I guess I’m in this world to provide balance for those of you who simply LOVE Halloween. There are many things I love about having children, but Halloween is not one of them. It isn’t the candy or treats. It isn’t the tacky, spooky, or downright disgusting decorations (i.e. fake spiderwebs?!?) It’s not even really the absurd amount of money you can end up spending on a costume that gets worn for one day. It is the fact that Halloween is predominantly arranged around trick-or-treating…and you know when trick-or-treating happens? After dark. Do you know what small children turn into after dark? Gremlins. Seriously…small, angry, over-tired, overstimulated gremlins. Especially after a full candy-fueled, costume wearing, play day at daycare. Why are they at daycare? Because Halloween is ALWAYS on the 31st, and unlike other ‘special day’ holidays (like Christmas) the 31st isn’t a holiday that warrants a standard day off from work.
Halloween in the Baxter household went something like this: Jason picks up costumed children a bit early, in the hopes they will eat some amount of real food before candy-fest 2016 begins. It may be their last non-candy meal in days. All three children fall asleep during the 20 minute car ride home. Christopher is carried into the house and refuses to wake up. He tries his best to continue sleeping in any position we place him in, including one point where he is kneeling on the floor collapsed into his oversized kid chair. William is also carried into the house, and although he is more awake, he is on the verge of a total meltdown. I predict this is because he is hungry (or hAngry as it may be). He proceeds to completely implode not because he doesn’t want to eat, but because he can’t decide what he wants to eat. He proceeds to cry as if this is the biggest failure of his entire life. After being offered mashed potatoes, PB&J, popcorn, and an assortment of other “real foods” he manages to eat two go-gurts…which should fuel him for at least 2 blocks of trick-or-treating. By this point we have managed to wake up Christopher who is not only crying but now also ANGRY. He refuses to willingly take off his costume for a diaper change but I manage to wrestle a clean one onto him anyway. It might be a little early to start, but hanging out at the house is not making things better. We pull out the double stroller, give the boys their pumpkin pails, and attempt to take some pictures. Christopher says “no” and starts to cry when I suggest a picture. Andrew wiggles discontentedly in his stroller because we’re not yet moving. William plays along for the most part. *whew*
Note: By 3 houses in my boys are sprinting door to door fueled by the lure of candy given out by strangers. They are cute, polite, and smiley. William is encouraging Christopher to hurry up, and 2 1/2 year old Christopher, who moments earlier was crying at the thought of having his picture taken, is now happily telling strangers “I Spiderman!” and “Today we trick-or-treating!!”. This is the kind of thing that greeting card worthy and convinces people without children that having children would be a great idea.
Post trick-or-treating is another series of meltdowns and struggles. Christopher is bawling as he comes back up the sidewalk because he realized trick-or-treating is over. William is obsessed with going to see the neighbor’s haunted house. Jason takes him over briefly, and then he proceeds to tell me he’s too scared to sleep. We divide up the candy, and I prematurely start feeling the guilt over how much I may end up letting them eat over the course of the next week until they forget about it. Another successful Halloween in the books. At least I got a few cute snaps of the boys in costume between bouts of crying.
Til next year!
S.~