Halloween Priorities

Sometimes I think that I want to be this amazingly crafty mom who is not only on top of life, but can make the holidays an awesome experience. From this post about Halloween, you'll see that I shouldn't try to fool myself because I'm much more into the holiday stuff that we did in the previous post.

I did try. I had plans. Some of them happened. Most of them didn't. Doesn't this sound awesome: At 10am, take the boys to the grocery store where they were holding a trick or treating through the departments. Evan would be a farmer with a "John Deere" stroller, Ryan would be a bumblebee in our front carrier and I would be his flower. (Aaaww...) Then at 5 we'd go around to the apartments in Heritage Halls to do some trick or treating and basically just show off my adorable children because we don't really need the candy. Maybe if we had time, we'd finally carve the pumpkin that we picked at the pumpkin patch last week and let Evan play with the gooey insides. Great plan right?

Here's how it really went down...at 10am, bee & flower costume not even in existence, "John Deere Green" chorus running through my head as I stare at the posterboard being eaten by Evan. At 11, Farmer Evan in John Deere stroller and I in Oliver's cowboy hat head to the Central Building where I have to gather some things for work. We get back and I continue to work on my plan for the disaster scenario the hall advisors will have to go through at 2pm. At least the John Deere logo looks as cool as I had hoped it would. Come 5 o'clock, I realize that I haven't had time to make dinner and that food is much more important than showing off my adorable children, so we go to the cafeteria to eat. Afterwards, as I started to clear the table off, I realized that last Friday's pumpkin was already rotting and was leaving a little mark on the table. So that went directly to the dumpster. That was Halloween for my family. For me, it wasn't quite over yet because at 8 I was responsible for spending 3 hours at the area dance where we had the job of making sure the dress and grooming standards were being abided and that nothing bad happened.

So Halloween, I'm not exactly sure if I'm a big fan of you. It is fun to get dressed up and to see all of the little ones dressed up as little animals and little people, but you're just an excuse to have a party or have a dance and get together with other people and look funny. And yes, sometimes you're a really good excuse to eat candy. Thankfully, we successfully avoided that problem. I do feel bad about little Ryan not having a cute first Halloween picture, but you know...they won't care. In a few years when he starts to think about it and wonder why, he'll know I loved him...right?

I do want to say thanks to Emily for giving Oliver and I an excuse to get dressed up. While this is a costume, its also a dream we have...to go on vacation...relax somewhere exotic...

Doesn't Oliver look like he's ready to go right now?

And little Ryan, I do love you. This picture isn't a good one of you, but its proof that you were at least wearing black which would have been perfect for your little bee costume. Don't tease me about it too much when you're older...