Day o' Lyndsey

Some people call it All Hallows' Eve.

To some it is Reformation Day.

In Peru it has become "Dia de la cancion criolla" (Peruvian music celebration).

To most it's simply Halloween.

But in recent years there has been a push to recognize 

the most important holiday that falls on October 31:

Day o' Lyndsey!

Yes, it's a very important day and I hope you were able to celebrate with friends and food and maybe some sort of ridiculous attire. If you didn't eat your weight in candy corn then you probably weren't doing it right.

Anyway, since Day o' Lyndsey happened to fall right after a week of travel, a women's retreat, and right before another week of travel, I was kind of limited as to my planning for the event. Being away from your best friends and family for your birthday can be kind of depressing, so I wanted to make sure I could celebrate with my coworker "family" here in Lima and spend the time enjoying their friendship instead of missing home. I also thought it would be a good excuse to try a bunch of things I had seen on Pinterest and had been wanting to do. So after the retreat I spent the next solid day shopping and cooking and cleaning up the apartment since this was also the first time we were hosting anything in our place.

I had a lovely birthday with lots of sweet wishes from people back home. (And thanks to the Peruvian mail system I am getting to extend my birthday celebration waiting on cards even now. Hehe.)  I also had a lot of fun with everyone who came by. I really enjoyed coming up with the recipes and decorations and was so blessed to have such great friends to celebrate another year with.

Here are pics of the party and links to recipes that I based mine on:

Classy, right?

Guacamole pumpkin

Owl cupcakes. 

Mini caramel apple bites.

I got tired of trying to separate Peruvian oreos, which do not separate easily, for owl eyes. So I decided to crumble them up and make dirt and worm cakes too.

Cheesecake filled strawberries, dipped in chocolate. 

Spicy cheesy spinach dip with a bell pepper octopus. He was cuter when he had his tentacles arranged and no dip on his face, but I didn't get a pic before people started eating. Dip was pretty tasty!

Spread.

Ellen made me a birthday cake! And put 2 and 6 candles on it. :-)

Fun times with friends.

Excited about cake!

With Evelyn, who loves a good party. 

My friends aren't weird at all. Suuure. 

Norah helped me celebrate too!

Since I didn't have time to carve a real jack-o-latern, I just stuck a candle in the sick one.  Haha.

 Happy Day o' Lyndsey!
And many thanks to all who helped me celebrate and made my birthday so very special.
Here's to another year of blessings.