Halloween -Aha

I didn't think I really read a lot of blogs. Last week I had to search to find ones that might actually interest me. I love learning about new technology, yet I haven't done any blogging except what was required through Moodle for my college grad courses. I waited hoping someone else would start the blogging process, but found myself with free time and decided to bite the bullet (later realizing that I was just duplicating someone else's work since I hadn't checked one of my five e-mail accounts, maybe it is time to sit down and figure out how to streamline them, but that is another topic.)  I could have spent hours playing with backgrounds and fonts, seeing about the technical design of the site, but trying to write and tell others my thoughts and ideas was not coming easy.

Give me a topic and I can do the research for you and tell you all the intimate details. Take the upcoming holiday season, I have been doing some research to help educate the youth I work with and also to help make some of our Halloween decorations authentic.

Halloween is my husband and my favorite holiday. We put up decorations with flashing lights, moving parts, and scary noises. I am an individual who like to know the "why" behind everything. So have learned more about why Halloween has come to be.

What we now call Halloween was a Celtic holiday called samhain.
Many of the customs of the Druids were adapted and celebrated during this time. They believed the souls of those just departed would wander the earth on this night, so many would put candles in their windows.

With the rise of the Catholic church, Pope Gregory II moved the holiday "All Hallows Eve" to coincide with samhain, in order to incorporate an already established holiday into a christian holiday. He hoped overtime the Celtic holiday would be forgotten and the christian holiday revered.

Overtime other rituals and customs were added into the mix, until we come to find what we now have Halloween. I don't think it the change of date for All Hallows Eve had the effect that Gregory had hoped for though.

Want to know more history:  http://www.history.com/topics/halloween