This is Halloween, This is Halloween
Happy October 32nd, everyone! I’ve decided to just ignore November entirely.
I love mid-October because Halloween is my favorite holiday, though I did phone it in a bit this year. Lorelei wanted to be a witch, so our theme was just basic dark fairytale cliches.
A few days before Halloween we always head downtown to Barktoberfest. It’s an awesome festival at the farmer’s market that supports Beyond Fences: The Coalition to Unchain Dogs, a fantastic non-profit that builds secure enclosures for dogs who would otherwise be tethered to a chain. We look forward to it all year.
Two years ago we won first place in the costume contest, with our Harry Potter theme (I was the Nimbus 2000 broomstick). Last year we were first runner-up, with an under the sea theme (I was seaweed).
For 2017, I was a spider web (I sense a theme), Zach was a bat, the dog was supposed to be a black cat, and Rowan was supposed to be a dragon. We won no place, because the whole thing was a fucking disaster. It was chilly and raining and we were all fairly hangry, but we figured we would get some food at one of the food trucks. We get there and realize there are no food trucks this year. Lorelei immediately starts complaining that she is cold and her dress is uncomfortable. Rowan refuses to wear his costume at all. I realize I didn’t put any sort of hole in the dog’s hoodie to allow us to connect her leash. Zach’s wings fell off.
We decide to walk down to Fullsteam Brewery and get some lunch and a beer while we wait for the rain to let up. About halfway there, Lorelei says my shoe is coming apart. A few hundred feet from the brewery the shoe gave up completely.
So now I’m quite literally hobbling. Rowan is refusing to hold hands. And the rest of us have our hands full of costume pieces and the dog leash, anyhow. We manage to make it for some lunch without major injury, but the rain didn’t let up. It was just nasty outside. Zach and I finally convince Lorelei we should just go home, by bribing her with a movie and popcorn.
Luckily, actual Halloween was much better, even though we didn’t get started until after work. I rushed home and we got ready and headed down to our neighborhood block party.
I’ve never dealt with a kid who absolutely refused to wear costumes before. Lorelei has always been game to dress up as whatever. Rowan started screaming “NO DRAGON!” the second I put the green pants on him. I asked him throughout the night if he would like to wear his dragon jacket, but he would just say “no dragon jacket!” and push me away.
I was super proud of Lorelei for going up to houses by herself to trick or treat. ToT is my least favorite part of Halloween, since it leads to an overabundance of candy. And it feels weird to encourage my kid to knock on strangers’ doors to ask for said candy. But until this year her anxiety always overrode the need for candy, or else she’d find someone else to go with her. This year she went by herself to a few houses, though I’m not sure she said “trick or treat” or even “thank you.” She did refuse to go to one house because she could see the owner on the phone through the door and she didn’t want to interrupt him.
We didn’t take the dog with us at all. Oh well.
Onwards to Halloween 2018.
I was going to write all about my feelings related to November being prematurity awareness month. But seeing as how it’s still October for the foreseeable future, that will have to wait a while.
