I’m a full two holidays behind now on the blog and so I’m afraid this will have to be quick because Cayman was gearing up for Christmas before we could even think about making American Thanksgiving plans. But I’m already getting ahead of myself talking about Thanksgiving. Let’s start with Halloween, shall we?
I’ll be frank…I’m not someone who likes to give little people lots of choices. Democracy’s cute and all but anarchy is just around the corner. I am slowly coming to terms with the fact that I will not get to be the boss forever and one of the mandates that I will miss the most is who wears what for Halloween. Because I think children’s lit is the greatest, I’ve always tried to dress my kids as characters from children’s stories.
Here’s our first Halloween…Nora Ruth’s favorite book at the time was Kitten’s First Full Moon by Kevin Henkes. We had to read it every night and she loved to talk about the “moon”. I could either fight with her over keeping ears on her head or let her wear a pillow around her waist. She talked about the moon more than the kitten anyway.
The next Halloween we were into Alice the Fairy by David Shannon. I’ve been searching for those Halloween photos for an hour and can’t find them anywhere! I did find this sweet picture of NR, wearing bits and pieces of her costume on some ordinary night. Its hard to see her face for that big prego belly that she’s kissing.
Things got a little bit trickier in 2010 when I had a second Halloween costume to envision and create but it all panned out eventually. Allie was a cute little cheshire cat and Nora Ruth was Alice. Alice’s favorite part of the costume? Her new, shiny, black patent shoes.
In 2011, I got in on the action to be Miss Clavel to their Madeline (Can you tell that I’m a prego nun?). This was when I discovered that Alliene, the more obstinate of my two girls, is amenable to wearing hats! I never thought she’d make it through pictures with her hat on, but she never took it off and if it somehow became askew she was very insistent that it be put back on right. Again, Nora Ruth was most excited about shiny, black shoes.
This year I failed to come up with coordinating costumes for all three kids but both girls have really been into Pinkalicious, Purplicious, and Goldilicious by Victoria Kann, so I did my best. Nora Ruth’s favorite color is indisputably pink, pink, pink. And Alliene’s favorite color is indisputably green, green, green. It’s not easy to find everything you need here in Cayman (at a reasonable price) to make a costume, but a little spray paint, hair paint, and face paint goes a long way! Pinkalicious and Greenalicious were too cute this Halloween. And poor Thomas, I wasn’t inspired by any other characters in Pinkalicious, so he was the odd-man-out as baby Harry Potter.
We had a great time trick-or-treating in a neighborhood called Snug Harbour, not too far from where we live. The wonderful residents of Snug Harbor had beaucoup decorations and many of them were in costume themselves. We parked in the neighborhood and walked from door to door, shielding Alliene from any scary costumes or decorations along the way. Allie was having NONE of the scary. One of my favorite moments was listening to Nora Ruth, my thrill-seeking adrenaline junky, attempting to explain why spooky is fun. Alliene listened stolidly as her eyes scanned the street for signs of more jumping, shrieking decorations and watched carefully to see who was opening doors and handing out candy to all of the children ahead of her. Thomas had the best seat, cruising in the stroller and taking it all in and getting the occasional “ooooh, he’s sooo cuuute!” from teenage girls passing by. And he was, too, in his white polo, diaper, and scarf with face painted spectacles and lightening scar.
looking for hogeye 