Sunday, November 01, 2009

Halloween

I must confess to not being a big fan of Halloween. I don't particularly like scary things--there are enough things to scare me in real life that I don't get any pleasure out of artificially scaring myself.

I do remember with great joy, however, my own childhood trick-or-treating--and maybe a bit beyond childhood if I'm truly honest ;). It was so much fun to go with my parents and later my friends and go door-to-door (hoping for as much chocolate as possible).

Since Mark had to work both Saturday and Sunday (yeah, 12 straight days of work for him!) we went to church on Saturday night. We picked up pizza on the way home and then I put the girls to bed while Mark took the boys trick-or-treating around our neighborhood. We'd had a long day with soccer and lots of playing outside and the girls were just wiped out. We did promise Danielle that she could go trick-or-treating next year. She really wanted to go and we simply told her she was still too little.

The boys' costumes were not elaborate to say the least. Tim wore the police coat that Alex wore last year and Alex wore his costume from school on Friday. Friday all of the kids dressed up with a theme for their class. Tim and Danielle's classes both did "community workers" so Danielle wore the police coat and Tim was a "truck workman" (his concoction, which apparently requires a hard hat and a blue shirt). Alex's class was supposed to dress up as someone from the food service industry.

I struggled with what to send him as for awhile. I wanted to make sure it was something where he would understand what his job was. I debated a waiter (using a bow tie) but he's never been to that kind of restaurant. ;) I thought about a chef because he has an apron that will fit him, but I thought it would cause restricted movement at school and be hard to play around. Finally it hit me. He could go as a nutritionist! They've been studying "good" and "bad" food at school so he could understand the basic concept that a nutritionist is someone who tells people which foods are "good" and "bad." I pinned up an old lab coat of Mark's and sewed on a name tag that read "Alexander ..., Nutritionist." I had told Alex I would put his name on it..."Alex ..., Nutritionist" and he corrected me and said no, ALEXANDER ... apparently that's his professional name. ;)

One of our biggest goals for our children is to help them be successful with where they're at. There are a lot of concepts that Alex still just doesn't get. He's been hearing and speaking English for less than 2 years and he still hasn't experienced a lot of things that kids growing up here would have experienced by age 7. By seeking things he can be successful in now, we hope to give him the confidence to continue to grow beyond his past and succeed in all areas of life.

As he was taking off his lab coat Saturday night, he turned to me and said "Mama, I really like this costume." :)

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Poor Danielle, she knows she is older than Tim, but Tim gets to go and she has to stay home, because she is too little. That's just sad.

Courtney said...

No, Danielle's not older than Tim. He's 6 and she's 5. :)

Anonymous said...

I can't believe the girls didn't get to have Halloween! The poor girls, I'm sure they would have really enjoyed it! Hopefully they don't have to miss out on too much more, especially since Danielle got to do the school Halloween, and then was told that she was too young to do the real thing. Poor girl!

Unknown said...

I remember when mine were younger ... After a long day at daycare and/or school, they would get "hyped up" on sugar at their grandparents house. Then, it was usually about only 15-20 minutes into trick-or-treating that they would be whining and crying because they were overstimulated and just plain tired. Looking back, I think I should have left the younger ones at home, and then just split the candy between them later. It would have made for a more enjoyable time for (me and ) the non-crabby older one(s)! :)

Karen said...

Some of my favorite memories are of my middle daughter when she was 3. We were still working on perfecting the potty training. I guess she was afraid that if she told me she had to go..we would go back home and not go out again. I wasn't paying attention and we got to a neighbors house...she said trick or treat...and had an accident on the porch. It was one of those embarassing moments that you didn't know if you should laugh or cry....We still laugh about it today....and as this Halloween passed and my kids are too old to go trick or treating...i miss making those memories....

Courtney said...

Sorry, I didn't explain this well. The school does not celebrate Halloween. They have a fall party but it celebrates the end of their community workers unit (for pre-K and K) and food/nutrition unit (for 1st grade). The kids all participated in the trunk-or-treat that we went to last weekend at a friend's church but none of them dressed up. Danielle was not upset about missing out on trick-or-treating. She doesn't know what it is. She was just as happy to have Mama put her to bed and gets lots of attention that she didn't have to share with the boys. :)

As a side note, all of the candy from trick-or-treating and school (regardless of the time of year) in general goes into one community bowl for the family to share. This cuts down on possessiveness/greediness which can be an understandable issue for some of our kids.

Bethany said...

Don't feel like you have to justify or explain. They're your kiddos, and "anonymous" (why are these people always too chicken to leave their names!?) just needs to realize that being a good Mom requires doing what's BEST for the child. Not always the most fun thing, but what is best. She didn't know what she was missing, she has only been in the US a short time...you didn't scar her. :)

Jane said...

We have an enormous bag of candy at the house. I'm going to make the kids go through it today and pick out a few of what they want & then the rest will go to work as break room fodder.....
I don't know when Halloween turned into a month long holiday that gathers in mountains of candy that is ever eaten by the kids. We throw most of it away at Easter!!!
You are a good mum to know when your kids have had enough stimulation for one day. One of our most-used lines is "we stayed 10 minutes too long" We are STILL learning!!!!