, friends to meet up with, and even tickets to Mickey’s Halloween Party at Disneyland, but I was still completely uninspired. Then one evening, two nights before our first Halloween outing, we decided to put the movie Up! on. It’s one of our favorite movies and we can never get through the first ten minutes without crying. It even inspired us to start our own “Paradise Falls” travel fund. And it hit me, we were going to Disneyland as part of our Halloween extravaganza, we might as well go as Disney characters! Carl and Ellie were two characters we could easily relate to, and the clothing they wore when they first met was both iconic AND easy to acquire! We already owned a few of the items, and the rest only took a trip to the thrift store and a Halloween shop. And what is more comfortable to wear than a pair of overalls?! I was actually excited again to get in costume. And once it all came together, it was pretty darn adorable....

This week continues the detailing of my love affair with San Francisco. Every time I visit the Bay, I discover something new that I love, and always leave with the want to explore even more. In this blog I’ll tell you about the Palace of Fine Arts, the Golden Gate Bridge 75th Birthday celebration, and (for all you book geeks) the semi-secret Dashiell Hammett Walking Tour. Since my husband watched The Rock for the first time, he’d always wanted to visit Alcatraz and the Palace of the Fine Arts. We’d covered thee Rock on our first trip to San Fran, and were never able to make it  to the Palace on subsequent trips. This time, the Golden Gate Bridge festivities were so close to it, we made certain to check it out. San Fran is an architectural gem. It has a mix of every architectural fad in the last 150 years. And then there’s the Palace of Fine Arts. It was designed in the “Beaux-Arts” fashion by Bernard Maybeck and William Gladstone Merchant. It was originally constructed for the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exhibition, preserved by the Hearst family, and then mostly demolished and rebuilt to be more structurally sound in the 1960’s. Today it’s a beautiful park, with even more beautiful architectural structures that can be enjoyed by all. If I lived in San Fran, I can definitely see myself going to the Palace to read scripts, design costumes, or have a romantic picnic. Basically, it would be one of my “zen” places. It had the perfect amount of people in it (not too many, not too little, but just right) and it had wildlife. Ducks, birds, swans, turtles, etc; there was enough wildlife to keep you happily entertained by their antics. As for the indoor...