Spooky Stuff

What's not to love about Halloween. Total strangers give you candy, you get to use sharp instruments to carve pumpkins, and dressing up is encouraged. This year I decided to dress up as the scariest thing I could think of - a skeleton! I told my mom about my plan and my decision to have Gates also go as a scary skeleton. She said three year olds should not be creepy looking, nor should infants. But I was persistent...VERY persistent. I would be dressing as a scary skeleton no matter what. My tricky mom had an idea that worked for both of us. The whole family would dress as skeletons and she'd attached the word "Ha" on each of us making us a family of funny bones. Compromise. This is a new word in my vocabulary.

To be honest, her plan was better than mine - three year olds don't need to be super creepy - and our family ended up winning "Best Family Costume" at one of the Halloween parties we attended. Gates even hung in there in his costume, though I think he was a drooling skeleton, which isn't too spooky.

This year's Halloween included a total bonus -my Grandma flew in for the holiday on a last-minute trip. She said she missed us but I think she just wanted to scared in person by my super spookiness. She helped us carve seven of our pumpkins. We had 10 additional small pumpkins from the gazillion pumpkin patches we'd gone to this month, but even with my offer to help, my mom said, "No way are we carving another 10 pumpkins." Something about being covered in pumpkin guts from head to toe. Oh well.

Halloween night included the typical chaos at our house. More than 400 trick-or-treaters came to our house before 8pm. I took on the job of smoke machine operator. The goal was to cover the yard by continually pressing the buttons on our two smoke machines, strategically placed in our homemade graveyard. I think I accomplished it. Here's a before and after.

Friday we had our big school party (we go to preschool mon, wed, and fri). First a parade, then a Halloween sing-a-long, and finally a party that lasted the rest of the day. Pure awesomeness. I opted for a costume change on Friday and went to school as a NASA astronaut. I think the costume is made out of that fancy, lightweight material they use to warm up runners after a marathon. Keep in mind I had this material on from my head to my toes and by the time we got to the classroom for our party I had an enormous amount of sweat pouring off of me, my eyes were glassy, and I was swaying back and forth. So rather than end up on the floor from passing out, my mom offered me some water and suggested I take my helmet off and unzip my space suit. Whew, being an astronaut is hot.

Another Halloween down. Now to start thinking about next year...