I guess you could pretend it’s not Halloween next week. There’s plenty going on this weekend: a great new exhibit opening, a really big consignment sale, walks to raise money for pancreatic cancer research and special needs kids. You can look at birds, and explore cultural venues downtown, and learn about water conservation and trains (both model and big).

Though why you would want to ignore it is beyond me. Candy. Dressing up. Candy just for dressing up. I understand you might want to avoid the scares, but really most of the spooks are of the ha ha kind, not so much bring out the defibrillators. (Though there is some of that.)  And you could always use that old standby “Harvest”  (with "Fall" as a close second) as your excuse for downing fistfuls of sugary goodness. (Candy corn grows in fields, doesn’t it?)

You say po-TAH-to; I say Happy Halloween. Harvest on, my friends.

Keep reading for our most Hallo-harvesty picks for this weekend....

There are so many places your kids can wear Halloween costumes this weekend—assuming you have your costumes. Which I do (not to brag). You can wear them at the Zoo (We did that last week! Way fun!). You can wear them at the Natural History Museum (to trick-or-treat—free candy for being ahead of the game and having your costume early). You can wear them to the Disney Store's Halloween Dress Rehearsal (where you can not only wear this year's costume;  you can plan ahead and buy next year's costume while you're there—score!).

(Psssssst! You there, with the kid: if you don't actually have this year's costumes yet, your kids can totally wear something from last year. It's not like they have an expiration date on them, am I right? You can use this weekend to augment your costume with accessories or masks, or trade your way to a new and improved pre-loved costume. There are even events in malls, where rumor has it you can sometimes use money to buy things.)

And who says you have to wear a costume at all? Halloween is still two weeks away, and there are tons of events without an orange and black color scheme. Hello, Cirque du Soleil in Costa Mesa!  Hey there, CicLAvia in the heart of LA! What's cookin, CAKE Expo, also in Costa Mesa? Seriously, what up, Costa Mesa?  Didn't you get the memo about Halloween?

Keep reading for our most festively adorned picks for this weekend....

This weekend is going to be hot. So hot it sizzles. So hot you’ll think that you’re in that lava pit that (spoiler alert) Anakin fell into in Revenge of the Sith and not just reading about it. So hot you'll feel like you’re actually on the surface of Venus and not just talking to the rocket scientists who send probes there. So hot that people are going to say, "What are you? A Mommy Poppins mama?" Dudes, it’s going to be hot.

But that’s okay. We’re Southern Californians. It takes a lot to scare us. Like, you know, spiders, haunted ships, elephants eating pumpkins, and Mickey Mouse in a costume. Okay, what? Those last two aren't even scary. Just fun, seasonal frivolity. But that's life here. Always fun, always in season...

But enough with the hot already, okay? (Cue El Niño in 3, 2, 1...)

Keep reading for our hottest picks for this weekend....

Hey, remember when we were kids, and Halloween was only one night? Yeah. Good times. Of course, we also rode in cars without seat belts and ran with fire, so maybe everything wasn't better back then. Either way, the genie is out of the bottle, and Halloween is well underway in Southern California.

Starting now, you can celebrate Halloween at the zoo, at Legoland, at Underwood Farms, at Knott's Berry Farm, at Descanso Gardens, at Fillmore and Western Railway, and at Disneyland. There are mazes and haunts and rides and pumpkin patches. Spirited costume shops are popping up all over town, and Trader Joe's is selling a pumpkin version of every product.

True, you can kid yourself that October is about other things besides Halloween, like maybe books or angels or horses or stars or pie.  You might even convince yourself for a little while. But soon enough you're going to notice that everything gives you an idea for a costume, and then you realize that any adventure that ends with a full bag of candy can't be all bad.

Keep reading for our spookiest picks for this weekend....

This weekend, we moon you six ways to Sunday.  We're going to fool moon you, harvest moon you, and blood moon you; we're going to moonrise you,  Chinatown moon you, and now-you-see-me, now-you-don't, lunar eclipse moon you. We might even moon you in other ways, but pics or it didn't happen, capiche?

And because nothing is more welcome when the Earth is plunged into total darkness than a visit from those eight-legged creatures of the class arachnida, we're gonna throw in some spiders for good measure. Lots of them. Roaming free. Possibly hungry for blood, possibly not. Definitely creepy crawly.

And though the sky may or may not be falling, it is in fact fall, so throw back a few pumpkin lattes and reconnect with the earth. Start plotting which autumn harvest train ride, pumpkin patch, happiest spookfest in So Cal you're going to hit. (It's never too early to break out the costumes, and no one has ever looked a free treat in the mouth).

Did some one say free treat? Hello! Free coffee and donut! Who loves ya, baby? Mommy Poppins, that's who; to the moon and back!

 Keep reading for our mooniest picks for this weekend....

Who needs yogurt? This weekend, LA is full to the brim with its own live, active (and sometimes mummified) culture. We have culture of the museum variety, with a new exhibit opening at each of the Discovery Cube locations (Curious what they are? I'll race ya to find out!); the Natural History Museum proves everything ancient is new again, and the latest museum to open will have the whole town talking (mostly about how to pronounce its name).

Our culture reflects many cultures, with events celebrating the cultures of Thailand and Greece, Scandinavia and Scotland, indigenous California Coastal cultures, and Valley mall culture. 

And lest you fail to recognize the importance of pirate culture, consider this: learning to speak the lingo could earn you some serious booty: a dozen of LA's finest donuts. Take that, yogurt!

 Keep reading for our most cultured picks for this weekend....

Summer, shmummer, who needs it I say. This is the weekend that has it going on, with a supercool comic con that you don't need to drive all the way to San Diego for, a tall ships festival with cannon battles, pirate school and mermaids, nom nom lobsters, hang ten surfers, and the Hollywood Bowl finale with the B-52s and fireworks.

We've even got holidays. Break out the apples and honey for the Jewish New Year. And, hola, the fiesta's on Olvera Street for LA's largest celebration of Mexican Independence Day. (It's big!) 

And we've got heat – lots and lots of heat. 'Cause that's the best part of summer, isn't it? (If you need an escape, you could always take in one more screening of Frozen.) So don't you be feeling bad for summer, because technically it still is. Summer, that is. (And boy, is it hot.)

 Keep reading for the hottest picks for this weekend....

School has only been in session a week, and already I am learning so much. I am learning about the many ways to see aquatic life in Southern California. I am learning about the many ways to experience Little Tokyo. I am learning what it's like to drink a cup of coffee uninterrupted.

Not one to hog all the learning, I plan to offer some educational opportunities to my daughter as well. This weekend, for example, she can learn about the 1950s, Iberoamerican folk art, and the music of Veracruz.  She can learn to write a travel journal, make a Chinese lantern, dance Flamenco, and play the ukulele. And because Momma gets hungry, she can learn how to make pizza (both foccaccia and classic style).

And after all that learning, I think we'll both have earned a little treat.  Perhaps some vegan soft serve (free).  Perhaps a concert (free). Perhaps a movie (free.  Or maybe free). Because if I've learned anything in my week of school, it's that nothing beats free.

Feel free to keep reading to learn our favorite picks for this weekend....