Halloween, and the day before Halloween, and the week before that...

I am happy to report that there is a decided absence of Halloween decorations in Boulder. Not a single illuminated, generator-pumped pumpkin in sight. No Halloween flags or banners. Only one yard I know of is covered in fake spider webs, and it's not that bad. I haven't seen any Halloween sweaters, either. (Maybe they don't know about Christmas sweaters here. One can only hope.)

O is very excited about her bunny costume. For the past couple weeks whenever she couldn't find me, I'd hear her say, "maybe mommy's making my bunny costume. I'll go check." Once when I said it was time for me to make dinner she added, hopefully, "and my bunny costume"? M thinks her elephant costume is fun and all, but she's a little less anticipatory about the whole thing. My mistake is that O's costume is a WHITE bunny. Bunnies in real life come in all kinds of colors, I couldn't have selected black, brown, or even spotted? No, I went with the stereotype, and the price is trying to clean food from pre-Halloween events off a costume that can't easily be laundered. It seems Halloween is no longer a single-day event; there are ample chances to get a costume dirty before the big night. Whether this multi-day Halloween is the result of experiencing Halloween through the eyes of my kids, or whether it's because of holiday creep, I don't know. But, whatever the cause, I'm going to plan better next year. You should have seen me, geek mom of the century, putting bibs on my kids at a Halloween pizza party last night.

This morning we went with another couple, also new to Boulder, to go pumpkin picking. They have a daughter a little older than M+O, and the three kids had fun running around choosing pumpkins, and later playing with the other obligatory (money-making) things pumpkin patches set up this time of year. There were jolly jumpers, a large inflated slide, a hay maze, a petting zoo, and pony rides. The girls had so much fun that they conked out in the car on the way home even though it's only a 20-minute drive. Later this evening we carved our pumpkins. Jack 'o Lanterns, they must have learned the term at school. They drew the faces on and we carved. (For kids who love to put their hands in paint any chance they get they were surprisingly un-interested in helping clean out the pumpkin guts.) They each did one, and they shared a third. (M's is on the left, O's is on the right, and joint pumpkin in the middle -- M did the eyes and O did the mouth.) The results are outstanding, the kind of ghoulish look those of us over three have to work quite hard to achieve. They were so proud when we put them outside, or was that us? The holiday may be expanding, but as far as M+O are concerned, that's just fine. They're enjoying every minute.