A lobster. That is what my 3 and a half month old baby is going to be for Halloween. There is nothing cute about shellfish, but my baby dressed as a lobster? Come on.
I have friends who sew and make awesome costumes for their kids- I don't. There are not even costume ideas floating around this over-occupied mind right now.
I used to have great ideas. One year during high school I had one of the cooks in my school's dining hall save all the cereal boxes for a week or so, and I went as the cereal section of the grocery store. And in last year's Halloween blog post, I mentioned my very realistic arab costume. We're talking award winning costumes here.
Halloween can get expensive, even if you go the home-made route. Marley would love to be Strawberry Shortcake, but $30 for a costume and another $15 for the must-have accompanying pink wig, for a 2-year-old mind you, is not happening. Part of me doesn't get all this effort and expense just to get a bit of candy. If you're going to get all dressed up, put in all this preparation, shouldn't it be for Christmas, or at least a birthday, where people are giving you actual gifts, and everyone knows exactly who and what you're celebrating?
What are we celebrating again? Costumes? Candy? Scariness? That slimy crud inside pumpkins? I love little kids dressing up, and fall, and all that, but I'm not a fan of the really creepy ghoulish parts of Halloween. The bottom line for me I guess is just letting my kids have an excuse to dress up and run around outside past their bedtimes. But then if that's the case, why do I dress Noah up when he couldn't care less? I mean, at 8, he has only been eating solid food for 2 years, and even then, only a select few foods. He doesn't eat candy. He looks at us with some disdain and minimal tolerance as we're sticking him in some get-up that he has absolutely no use for. And the baby, why do I feel the need to dress him up? Certainly it's not for him. It seems Halloween is as much about the parents' entertainment as the kids'. There's too much pressure to have some brilliant, original or cute costume- this year at least, it feels like pressure.
Why can't I just dress my kids up on a Thursday, pump them full of candy, chuck them into piles of leaves, roast marshmallows over our fire pit, and call it good? On to Christmas, I say. Which this year may feature a very cute Christmas lobster.
3 comments:
Hi Wendy! We're having the same problem in our house this year. We took the kids to Toysrus on Sunday to pick costumes and came out with nothing! Everyone is enthusiastic about the candy and about decorating our house and doing all the Halloween crafts I always pull out but no one is interested in dressing up! Looks like everyone is going to be a witch again!
I found a noble reason for trick-or-treating. No, hold on, I really did.
In our small town, the morale among the elderly plummeted the year our school started doing the trunk-or-treat. Seriously. These elderly people LIVE for this. Little kids coming to their door for treats? In costumes? What lonely old lady wouldn't want to see a baby lobster? They are totally depressed now that hardly anybody comes anymore. They buy huge candy bars, trying to bribe kids to come. It doesn't work. Stupid trunk-or-treat. I know the logic behind it. The safe, fast food version of trick-or-treating. But it totally leaves out the people who WANT to give out treats.
So. Every Halloween it's our service project. Ben hates it. We put on costumes, load up the kids, and DRIVE to a zillion houses. Not to get candy. But to visit the elderly people who want to give us candy. Thirty seconds makes their day. One year I wasn't feeling good so we only went a few places. I got several phone calls the next day, wondering why we didn't stop by.
So... It may be stupid, but Halloween matters. =o) Wanna come to our town for Halloween this year? I have two grandmas and lots of elderly friends who want to see your baby lobster.
(Before I moved here, I had no idea.)
We love Halloween, but I'm not big on ghoulish or scary either. Heck I was even a little perturbed when Miles wanted to be Darth Vader. Why would he want to be the bad guy? LOL.
I love the dressing up and trick or treating. We just hand out glow bracelets--or whatever else we have leftover from our events. Cheap, and not candy.
My kids talk about what they are going to be for months ahead of time. We have boxes of costumes that somehow I've ended up with and these days it seems they just throw things together from the boxes, saving me from having to go out and buy stuff. I love the lobster idea. I think that would be so cute!
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