Bouncing Off The Walls... Literally

Did you know a town can reschedule Halloween? Well, they can! They can, that is, if a freak October blizzard takes down half the town's trees and power lines and leaves it all piled in the roads while the residents move to hotels because they have no heat or electricity.

All that to say, we finally had our Halloween tonight, a week later! While I was originally annoyed that this whole thing was dragged out a whole extra week and tempted to just forget about trick-or-treating, I am glad we went. My boys just loved it and had such a great time!

Mitchell was an astronaut, Ben was Optimus Prime, and Jack was a kitty cat. He calls his costume his "kitty soup!" I assume he means "suit..."

We met up with Ben's best friend, Jake, and hit the streets. The big boys all stuck together and hit a record number of houses, running into a friend or teacher every other person or so. It was so much fun to actually run into so many familiar faces!

I brought the stroller to push Jack around in, hoping I could give him a lollipop or two and he'd just sit still and happy. Well, he was definitely happy with the candy, but it did not keep him in the stroller! He kept launching himself out of the stroller while it was still moving, tripping on his tail, rolling to a stop, then jumping up and running up to more adoring fans overjoyed to give him more "nummy treats."

Sometimes, a treat wasn't quite enough. More than once, I had to run up a sidewalk to retrieve my too-friendly toddler from someone's living room couch. He also kept trying to steal Halloween decorations: skeleton bones and skulls in the yard were his decoration of choice.

All the boys did great though. Jack was a handful keeping track of, but it was a fun atmosphere and was totally worth the effort of going.

But now, a couple hours later, Jack is literally bouncing off the furniture. He has been wrestling with a blanket on the couch for an entire movie. Occasionally, he bangs his head against the back of the couch a few times before covering himself back up with the blanket and kicking me repeatedly. Then he rolls off the couch, screams in laughter, climbs back up, and cannon balls into my lap. He is so wound up! I have never seen sugar effect any of my kids like this! It's incredible!

What a fun day. A day to pig out on candy, dress up silly, walk around laughing with all your friends, watch movies till late, and bash your head repeatedly against the couch.

Optimus Prime's Secret Weapon Against Man Stench

Have I mentioned that Ben will be Optimus Prime, the Transformer, for Halloween? He has had the costume for weeks now, but has been a bit lonely as an Autobot. As his trusty sidekick, Bumblebee, has had to only pretend to be an Autobot, he usually tires of being a transformer long before Ben is ready to end the game.

Well, for the sake of harmony (and adding minutes or even hours to play time that doesn't involve mom), I finally bought Mitchell a Bumblebee costume. He will still be an astronaut for Halloween, but I deemed an extra costume a necesity, so I got it!

Let me tell you, it was a great decision! The boys do everything as transformers together now!

The one downside to these costumes is the fact that they are not very breathable or machine washable. They specifically say to hand wash and line dry them. Lame. I don't even buy clothes for myself with those care instructions!

So what is a mom to do when her two crazy boys not only wear their onesie suits constantly, but wrestle in them? Febreeze to the rescue, once again!

I tell you, when I discovered that Mitchell was actually naked underneath that suit the other day, I thought, "this is trash now. I will never get that man stench out!" Ben wearing just underwear under his suit wasn't much better in the whole stinky, smelly, boy smell area. I Febreezed the you-know-what out of those bad boys!

I should be in a commercial...

Never Thought I'd Be Doing This!

Ben and Mitchell are planning a play for Matt's birthday. They came up with the story, the characters (a dragon and a skeleton, of course), painted the sets on big cut up moving boxes (with a little help from mom, but I'm just about as artistically gifted as they are), found costumes, and even found a part for me, the lone girl!

Now what part could a mere "girl" play in their fantastic performance (besides organizing and overseeing this whole production, plus being the narrator)? Well, I get to be the fairy. What did I expect? I'm a girl!

Once I was assigned a role in the play, the question of what my costume should be came up. Now since I have no little girls, I have no princess accessories; no wings, no magic wands, no glittery skirts or tutus. Ben suggested I find a costume store and stock up on some costume staples, as he just might need me to play a fairy more than once. "You will need this stuff again, mom!"

Well, I don't know of any fairy princess stores around here, so we decided to draw, cut out, and paint some giant cardboard wings for me. So that is what I have been doing for Jack's entire nap today: painting my fairy wings.

I have three boys. I have come up with plenty of dragon and monster and dinosaur costumes, but I never thought I'd find myself making fairy wings!

When I asked what part Jack could play, Ben thought about it for a bit and said, "The only thing he could be would be a tornado that messes it all up!"

I'll Come In When I'm Ready, Mom!

Matt and I were talking together about why this Halloween has been such a big deal for our big boys, when it never has been in the past.  Last year, in fact, we just ignored it altogether and they never even noticed!

We agreed that there are many reasons contributing to their excitement over this somewhat made-up holiday.  First, their school made a big deal and had a lot of activities and crafts and projects pertaining to it.  Second, they just LOVED the decorations all over the neighborhood, which were constant reminders of the holiday.  We regularly had to take "Halloween walks" over the last month, to see and re-see all the scary and silly decorations that our neighbors have gone a bit crazy with.  Thirdly, I think spooky and scary and silly are all things that just make sense to these two boys at the moment.  Fourthly, (and I think this is the main one), they are just finally at an age where a holiday actually means something.  They know it is coming, they are able to count down the days until it arrives, there are activities leading up to it, and, in this case, there are costumes to be worn and played with.  Not even for Christmases past have they had this much excitement leading up to the actual day.  I think they are just at that magic age where this sort of thing is simply perfect!

The magic culminated tonight as we suited up, met up with some friends from the neighborhood, and hit the sidewalks for some trick-or-treating.  What a great neighborhood we live in for kids.  Everyone was out participating, whether giving or receiving candy, and hardly any house was "closed" to the kids.  It only took a few blocks for the dark to settle and their bags to be full to overflowing and we headed home.

But for Mitchell, the best part was still to come!  He just LOVED manning the candy bowl here at home.  He sat out on the front doorstep with his strobe flashlight, a voice-distorting megaphone, and a giant bowl of candy, calling one and all to him for some Halloween treats!  Ben and Mitchell did it together at first, but Ben kept hearing the call of his candy upstairs, and decided he'd rather keep an eye on his own candy (and organize, sort, and stack it like Scrooge with his piles of gold) than keep sitting in the cold, supplying the stragglers with treats.

Mitchell was just in his element though and flagged trick-or-treaters down with style, shining his flashlight in their eyes, handing out giant handfuls of candy to each person, trying to convince adults to partake, laughing a crazy laugh into the megaphone, and dancing around holding himself as he refused to take a bathroom break.  I wonder how many parents got a kick out of the potty dance as Matt and I did.  We finally had to give Mitchell the dentist a five-minute warning for coming inside, and he turned around and said, "I'm not ready yet!  I'll come when I'm ready, mom!"  We stuck to our five-minute time limit, but he managed to get rid of most of that candy for us!

So it has been a fun fall season for us, thanks in part to our friends' and neighbors' decorative efforts, and Halloween came and went and left us all with belly aches.  Tonight was a blast for the kids, but I am so glad it is finally over!  Now I can take down the spider webs in their room, I can stop trying to "save" Mitchell's costume from certain destruction, and we can get on with preparations for more real and meaningful holidays.