en costume

Somehow, while we weren't paying attention, our family moved into the pre-teen world. Halloween 2009 proves it. Let me illustrate.

 Four pumpkins for four kids {except for L, they did most of the work, including the designs}...

 Four pumpkins with two kids {one baseball player & one ninja}...

Our corpse bride spent the day with a friend, coming home only to pick up her costume and make-up so she could run back over there to get dressed and go trick-or-treating with her friend and her friend's older sister and her friend's older sister's friend. Our lacrosse player went to a Halloween party at a friend's house and trick-or-treated with a bunch of his buddies. And do you think those two used plastic pumpkins like our "littles"? Why would they when pillowcases can hold more loot and be slung over the shoulder for comfort while holding the tons of candy they dreamed about? Both took off before we got out the camera.

J escorted L & S around the neighborhood, and after maybe a half-hour, S came home to hang out with me. {He said he was done. I reminded him that he'd probably want more candy, especially when his siblings would be eating theirs long after his pumpkin was empty. He told me too much candy isn't good for you and he had enough. Sometimes they do listen when I speak! Or at least, one does.} I stayed home and passed out the 600 pieces of candy I bought to try to appease the record crowd we had this year. I kid you not: I bought 4 Costco bags (someone told me there are 150 pieces per bag).  With the kind of traffic we get there's no sense in staying inside as I have to get up and open the front door every minute. So I bundled up, moved S's pumpkin to the floor so I could have its chair, put on C's witch hat from last year, and parked myself on the porch to pass out the goods. We passed out every last piece (some to our mouths) and turned out the lights by 8:00ish. {I think we may have run out of candy even earlier had not J illuminated our porch with his strobe light. While there was nothing else remotely threatening about our sparse Halloween decorations (except for the lame witch impersonation I whipped out every other group or so), I kept hearing little kids say they were too scared to come up to our door. J thinks it's good for kids to get a bit spooked on Halloween. The candy would also have lasted a little longer had I refused to drop any into the sacs of the handful of adults that came to our door, sans costume, for a handout.}

J & I wanted to hunker down and go to bed soon after, but in this new preteen world, we had to stay up so we could fetch E & C around 10:00. I know...10:00 is nothing next to what we're in for when the kids grow into real teenagers. Just get used to seeing me with bags under my eyes for the next decade.