Halloween 2011

Happy Halloween, folks! We actually did a lot of our celebrating last week, with class parties. Elizabeth's grade held a parade/sing-a-long for the parents. It was about the most darling thing ever. (I cried, just a little bit. Happy tears, of course. But seriously, crying? Over a Halloween parade? Sigh.)


Elizabeth, the cheerleader. Nonny contributed the skirt that she'd sewn for Aunt Kellie back in the day (Kel, wasn't that the year you wanted to be "a cheerleader who is Dracula's girlfriend and looks like Paula Abdul"?) . Elizabeth really wanted her costume to be in her school's colors (red AND blue), so I agreed to make a new shirt. Thank goodness for fusible webbing and ready-made bias tape.

Anna, the fairy-butterfly. Wings by JoAnn's, tutu and makeup by Mom, accessories by Anna.

Ben, the garden gnome. Tee hee. Sure, I had a couple of costumes already on hand that probably would've fit him. . .but I couldn't help myself.

Over the weekend, we carved pumpkins. . .




A happy moment for this mom: the girls are now (mostly) self-sufficient pumpkin-gutters.

Unlike last year, Elizabeth has more teeth than her jack-o-lantern this year. (For those keeping score at home, she's -7 baby teeth and +6 permanent teeth).

I really thought Anna would insist on a kitty face or a fairy face or something, but she ended up pretty traditional. . .although she made sure to tell me her jack-o-lantern was a girl. Even if she doesn't have eyelashes.

We also made play-dough monsters. I was in charge of the craft station at Elizabeth's classroom party, and this is what we did there as well. Here's what the girls created back at home:

(I'm convinced this is the Holy Grail of group Halloween crafts for the under-8s. Cheap and easy to prepare, minimal mess, open-ended, and the kids can spend anywhere from 5 to 15 minutes on it. Many, MANY thanks to the genius behind this blog for sharing the idea!)

On Halloween itself, we paid quick visits to the grandmas for a little costume fashion show. We got home just in time to eat a quick dinner of homemade mac & cheese with Halloween-shaped noodles. I should've taken a photo of the label; the ingredients included "1% cuttlefish". . .I'm assuming to give the black bat-shaped noodles their color?

After dinner, the girls got into their costumes, held still exactly long enough for me to take photos, and then we left the boys at home and went out for some trick-or-treating. Anna led the charge, while Elizabeth was more inclined to state that this or that house was "a little too creepy" and suggest that we skip it. One neighbor played a "trick" that just about did her in; as we walked up to a house we saw a scarecrow sitting on the front porch with a bowl of candy in its lap. As the girls and I discussed whether we thought it was a real person or just a dummy, the scarecrow MOVED and the girls let out an ear-splitting scream. Elizabeth was ready to run straight home, but to our relief, the scarecrow pulled off his mask and revealed himself to be their buddy Landon's big brother.

We managed to make it around the block and up one more street, to THE house. (I think every neighborhood has one, right? The house giving out the extra-cool goodies? In our neighborhood, it's stuffed animals.) For the girls, nothing could top this "treat"--they were so delighted with their little bears that they were more than happy to call it a night at that point.


At home they did the usual oohing and aahing, sorting and sampling, and then it was off to bed with their new bears. Since then I've been letting them each pick out three pieces each morning, to be eaten whenever and however they like. Elizabeth tends to pick a variety: some with chocolate, some without. Anna seems to go for the candy with the most artificial coloring and the highest sugar content; her picks for the first day included a full-sized bag of Skittles, which she ate on the way to preschool, and a triple packet of Fun Dip that, no lie, kept her quietly busy for well over an hour.


Ben also inadvertently got in on the candy action. While he and I were out running errands, a well-meaning cashier handed him a Dum-Dum. He had been fussing, and the (still wrapped) sucker held his interest, so I figured there was no harm in letting him play with it as I got him buckled up, loaded up the car, etc. Pretty soon, though, I noticed that the noises he'd been making had changed from grumbles to a cheerful, self-satisfied humming. When I checked on him, lo and behold: he'd pulled the wrapper off the Dum-Dum and was delightedly sucking away at the tasty treat, with bright blue syrupy smears all over his face. Let me tell you, whoever coined the phrase "like taking candy from a baby" obviously never tried to pry a baby's first sucker out of his sticky hands.

So, another Halloween is on the books. Before we know, Thanksgiving will be upon us--and then it's full steam ahead to Christmas, with a stop first for Elizabeth's birthday. For now, though, all I'm thinking about is whether there are any Reese's Peanut Butter Cups left.