A Spooky Confession

Don't tell anyone.... I am not Halloween's Number One Fan. (or number two). I have a kind of take it or leave it attitude about Halloween. I stopped enjoying Halloween when I experienced my first apple bobbing contest. Dry Creek circa 1984. Lots of saliva in the water, Halloween never was the same.

Halloween is really one of those things that the idea is better than the execution. The apple bobbing of course. Eating lots of candy sounds good until you are puking Skittles. The clown costume is a good idea until you are dripping white makeup at recess. Transforming your house to a haunted mansion is great until you realize that you take it down as soon as you put it up. Keeping your porch light on sounds good until the teenagers in jeans and t-shirts come by. Scary music and such is great until the four year-olds come by your house. Oh and don't get me started on the price of candy and the moldy pumpkins.....

Then came Patrick. Really 98% of our Halloween accoutrements were Patrick selections over the last 3 Halloweens. I was of the attitude that a pumpkin always trumps a jack-o-lantern because a pumpkin can stay out through Thanksgiving. So we have been doing some Halloween decorating. It is hard to say no when your kid has passion and imagination. It is kind of contagious. I'm still not one of those parents who dresses up to take their kids trick-or-treating but I did throw a pretty fun Halloween party.

We watched The Sword in the Stone a few months ago and Patrick decided that he was going to be a knight. Then he decided that he would be a Dragon Slayer Knight and Keith would be a Dragon. Cool.



Here are the big boys. Ian, Patrick and Chase


Here are the babies (not really anymore) Ryder, Keith and Ava (our lone girl). How cute are they?!!? This is the best part of Halloween! Keith barked at Ryder the whole time we were trick or treating.



Keith has a serious silky problem. He was convinced that Ryder's costume was a silky. He also thought that since Ryder had his clothes off well....


I bought a lot of candy (three or four hundred pieces of the good stuff). The boys were in charge of the door (Plain White T's) and it was all gone by the time we left to trick or treat. They were generous and there were TONS of kids.


The little kids caught on quickly. Keith tried to run into our neighbors' house (first stop) but after that he got it. He then proceeded to chat with everyone along the way.



By the end of the trek Patrick had divided all of his excess weight among the 5 adults. He was walking up to the door and putting his hands out. We all needed a break before the final stretch.


And that is when we met up with Chewbacca. I guess I always imagined Chewbacca as a Heineken kind of a Wookiee. Turns out he goes for the Nati Light. This is the kind of culture you can only get on Halloween (see why I love it so much?).


We had a really great time. I love that Halloween is over and we can relish the idea of next year. Woohoo! I wonder what Patrick will come up with next year.....