Lovely Craft: Halloween

For the next six days, Pip worked not with screams, but with stitches. He cut and glued and tied. And on Halloween night, while the other houses on Willow Creek Lane had flashing skeletons and wailing ghosts, Pip’s front porch was… quiet.

Pip thought about that. A hug. He looked around his room. He saw the jar of shiny acorn caps. The basket of pinecone scales. The rainbow of embroidery floss. lovely craft halloween

The contest judges came by last: the town mayor, a dignified badger, and the owner of the Giggling Goblin Costume Shop. They looked at the house with the shrieking banshee. They looked at the house with the fog machine. Then they came to Pip’s house. For the next six days, Pip worked not

She held up a perfect little felt pumpkin. Pip thought about that

Mr. Otter, the mail carrier, read another: “For the mail carrier who always smiles, even in the rain.”

In the cozy little town of Willow Creek, Halloween was always a bit too loud and a bit too sticky for a young raccoon named Pip. His friends loved the goopy slime and the shrieking ghouls, but Pip preferred the soft rustle of autumn leaves and the quiet snip-snip of scissors. His favorite place was his attic room, filled with jars of dried flowers, spools of thread, and a mountain of felt.

The front yard was a “Felt Forest.” There were no zombies, but there were sleepy, smiling felt mushrooms as tall as toadstools. A crooked path made of brown felt circles led to the door. The bushes were made of piled-up green tulle, with felt fireflies sewn to the tips.