Love is a spooky little thing for Sonja Duncan and Ken Yanik.

The Bellingham couple chose Halloween night, Oct. 31, 2012, to tie the knot in a barn on their property, surrounded by spider webs and pumpkins and their favorite ghouls and ghosts.

"That's both of our favorite holiday," Sonja says. "I like it because you can behave badly, dress in costume and eat a lot of candy. He used to have just giant Halloween parties. I thought it was a really cool opportunity to bring back an excuse to have these really fun parties."

And there's no doubt about it, their wedding was a party, complete with a fog machine and a laser disco ball. Their first dance as a couple was the Time Warp, from the cult classic "The Rocky Horror Picture Show."

"We started the party, and somewhere around 8:30 or 9, we briefly interrupted it to get married," she says.

Most of the guests arrived in costume - Marilyn Monroe, skeletons and a crew of Vikings were just a few - and were encouraged to bring food, something strange. One of the oddest dishes? Cooked oxtail, which Sonja says was good. There was also the requisite creepy brain Jell-O.

Sonja's 11-year-old son and Ken's 9- and 13-year-old boys built and manned a fortune-telling booth for revelers.

"My favorite fortune was 'You will realize the foolishness of having your fortune told by middle-schoolers,'" she laughs.

The boys wore tuxes with fake mustaches and their flower girl was dressed as an angel, tossing candy instead of the usual rose petals.

Sonja almost didn't even make it down the aisle to meet her groom, dressed in a tux and wings. Her husband had built a maze of interconnected tents to get into the barn, and she got lost in the labyrinth on her way to say her I dos.

"They had to restart the music because I had to figure my way out of the maze," she says. "I neglected to take that into account."

That moment was one of Ken's favorite memories from the night.

"The best was standing on the altar waiting for Sonja to come," he says. "We played the 'Wedding March' and she didn't arrive. After the second playing of the 'Wedding March,' she made it."

"My maze worked."

Reach ZOE FRALEY at zoe.fraley@bellinghamherald.com or call 756-2803. Visit her School Days blog at blogs.bellinghamherald.com/schools or get updates on Twitter at twitter.com/BhamSchools.