Ask Elnora--About Masquerades? Lenora Worth

So yesterday, we asked to see some costume pictures. I'll get back to that in a minute. But all this talk of dressing up got Elnora to thinking. What is it about masquerades that bring out the strangeness in people. Here we have a big party each Halloween called artscare (with no caps). Artscare is put on by the local Arts Council and Elnora used to be a social reporter for a local magazine and artscare was actually one of my first assignments. I know you won't believe this, but I'm rather shy and entering a dark room full of people wearing masks and heavy make-up almost had me running away in fear. I didn't masquerade. Elnora wore a black tuxedo suit with a jack-o-lantern scarf slung around my neck. That's about as costumey as I get. Kind of James Bond meets Ichabod Crane. Wearing pumps. Anyway, it was fun to take pictures of people dressed as zombies, gypsies, rock stars, mad scientists and fairy princesses. Just another day in high society. And given the fact that I live in the land of Mardi Gras, I see a lot of strange costumes all year long. It's alway fun to see what people will come up with. So that begs the question--Why do we like to masquerade as someone else? Why is it fun to change our appearance into something else just for laughs? Or for scares?? Here is a picture of my group of friends and me at Mardi Gras a few years ago, celebrating The Wizard of Oz theme. We were "Good Witches', of course!

Let's talk about dressing up in costumes. And in the meantime, let's celebrate our costume winner--Beth N--who was brave enough to send me this picture of her dressed as a Centurion. Beth writes that this is her favorite costume. She wore it at a kids program she helped lead at her church. She told the story of the Centurion from Luke 7 wearing this amazing costume. Congratulations, Beth. I will get your mailing address and send you the promised prizes! If anyone else is brave enough to share a picture, we'd love to see it!

Thank you, Beth, for sharing. Now, everyone, how can we apply this masquerade theme to our stories? Readers, do you like this type of theme? Let's discuss!

What's your favorite Costume? Lenora Worth

I'm popping in early today to invite all our bloggers to share pictures with us of their favorite costumes--Halloween, Fall Festival, Mardi Gras, you name it, we'd like to see it. Tomorrow, Elnora will pick a winner and I'll send that winner a copy of "The Life of Riley", my November release from Superromance. (And I'll throw in one of my current Love Inspired books, too.) Send the picture to me through my website: http://www.lenoraworth.com I want to see lots and lots of pictures! I have one that of myself that brings back memories. I'm not a big costume person, but this particular party, Big Daddy and I went to as Santa and Mrs. Claus on vacation. So I'm not that costumed, but I do have on a Santa hat with my casual beachy outfit. One year, I went as a palm tree, complete with fronds on my head and he was a beach bum who hung out around my tree. (I had coconuts hanging around my neck, too.) I've been a flapper and a tree with fall leaves and once I went to a church fall festival as a spider. I made that outfits with black trash bags and duct tape! It's fun to go a little wild now and then! Let's see what you've got! If you can't send a picture, tell us about some of your costumes. Here I am as Mrs. Santa on vacation: