Hunkin Halloween!

I didn't decorate the house for Halloween this year. Again. October comes and goes so quickly! I love celebrating traditions and participating in holiday fun. I don't know why I don't do more around the house. I know the kids would love it. You'd think because I have an October birthday that I'd have tons of Halloween decor. Not one piece. Shame! The babies were supposed to have an October birthday, too, if I'd carried them full-term. Their original due date was on my birthday, October 14th. That would've been neat. For my birthday this year, my mom brought me a Halloween decoration to help me get into the spirit, a pumpkin with a stand. It is the cutest pumpkin stand ever. It looks like a spider. As soon as she came in with it, Ethan yelled out in excitement, "Hunkin! Awesome, dude!" And Emma pointed out, "Spi'er!" She's really into the song, "The Itsy Bitsy Spider." She loves when I sing it with the hand motions, and she does her best to follow along. The pumpkin-spider is our only Halloween decoration. I promise to do better next year.

On the day before Halloween, we went to a Fall Festival at Connors, where I work. The twins made their first appearance in their costumes: a blue Crayola and a pink Crayola. My mom thought of the costumes this year. We thought it was a cute idea. We ordered them online from Amazon. They were super cute and the kids loved wearing them! They had little pointed hats that I worried would be a bother to them, but they loved them! If they fell off, it concerned them and they wanted them back on. When they first saw the other in costume, they laughed, and they reached out to touch each other's hat. "Color! Hat!" They recognized them right away from their own crayon boxes that they love making pretty pictures with. They cried when I took the costumes off. After the festival, we went to a church carnival with two of our favorite friends, Necole and her son, Colton. They had a section of games especially for small children and it was perfect for them! They threw a squishy, sea urchin ball through a hole in a cardboard fishy drawing, dropped a penny in a jar of water onto a small platform and even shot some basketball hoops for prizes and candy.

"Candy!!"

The babies get to eat candy and chocolate this year! Last year, I was afraid to let them have too much sugar and "No chocolate until they are two," said The Baby Bullet recipe book. I only let them have a few dum-dums and I was so uptight about them getting messy (See Costume Control). This year, we are going real trick-or-treating, and bring on the candy! Mommy, chill out. They're big and messy 2 year olds now!

On Halloween, the weather was perfect! The babies...excuse me--kids--made the rounds to see family early and then came home for some corn dogs before the big event. When their dad came home, we headed out into the neighborhood to collect desert.

We held their hands as we walked down the street. They loved seeing all of the Halloween decor from the big inflatables to the jack-o-lanterns, and one house even had a bubble machine. Emma danced and danced in the bubbles and Ethan looked on in amazement.

There was one house that had a big, tall mummy on the porch with eyes that lit up and looked around. He had an evil laugh and said something scary that I couldn't make out. The kids just stared at it. I think they thought it was a real man. Ethan was scared and wanted his dad to hold him. Emma said, "Hi!"

They were too shy to say, "Trick-or-treat!" but they would say, "Thank you" once in a while. Mom and Dad had to say their speaking parts for them, but I'm sure they'll catch on for next year. They gladly accepted the candy and dropped it in their plastic buckets. After the mummy house, Ethan went on repeating, "Scary man, scary man," for the rest of the night. Emma happily greeted every one she saw. They were complimented over and over on their Crayola costumes. One group even remembered them from the night before at the carnival.

When we got home, we poured the candy into the floor and let the babies help us examine it. They ate chocolate candy bars, Sour Patch Kids gummies, and suckers galore! I was a little worried that they may have a reaction to that much sugar, but I restrained myself from the uptight worries of last year.

I could definitely tell the sugar was flowing through their veins. They were running around and laughing like crazy, and then the next minute they were having meltdowns.

"Time to brush your teeth!" I said, and they followed me into the bathroom like they do every night. We brushed for an extra minute or two that night. The trick-or-treat-first-timers went to bed with candy on the brain. And when their eyes popped open in the dim morning light, it was the first word on their lips:

"CANDY!"