The Boy and Halloween

We made The Boy accompany the family to the local pumpkin patch.



He was thrilled.

So thrilled, he wanted me to take the sibling picture again. Just to make sure I captured the perfect moment in time.




Picking the right pumpkin was remarkably easy. He found the perfect pumpkin almost immediately. It was so perfect that he wanted to leave right away.



See? Perfect pumpkin. He was so eager to show it to me that he covered up his face accidentally.



The Boy. 15 and not too cool to hang out with the family in public.

I'm so blessed.

You Want To Be What??

This past weekend, The Husband suggested we take the girls to Canadian Tire.

Despite me shouting, "No. That sounds like a crappy idea are you INSANE you can't make me go," I found myself walking down the aisles of automotive parts and Debbie Travis home decor. It's not that I dislike the store. It's super awesome and all. It's just that The Princess was on a tangent about Halloween costume decision making. It's hard to find the right plastic bolts for a car door panel when you're being forced to converse about the need to buy blood red lipstick and agree 18,542 times that her costume will be the awesomest.

The Princess was going to be a spider. I was thrilled with that. If I'm going to have to make a costume, then that would be doable. I've made a number of costumes in this sojourn of motherhood....cat, ghost, bear, mummy....they were all great. Well. Not the mummy. That one sucked big time and The Boy ended up trailing it all over a four block radius. But the other costumes were good. Made without the aide of a pattern or directions. Just a trip to assorted Salvation Armies and stuff from the house. My mother trained me well.

But something about Canadian Tire made The Princess feel that a spider costume was not 'it'. She wasn't feeling it.

All of a sudden my 7 year old said, "What about a corpse bride? That would be so awesome!"

"A what?"

"A corpse bride! Jaclyn was a corpse bride last year and she looked so awesome. Her costume was the best. It was so awesome."

"You want to be a corpse bride??"

"Yes! Oh Mom. It will be awesome. Oh my gosh. It will be so awesome!" *squeal!*

All the while that she was blabbering on and on and on and on about it, all I could think of was, "Will I lose my mothering licence if I let my 7 year old dress up like a dead woman on the day of her nuptials? What will my mother say? What will her grandparents think of me?"

I was also thinking, "How can she talk so fast and exactly how many times is she going to say awesome?"

15 minutes of walking through the store, listening to The Princess go on about all the different things we need to do for her costume, she stopped in her tracks.

"Mom?"

"Ya?"

"What's a corpse bride?"

Aw. My 7 year old isn't as old as I feared. She may think she's too old to dress up in fairy wings and carry a magic wand, but she's still pretty innocent.

I explained what a corpse bride was.

She's thinking about it.

Days 17, 18 and 19

Sorry to have kept you on the edge of your seat about the banking calls . I've been busy doing stuff.

Day 17 arrived and I was out for most of the day. But I was beginning to think that they were finally on to me, because they called at 4:46pm. They were kind enough to tell me they would make a note on the Husband's account that he should be called in the evenings.

Day 18. 3:45 pm on the nose. They not very kindly told me they would make note of it on the Husband's account. I don't understand it. I was nothing but peaches and cream to that woman.

Day 19. Today. 10:03 am. Excellent. We're right back on track. I hope I get to wish these guys a Merry Christmas. Bonnie wasn't very cheerful this morning. In fact, I would wager that that she had a fight with her significant other last night. Or there's a teenager living in her house. She didn't even tell me she would make note of it on his account.

So, with the daily banking courtesy call out of the way, I'm off to find a Halloween costume for the Boy. All week I have asked him what he's going to dress up as on the big day. What do I need to get. You know, motherly stuff. Yesterday, before heading to the Salvation Army yet again for a costume accessory the Princess needed, I asked him......"WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO BE??? I'M GOING TO THE SALVATION ARMY NOW."

The Boy said, and I quote, "I don't know."

This morning, October 31st, the Boy told me he needed a Halloween mask.

After pouring water on my head to douse the fire shooting out of my ears, I asked him why he didn't inform me of this when I asked him YESTERDAY. His answer gives a pretty indepth look into the mind of a 14 year old boy.

"I told you at dinner a couple nights ago I was thinking of wearing a mask."

Yes. I gave birth to that.

How a Trip to the Salvation Army Turned Into a Shovel Upside the Head Moment

Our eldest child, hereafter known as EC, has FINALLY decided that she is to be Alice in Wonderland for Halloween. I mean, really. It's officially autumn. I'm already on to Christmas planning and she's just decided on Halloween? Please.

Sarcasm is a wonderful thing.

Off we went to the Salvation Army to see what we could piece together. EC is quite the seamstress/fashion designer so I figured it was a good first step.


We had some great luck. We found the material she needed to make both the dress and the apron. But anyone familiar with Disney's version of Alice in Wonderland will know that she needs a poofy skirt. Oh, heck, I'll save you some memory cells. Here ya go.

I had the brilliant idea to head over to the old bridesmaid and wedding dresses to see if we could find a crinoline we could use.

As I searched through the wedding dresses, I was thinking, "Someone wore this? Someone actually picked out this dress as 'the one' and wore it in public? Some bride loved THIS? EC! Look at this one! Oh my gosh, these are old."

And then God laughed.

I looked down and saw some familiar lace. Time stood still. I reached up and shoved assorted wedding dresses aside. There it was in all its glory.

My wedding dress.

Not MY wedding dress, but the exact same wedding dress that I wore in 1989. The wedding dress that I knew was 'the one' the moment I put it on. The dress that made me feel like a bride. The dress that I chose to wear when I made vows to my Hubby before God and our family and friends.

To add injury to insult, EC looked at the price tag and it's original price of $35 was crossed off and it had been marked down to $27.99.

I paid $800 for that dress.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And within your generation. EC thinks my wedding dress is ridiculous. Well, let's be honest. The 80's was a time when more was good and big was better. Ridiculous is a pretty good description for the entire fashion era.

But there's something about adding memories and meaning to an outdated piece of clothing that makes it beautiful. And I started thinking about all the hopes and dreams that were attached to the wedding dresses that I thought were ugly. I could start to look past the massive bows and puffy sleeves and see them in all their glory.

I thought about how someone could be coming along and laughing at my wedding dress. Buying it only to hack up and use pieces of it as a Halloween costume.

We left the wedding dresses. Whole and intact. Left them to reminisce amongst themselves of a time when they were loved and had the great privilege of holding a woman's hopes and dreams in their folds of lace and embroidery.

And we bought a Snow White costume and hacked that up instead.