Halloween!

Lydia really looks forward to Halloween. This year, she decided pretty early in the year that she wanted to be a mummy, and shockingly, she stuck with it. Lucky for me, Audrey wanted to be a pumpkin just like she was last year and Charlie really had no choice, so she was a dinosaur just like Lydia and Audrey were when they were one and a half. Jayson's mom made both the pumpkin and the dinosaur costumes and they've held up well.

I made the mummy costume. It took way longer than I had anticipated. I got the cheapest white sheet I could find and I ripped it into strips. I hand-sewed it onto a white sweatsuit, being careful to put a nice edge along the zipper, hood, and pockets. I left long strips on the hood to wrap around her face (I know, not exactly safe, but it looked great). Unfortunately, the stitches weren't strong enough and easily broke, especially on her butt when she sat down. So, I reinforced everything with machine-sewn stitches. Unfortunately, I could only sew the top and bottom of the legs because there was just too much material to try to get to the middle of the legs. So, the top held up well, but the legs kind of unraveled. Luckily, mummies aren't exactly tidy, so as things unraveled, I could just re-wrap them and tie them in whatever way worked.

We live right on the border of two cities. One has trick-or-treating from 1:00pm to 3:00pm and the other has it from 4:00pm to 7:00pm. SCORE! While Charlie napped, I took Lydia and Audrey in the afternoon. It was rainy, but not too cold, and it was bearable. The weather kept a lot of people home. We barely saw anybody out. One of the first houses we went to held their bowl out and told the girls we were the only ones they had all afternoon and they could take as much candy as they wanted. Audrey very delicately picked out two pieces. No, no, no. We had a little huddle and I explained to them that if they are offered as much as they want, they grab a handful. And go for the brown, orange, and red wrappers. Stay away from that fruity stuff. They got a pretty good haul and despite the how miserable it was, they happily thanked people and skipped back down the driveways yelling, "Happy Halloween!"

We went home to eat some healthy food and then went back out in our neighborhood with all three girls. By then, the rain was coming down a bit more, the temperature had dropped, and it was windy. Charlie didn't even get out of the stroller. We definitely had to make it at least to the house that gives away king size candy bars every year. Then the girls started to get tired. They fought over who got to ring the doorbell (or ding bell as Audrey says). Audrey got tired, but Lydia insisted we keep going. Finally, we made our way home and changed out of our cold, wet clothes and took inventory. The girls got a nice selection of candy and no junk. They don't normally eat candy, so it's a special treat for them and Jayson and I help them out. Yesterday they got three pieces each and bedtime was an absolute nightmare, so we'll scale that back. Overall, a successful Halloween!