Happy Halloween!

I'll be the first to admit I was NOT in the mood for Halloween. It isn't my favorite holiday, but usually I'm ready to have fun with the pumkins, costumes, (candy), and fall-ness. . . . but not this time. First of all, my scrooginess may have had to do with the fact that we had no pumpkins, we hadn't been to a pumkin patch -- my FAVORITE part of the Halloween season. It isn't that we didn't try, but we had four trips planned that each got cancelled. Three of them due to the weather -- it was too rainy and muddy all month, and the other was because someone was acting up and the punishment was that we wouldn't go that particular day. Allen seemed to think my seasons were "off" and I wasn't in the autumn-mood because I've been cleaning as if it was spring. The other part was that the costumes for the kids were falling apart and very difficult to repair.

Allen and I picked out the costumes at the Grand Bazaar in Instanbul when we were there this summer. We thought it would be a great gift because the kids all love playing dress-up, and with Halloween coming up, they could wear them then. After wearing the costumes for about an hour when we gave them to the kids, the lack of quality was apparent as the stitching unravelled, the fabric frayed and tore, and I got frustrated. This past week, I've been trying all sorts of things to reassemble the outfits or at least get them to a presentable state for the few hours the kids would be costumed. I finally finished, but the efforts definitely didn't cheer me up.

I was really ready to just cancel Halloween. The little kids probably wouldn't have noticed, but I didn't really want to break Will's heart since he looks forward to Halloween starting with the end of the fireworks show in July. So we did it. I don't know what to say they were dressed as. The costumes were Turkish folk dance costumes, so were they my Turkeys? my Turkish Delights? I don't know. When they all tried them on the first time, Will commented, "Hey! We look like Aladin, and Genie, and Jasmine. Who wants to be the monkey?" The little boys, especially Jon in the red costume, reminded me a little bit of the cappuchin monkeys that dance with the organ grinders. [Photos below: Jon (red), Maddie (purple), Ben (maroon), Will (black)]

We got the kids dressed up, took the pictures, and meant to just go to a few houses, but ended up circling the entire neighborhood. And in the end everyone had a great time -- including me.

Allen and I both took the kids around to the neighbors, and most of the way, he just laughed at me. I guess I was too bossy? He said I had too many rules, but throughout the evening, he hollered quite a few, too:

• Don't start trick or treating before 6:00pm.
• Only go to the houses with porch lights.
• Wait for your siblings.
• Stay together.
• Hold my hand in the street.
• Say "trick-or-treat."
• Say "thank you."
• Don't go in the house, just stay on the porch.
• Don't shout in the open windows, "Hey! We're twick-tweating out here!"
• Don't ring the bell more than once.
• Stop ringing the doorbell -- that's enough.
• Only one of you can ring the bell.
• Don't fight.
• Only Will can ring the bell.
• Wait for your siblings.
• You get what you get -- don't get upset.
• Don't try opening the door just because no one answers. (We know it's locked.)
• Don’t ring the doorbell AND knock.
• Don’t run from the scary man that answers the door but
• Do run from the tiny little doggie that comes out and barks at you
• Don’t grab handfuls of candy from the bowl
• You don't need to discuss all 40 pieces of candy with the neighbor who tells you you've got a lot. Neither do you. . . or you.

The kids should be experts by this time next year. They were polite. Yes, they tried opening the doors. Yes, they shouted in the windows. Yes, we laughed a lot from the curb. One of the funniest times was when all four got the nerve (finally) to go knock on the door of a very spookily-dressed house. As soon as the door opened, a small dog barked, and the three little ones turned around and ran scattering like quails (as Allen put it.) As soon as the candy bowl came out, they ran back just as quickly. Another house wasn't as spooky from the outside, but a big guy in an ugly mask answered the door with another little bitty barking dog. Maddie screamed and cried and the guy guiltily took off the mask to soothe her, but she hadn't even noticed the mask since the dog was still yapping and she was frightened by the dog.

We all had fun and when we got home, we let the kids eat candy until they were sick of it. Yes, we are parents who do that. The dentist said that was a good way to do it -- after that we get rid of a lot of it, freeze some for later in the year, and the kids are sick of it and don't ask for it anyway. The weather was beautiful, so I'm ready for fall finally. Tomorrow is supposed to be another gorgeous day and we'll head to Canton and meet Allen's family.