Annabel is in a fall crafts class once a week that has made some really cute fall and Halloween crafts. She’s really taken to it, and asks me all the time if we can make things at home. A few days ago we made spiders with yarn pom-poms and pipe cleaners, and then Annie tried to make skeletons with q-tips, yarn, and glue. It’s been fun putting together little projects with her, and now we have cute holiday decorations that I’ll pull out every year.
Yesterday the kids both had their school Halloween parties. After I got the kids ready, I ran around my house and threw together a costume for myself. My eyes settled on the spiders Annie and I had made, so I grabbed them and some of that cotton spider web stuff and boom, costume.
Annie took one look at me and said, “But Mommy…you hate spiders.” Which is very, very true. But since Annie and I made these, they didn’t bother me.
After I dropped Annie off at school, James and I headed toward our parent/child class. As we drove through the neighborhood, I saw something out of the corner of my eye but I couldn’t look at it since I was driving. A few seconds later, I got a good look at it when it dropped off the ceiling of the car, right onto me. A real spider.
My first instinct was to crash my car into the nearest tree and then light everything on fire, but since James was in the car I instead calmly slammed on the brakes, put the car in park, and jumped out of the car moaning, “UGH SPIDER UGGGGGH! SPIDER!” I was swatting at myself and shaking my body in an attempt to get the spider off of me. I looked like one of those inflatable air dancer things.
As I did my spider-removal dance next to my car, a man on the sidewalk called out to me, “Are you okay?”
I stopped smacking myself and said, “Oh, yeah…I had a spider fall on me while I was driving, and I wanted to get it off of me because I hate spiders and…”
The guy was looking at me like I was insane. And that’s when I remembered that I had three large fake spiders attached to me.
“Anyway, I think I got it, thanks!” I said, acting all breezy, even though I was getting back into a car that likely still had a spider in it.
After school I burned the car and the costume. Okay not really, but let’s be honest, it has to be done.
shelli says:
I was feeling horrified for you whilst reading until the bit when you were jumping around outside the car swatting yourself & the man spoke to you, I literally spat wine all over my fone from laughing!
Lee Cockrum says:
Spiders in the car are the WORST!!!
RzDrms says:
Large Target ads are actually the WORST! It’s back this morning again.
Fills up the whole screen, then I “x” it out, and then a smaller one appears again at the bottom, disallowing me to scroll until I “x” that one out too. It wants me to accidentalky click on it. Argh! So mad now that I went there two nights ago. :-/
Laura says:
Hilarious!
Shannon says:
I got into my friends car one day and she looked at me and very calmly said, “don’t freak out..” which obviously automatically sent me into a panic but I just slowly turned my head to discover that there was a spider dangling right next to my face! Luckily we were still in my driveway so I just opened the door and insisted he vacate. ha. But seriously, who does that?! I actually thought there was an axe murderer in the back seat or something.
Missy K says:
My cousin is deathly afraid of spiders of any size. We were driving to work one morning (in Wash. DC) when this itty bitty speck of a spider dropped down from the mirror. She freaked out, hit the brakes barely slowing the car and was jumping out. Thing is, she did not bother to completely STOP the car or put the thing in PARK! She was leaving me to die in a fiery crash in the passenger seat! Luckily I was quickly able to dispose of the “monster” before she was completely out of the car. Man…family is supposed to look out for each other. Not pull an every man for himself! LOL
Jennifer L. says:
Oh man. OH MAN. This just happened to me the other day. Only I was driving on a busy highway going about 65 when I notice movement out of the corner of my eye. I glance over and OF COURSE it’s a huge spider – seriously, bigger than a quarter. a quarter! – on the inside of the window. Slamming on the brakes unfortunately wasn’t an option, because I too had a wee person in the back seat and also, busy highway. So I just try and lean away from it until I can pull into a gas station. I then opened the door as wide as it can go and proceed to crawl out the passenger side. I calmly walked into the store and asked the person behind the counter if they are afraid of spiders. He is not. Can he please come help me at my car, there is a spider the size of my head and I cannot drive my car. He was awesome and got the spider. After picking it up gently in his HANDS, he casually says “It’s just a wolf spider”. Ugh. Seriously, we’ve only had this car like two months and this is like the sixth spider I’ve seen in it. Twice I opened the little door to the gas tank to see a spider hanging out in there. I think the car has to go.
MH says:
I would totally bomb the car. It only takes two hours and then you can roll down the windows to let it air out for a few hours. Clearly something had babies in there!!!!
christina says:
OMGAWD!! Makes me never want to get in the car again!
I refused to make rice for 3 months, as a wolf spider had taken up residence in the space between my rice can and wall in my pantry!!!! and every time I went after it with some sort of spray it would run deeper in to the pantry….. My kids thought I was nuts!
Erin Christine says:
I feel like Joey in the episode of Friends where Phoebe puts a caged tarantula in his apartment to get Rachel to move out…”Is it on me, I feel like it’s on me?!” Ahhh I hate spiders!! Had that happen to me way too many times in cars!
Your costume is great!!! (I think I’ve used up my daily quota of exclamation points.)
Kristen says:
I do not blame you at all Heather!! I am not a fan of spiders, and hate that surprise when they just pop up in your line of vision. I had a similar experience this summer. Thankfully it happened just as I was turning into the parking lot for work so it wasn’t as horrible as it could have been! I have never really liked sunroofs in cars, but the car we bought last year has one. I don’t have it open usually, but this one morning was so beautiful so I opened it. As I turn onto the street for work, something CRAWLS OUT OF MY HAIR and drops onto the seatbelt. It was a bright green bug, and had it fallen on my shirt I would never have found it since the shirt and bug were the same color. I floored it into the parking lot so I could fling open the door and throw the bug out. Needless to say, I do not believe I will be opening the sunroof again.
Jen says:
This is hilarious. I hate spiders too.
Steph says:
Great story. you can’t make that stuff up. it is funny how often doing something for our children makes us look crazy and not breezy:) and I’m glad you had a pic of the air dancer bc I wouldn’t have pictured the right image of you attempting to de-spider yourself.
Annalisa says:
You’d love where we live. Lots of spiders.
I’ve had that car conandrum with a bee. I hate bees, am allergic to their stings.
Lisa says:
Ahhhhhhh! I totally relate to you on the spider front. Even your costume made me shudder (though I understand the magical power of one’s own child being involved).
I was driving down the highway once and saw a big spider come out of the side mirror via a web that was connected to the window. To be clear, the spider was on the outside of my car and my windows were shut. Still, my immediate thought, at 65 mph, was that I should “shake” the car to try to get it to fall off. Thankfully my brain kicked in before I could actually do anything stupid, but I still won’t deny that flipping the car probably would have killed the spider. (I used a hose later to blast it out of there.)
I can’t own a gun because I know seeing a crazy spider would tempt me to think of inappropriate ways to end the damn thing. I’d be like Yosemite Sam up in here.
Jess says:
Cars and spiders should not mix. When I was in college, some jerk spider actually laid eggs inside the vents of my car. Or at least that’s what I concluded, after literally two dozen plus little spiders came crawling out of the vents while I was driving!!! I still have nightmares about it.
Giselle says:
Omg. That is literally an American horror story. I don’t know what I would’ve done, but I know I would still be in therapy for it.
Heather, great story! Very funny for those of us that it didn’t happen to! Lol
In college I used to get spiders in my car ALL THE TIME. I couldn’t understand why this was happening to me and I would cry and freak out every time. And they always showed up while driving, never whole I was parked or something. Eventually it dawned on me that perhaps it was because of the tree I always parked my car under at work for ‘shade’. Once I stopped parking there, no more spiders! Since then, I don’t care how hot it is, I will park in full sun rather than park under a tee bc a spider may come off it and into my car. Not worth it.
Jordan says:
I’m gonna have nightmares now! Reminds me of the recent news story about a house infested with spiders… WHY WHY WHY?!?!?
Chandra says:
I hate spiders. Sunday I was out for a 9 mile run, about 3.5 miles in I ran through a spiderweb, but it was just on my legs, so no big deal. About a mile later I got caught at an intersection and stopped. I felt something on my leg and looked down….apparently that web had a spider on it and had hitched a ride. I started yelping and flailing around like a crazy person to get it off. The people in all the cars were VERY amused.
Gretchen says:
I literally full-body shuddered while reading this. UGH!!!
Nic S says:
I was all smiles reading this post until that spider dropped onto you, clearly mistaking you for the Mothership, then my facial expression turned to horror and I had to read it as quickly as possible to make you survived. I’m sorry about the unfortunate fire, theft, accident, etc that will inevitably happen to your car… I’m sure your insurance agent will understand.
Glenda says:
Costume looks amazing… and then I died laughing at the man asking you are you OK..
Jesabes says:
I don’t usually LOL at blog posts, but I just lost it. My kids wanted to know what was so funny and I couldn’t even talk. So hilarious!
Jordan says:
I’m scarred for life now. *shudders* Cute idea for a costume though, not so much cute real-life spider in the car. That’s horrifying.
Jordan says:
Also, as if you wanted MORE nightmares about spiders, I saw this last week and thought of you: http://thesmallermajority.com/2014/10/08/the-sound-of-little-hooves-in-the-night/
(the actual post is about 1/2 way down the page).
Now, THAT thing is legit giving me nightmares. One of the biggest questions I’m gonna ask the Lord one day if/when I reach glory land: WHY SPIDERS? AND WHY MOSQUITOS?
Laura says:
Reminds me of the time we were at a DIY car wash and I stayed in the car while my husband washed. I was playing words with friends on my phone when I felt something scamper across my sandaled foot–a mouse!!!!!!!!!!!! At that time, the passenger side door of our car had just broken and the door had to be opened from the outside! The keys weren’t in the ignition, so I couldn’t even open the window! I banged on the window so hard it’s amazing it didn’t break. My husband said he will NEVER forget that look of terror on my face!
Denise says:
I’m not sure what’s worse..a spider in the car or shower. EWWW! Probably a car, because I would have totally crashed.
Amy G says:
Several years ago, I was riding in the passenger seat of my friends car and I kept seeing something move out of the corner of my right eye. After two or three times of casually catching this motion in my peripheral vision, I finally turned my head towards the window to see exactly what it was. Turns out a HUGE mac-daddy spider had spun a web from the window to my HEAD REST and was just sitting there a millimeter away from my eyeball. I immediately hurled myself over the armrest and into my friends lap(did I mention she was driving?) all the while screaming “PULL OVER! PULL OVER!” I can’t believe we didn’t wreck.
I still get chills to this day just thinking about it. It could’ve crawled into my hair and then RIGHT ONTO MY FACE. Eeeeek!
Erin @ One Particular Kitchen says:
I will never, ever, ever stop loving your use of “breezy.”
<3
Rita says:
You can’t say you’re breezy….that totally negates the breezy!!!
Jess says:
A co-worker has one of these wooden boxes where you open it and a spider (fake) leaps out on you hand. It’s made grown men scream. A woman cry. I hate it. I told him I don’t care how old he is (65) I’ll hit him if he brings it near me. I hate spider.
Check it out if you’re brave. http://youtu.be/w-n8abeQfL8
Nicole says:
LOL! That made me think of the time I was sitting at a red light. Out of no where I see a spider hauling ass up my leg toward my girlie region. I took my foot off of the break as I frantically started slapping at it. My car rolled into the back of the car in front of me.
Luckily it was an older couple and they were super nice and understanding of my spider drama.