Halloween

The Roussels came for dinner and the guys took the 3 kids out trick or treating. Katie and I hung out and gave out candy, and after a while she went down to her brothers house where the boys had the kids. There were tons of trick or treaters. People driving up and dropping their kids off, kids not in costumes, kids not having any manners at all. It was sad. But also there were the kids who were very industrious. Homemade costumes. Inexpensive clever costumes. So it was also awesome. We ran out of candy, which is a first. I turned the lights out at 15 minutes before the official "over" time, and PJ and the kids came home very shortly afterwards. Ava wanted to be a mermaid, and following PJ's request/suggestion that we only do homemade costumes, I set out to make her a mermaid. However, it was apparent that the way I had planned to do it probably wasn't going to work (in retrospect it would have, and probably would have been easier, but not as great and I wouldn't have overcome the sewing machine fear). So off to the fabric store for pattern and fabric and accouterments I went. I did not totally follow the pattern, and definitely made mistakes, but was overall very pleased, and most importantly so was Ava. We did have some "seaweed" she opted not to wear, which kind of took away from it, but I think it worked. For James, we couldn't figure out what to put him in, and I knew that we had Ava's costume from two years before of a bunny rabbit that I purchased at Old Navy. I was concerned that the pink on the belly and ears would cause folks to find my beautiful boy quite feminine, so I balked, but as we had no alternative he was a bunny in the end. However, PJ came up with the idea to cover the pink belly with a shirt, and what better shirt than the tie dye that Kathy had recently sent? Marybeth was a monkey, quite adorable, and the three looked awesome. James was not sure what to make of it all. The only thing he knew was that Steve had to attend. PJ said that once they got going he was totally into it and having a blast. Even saying his version of Thank You! The kids came back all sugared up yet exhausted, and with quite a bit of loot. We are still getting through it, although the M and M's have long been finished. I know what to stuff stockings with this year!