Halloween 2016

November first is here and my email box is already full of holiday emails from my favorite stores.  I bet if I went to the mall today it would already be festooned in garland and Christmas lights.  That kiosk that sells meat and cheese gift sets will be operational (why can't I remember the name) and the TV commercials will be starting.  And...although so many people complain about it...I LOVE IT.  I love me some Christmas and I don't think there is anything wrong with getting excited about it for seven weeks before it arrives.  That's not long at all.  I will hold off on the music for a week or two because I don't want to get myself tired of it before Christmas and I'm not feeling the mood yet because the weather has and is going to be nice with highs in the 60's and barely dipping into the 30s at night.  I think I could have left my plants out for at least another two weeks based on the forecast if I hadn't already moved them to their winter spots in the house.  Also, decorations in the house will be switching from Halloween to Thanksgiving, not Christmas.  But if stores want to put decorations all over the place and "conveniently" mark everything as 50% (I know that's the normal price, Kohl's.  You don't fool me) then they can go ahead. 

So, about Halloween.  I promise I won't say pumpkin...I promise I won't say pumpkin..too late!  For the last time...those Jack-o-lanterns sure have held up.  We carved them last Tuesday and they still look almost like the night they were carved.  I feel like usually they are piles of mush after a week.  They must have some good genes.  Ben was excited about trick-or-treating this year.  For the first time he actually understood it and we walked door to door for awhile instead of just visiting friends.  Ben was a police officer, which he has been talking about for months.  I saw a decent quality dress up uniform online a few months ago that is worth the price compared to the Wal-mart cheapies that fall apart so quickly and it came with accessories.  Tessa was a witch and wore a costume given to us by an old friend of mine.  I gave her the choice between the witch and the parrot from the rummage sale this summer.  Of course she chose the witch.  The parrot will be worn next year by someone!  And Milo wore the same pumpkin costume the other two and their older cousins wore. 

Tessa was mad when we were leaving because we wouldn't let her bring sheets of stickers with in the car.  Looking back, we should have just let her bring them so she looked happy in the pictures.  She cheered up later. 

The neighbors brought their granddaughter over to pose with our pumpkin towers.  I miss living on a more pedestrian friendly street but on Halloween I like it because these things are just begging for hoodlums to vandalize them. 

First we went to our old street to visit our neighbors.  Then we walked around that neighborhood for a few blocks and went downtown to the historic neighborhood because Justin donated a big load of pumpkins to the United Way and the woman lives in that area and she goes all out on Halloween.  Then we visited a friend's house who lives closer to us on the way home.  They have one son who is in middle school now and they passed on a gigantic pumpkin bucket to us. 

I had a lot of fun roaming around the streets with the kids.  I occasionally hear people "buzzkilling" Halloween because of how unhealthy the candy is or religious reasons or because there might be predators lurking around.  I hope the logical people prevail as the years go on because I would hate for kids to miss out on it.  It is fun to run into people out on the streets and have people welcome you to their houses. 

On the subject of candy...wow we ended up with a lot of candy.  We emptied their buckets as we moved around because they were getting heavy, especially for Tessa. 

That is a five gallon bucket with the big items like juice boxes already removed.  We didn't even really try!  I can't imagine the loads kids get when they really make an effort!  Notice all the peanut butter cups...aka the parent tax for taking them out, thank you very much kids!

Here is our new massive bucket!  We tried to put Allan in but he jumped right out. 

And of course...this is year six with the costume, I think!  I am hoping to check out the clearance sections today or tomorrow so maybe we can get something new, as long as it doesn't cost more than a few dollars.  This one cost practically pennies.  It turns out cats don't really care for costumes so there isn't a large market for them. 

And now...my new favorite game...guess which kid these are?  It is too easy because one is wearing pink...

And...it wouldn't be Halloween without an embarrassing old picture of my brother and sister and me in our homemade costumes. 

I imagine taking the kids to the fabric store and letting them pick a pattern for their costumes but I haven't managed to do that yet.  One of these years.  Oh, I miss that old living room with it's 1973 era carpet and heavy brocade (or whatever that was) drapes with tassels.  This was when I was in 4th grade so I was 9 so it was 1992 and we had only lived at the farm 1.5 years. 

Now I must get to work taking down, or I guess the more accurate description would be collecting and picking up, the Halloween stuff that is strewn around the house.  I need to wash the costumes.  Milo was really mad at the end of the night and it turned out he was sweating so much his hair was wet.  I suppose it gets warm wearing a stuffled pumpk...I mean jack-o-lantern on your body!