10 AM: It’s on! Joining the Farmers’ Market for the next four hours, it’s the 2016 West Seattle Junction Harvest Festival. Starting right now, on Alaska between 44th and 42nd, and on California south of the market, Alaska to Edmunds, local businesses, schools, and organizations are offering fun activities. Everything’s free except the Chili Cookoff starting at 11 am – a $10 donation gets you a taste of each of the eight competing chilis, plus a vote, and the money goes to the West Seattle Food Bank. Then at 11:30, it’s the costume parade from Junction Plaza Park (42nd/Alaska) around the festival/market zone, and at noon, business trick-or-treating begins. Explore the side-street businesses too – ReMAX, for example, has a noon-2 pm Haunted House on the NW corner of 44th/Alaska (that was canceled).

10:14 AM: Our first activity feature – “melting pumpkins” at the West Seattle Timebank booth. Here’s volunteer Cupcake, showing one off:

Thanks to Timebank leader Tamsen Spengler for the photo. The Timebank booth is on SW Alaska across from Twilight, which is just west of Easy Street. Go visit! We, meantime, are right in the heart of California/Alaska, and immediately west of us you’ll find free facepainting:

The costumes just might be the most-fun part of the festival every year. Even with more than an hour to go until the parade, many costumed people of all sizes are wandering. We’ve even seen Darth Vader (and survived the encounter):

This festivalgoer is costumed as cotton candy:

By the way, there’s free cotton candy (while it lasts) on SW Alaska by Easy Street.

11:07 AM: Chili time! That’s the number one question we’re being asked right now – where’s the chili? Answer: Look for the West Seattle Food Bank canopy right in front of KeyBank on the SW corner of California/Alaska. Here are the competitors:

Number two most popular question – where does the Costume Parade start? Junction Plaza Park is on the NW corner of 42nd/Alaska, and the parade will head west from there, starting at 11:30. Many awesome costumes this year. Check out Sharknado and friend:

11:44 AM: The parade is making its way through the festival. And this year it’s MASSIVE! Hundreds of people. Led by the West Seattle High School Band:

Here’s video from the start (looks like we’ll have to wait until we’re back at HQ for the full 6 1/2 minute clip):

Next up: Business trick-or-treating at noon. We’ve been asked how that works – look for merchants with candy OUTSIDE their businesses throughout The Junction.

12:15 PM: Trick-or-treating is now on! And activities continue. Westside School (WSB sponsor) is one of your stops on California between Alaska and Edmunds – there, you can play Plinko:

Coworking center West Seattle Office Junction (also a WSB sponsor) is nearby and has a “critter pit”:

Meanwhile, the Farmers Market continues until 2 pm as usual. Many vendors are in the spirit!

We have some music here at California/Alaska, too – WSHS Band members, post-parade, are busking, as they’ve been doing to raise money for new instruments. And all the while, more cool costumes:

12:58 PM: Final hour. The crowd has thinned a bit but still really festive – we are talking with organizers and participants about how big the festival is this year, so many people here in The Junction, it reminds us of Summer Fest. Thanks to everyone who’s stopped by to say hi – from our booth in the heart of Walk-All-Ways, we’ve had a front-row seat for it all.

1:19 PM: The crowd’s thinned further because the rain has returned. Next big thing: Vote-counting for the chili cookoff. Here’s a tweet with a look at the contenders’ offerings:

Still some good stuff at this week’s market, too.

1:30 PM: And the chili winners are:

#1 – The Westy
#2 – Brookdale Admiral Heights
#3 – Shadowland

Congratulations!

2 PM: The rain hasn’t stopped but the festival’s wrapping up.

P.S. We will have a separate photo gallery plus some other festival followups at midday Monday.