Besides being a rather "enlightening" way to spend an October evening, the Great Jack O' Lantern Blaze also provides bargain hunters and shopaholics alike with plenty of opportunity.

In celebration of Blaze's five year anniversary, the gift shop, your last stop on tour de Blaze, is jam packed with recession busters and cool stuff.  What's special about the gift shop is the large number of items that are unique to Blaze and available nowhere else, not even online! (How rare is that these days?) 

Visitors will find everything from an "I Visited Blaze" game to postcards, notecards, t-shirts, sweatshirts, caps, mugs, photos, and magnets - all Blaze original designs. You can even take home actual Jack o' Lanterns carved by the Blaze artists themselves. This year's designs include a bat, witch, cat, and spider.   

Need to pamper palates at your Halloween party? Dying for a pumpkin fix? The gift shop carries pumpkin fudge, pumpkin soup, pumpkin bread, pumpkin butter, pumpkin scone mix, pumpkin pancake mix, and more than a dozen flavors of Halloween coffees. And of course, there will be a bouquet of Halloween candies.

Believe it or not, one of the coolest things about the Great Jack O' Lantern Blaze is the shopping. Most especially because you can browse through hundreds (literally) of special Blaze-only merch made exclusively for - and sold only at - the event. Amazon.com's got nada on this.

Just how diverse is the selection? Well, let's put it this way, you could actually make a cool Blaze Halloween Survivor type game out of trying to complete your day using only Blaze items.

Today for example, I woke up from my peaceful autumn slumber snuggled soundly under my Blaze cotton throw (with all new Blaze design) and meandered into the kitchen where I had me some Blaze pumpkin scones topped off with Blaze pumpkin butter (yum) and coffee in my Blaze mug, being careful not to spill any on my Blaze placemats. I was a bit on the composted side so I slipped into the shower and lathered up with my Blaze pumpkin soap. Feeling refreshed, I took some time to compose some blog ideas in my Blaze blank journal (six styles to choose from). I then wrote wish you were heres to some long neglected distant relatives on my Blaze postcards (11 styles in all). Lunch was Blaze pumpkin soup and pumpkin bread followed by finger licking good pumpkin fudge.

OK, you get the idea. You'll find everything you need inside the visitor's tent at Blaze, as well as in the main shop which you enter towards the end of the Blaze experience.

There's a lot of stuff. I can't resist also mentioning:

• a Blaze chocolate bar
• coloring Blaze sheet with set of crayons
• Sticky desk notecube (the cube, not the desk) depicting four blaze designs
• a Blaze ruler
• All-new Blaze caps, t-shirts, and sweatshirts
• six new Blaze magnets
• Halloween books for children and adults
• flashing, blinking bracelets, earrings, and necklaces, and the cute little pumpkn jewelry box shown above

Collect them all!

Yes, the design will seem a little familiar to you loyal Blaze Blog readers, but, I think that's the point.

What you are seeing here is the back of the 2007 official Blaze T-shirt. I absolutely adore the design. I love the idea of walking around with this shirt on knowing that my second pair of eyes is offering a wry grin for those who may be following me.

Not that I'm paranoid or anything, but you get the idea...

This sneak preview of the back has got me jonesing to see the front. But alas, my highly-placed Blaze retail source has not come through yet on a spy image. Soon, I hope.

The Blaze T-shirts, along with dozens of other Blaze-specific treats, will be available at The Great Jack O'Lantern Blaze Shop, open all 19 nights of the event.

And of course, don't forget, for the first time this year, art-pumpkins hand-carved on site by Blaze artists are available to take home. Gotta love it...

What would a great Halloween extravaganza like The Great Jack O'Lantern Blaze be without a great gift shop? Just that, a great Halloween extravaganza sorely lacking a great gift shop. We can't have that. Neither can the Blaze organizers.

Instead, the Powers o' Blaze are already planning an over the top presentation of merch that should satisfy (they hope) even the most die-hard pumpkin/Blaze/Halloween aficionado. 

I've just learned the Blaze Shop, the last stop on the tour after the path of pumpkins, is expanding in size this year. For my money, some of the coolest new items will be the ones that are 100% Blaze specific and available there and there only, such as t-shirts, caps, magnets, paperweights, and mugs, all adorned with Blaze imagery.

But the highlight, (which, quite frankly, I can't even believe they are offering) has to be art-pumpkins hand-carved ON SITE by local artists. That's just incredible. It's like taking home a piece of the actual event! And, because they are art-pumpkins ("funkins," as they're referred to in the pumpkin trade), they'll never rot. 

But wait, there's more! Matted and framed wood-cut Blaze prints, 3D pumpkin postcards, journals and postcards featuring carved pumpkins from Blaze, porcelain pumpkin plates, platters, tureens, pitchers, lanterns, teapots, glass pumpkin ornaments...

OK, my head is spinning. Perhaps something to eat will help. The Powers o' Blaze Shop thought of that as well. They are offering pumpkin and ginger cookies, pumpkin pancake mix, Jack O'Lantern cookies, creme pumpkin candies, pumpkin cobbler, and pumpkin shortbread cookies.

And of course, you can adorn yourself head to toe in glow and/or flash in the dark necklaces, bracelets, rings, pins, and earrings.

There will also be more than 50 books for all ages such as "Spooky Pumpkin" "The Truth about Jack O'Lanterns" (uh oh), and "The Fierce Yellow Pumpkin." (I need to get my hands on a copy of that last one to see what all the fierceness is about.) 

Many popular items from last year will make a guest appearance, including BlazeBlogger's personal favorite, the punching pumpkin pen, pictured here. 

Are they missing anything?