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Happy Halloween

Is it Halloween yet? It is? At last? Thank ghoul-ness (Ha,ha!!).

This week marked the one year anniversary of Hurricane Sandy as it blew through the East Coast. We spent a week without power. Other parts of the East are still struggling to recover.

Last year, with all the downed power lines and toppled trees, Halloween was celebrated two day late in our small town. This year, I feel as though we’ve been celebrating for the past two weeks. Who am I kidding? October rolls around and the month is just about consumed with Halloween. It is the never-ending Halloween celebration. Not that I mind really. I have wonderful memories from Halloweens in Montreal. Say what you want about Halloween, but kids love it, so why not join in the fun?

The celebrations started with a trip to the pumpkin patch for both boys. It was Benjamin’s first kindergarten field trip, and a first for me too: I did not get to go. We both did just fine, thank you very much. I did, however, accompany Nicholas on his trip, my last after four years with his preschool (better get used to all these firsts and lasts). Nicholas, of course, chose the biggest pumpkin that he could find.

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We carved those pumpkins two nights ago. The boys helped me to empty their “pumkies” (as they call them), and we roasted the seeds.

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Then, they drew blueprints for me to carve:

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The end result was two pretty awesome, and totally original, pumkies. The kids aren’t bad either.

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Where there are pumpkins, there are costumes. Now I’ll admit, I cheated a little (a lot) with the costumes this year. Santa brought Benjamin and Nicholas astronaut jumpers for Christmas last year, and it took very little convincing for the boys to be astronauts for Halloween. And I do love dressing them in coordinating costumes. I’ll do it as long as they let me. I’m trying to convince Pierre that we should all go as characters from the Wizard of Oz next year, with Indy as the lion.

Costumes done! Easy-peezy-lemon-squeezy (as Ben says). We did make jet-packs though. Every astronaut needs a good jet-pack after all.

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Whew! Now to wait for the big day, right? Not so fast. The boys have each already worn their costumes three times. First, we trick-or-treated with friends at our local outlet shopping mall last:

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This might just be one of the most stressful evenings of the year. I have multiple mini-heart-attacks as the boys run from store to store amid the crowds. I’m terrified that I will lose one of them. Dressing them both in orange helped to relieve a little of my anxiety. Stressful or not (for me!), Ben and Nicholas love getting the chance to trick-or-treat with friends who don’t live in our neighborhood. Especially when they get to wear their costumes. And every year new friends join our group. Not much better than that.

Next, Nicholas had a Halloween party at school, and Benjamin and I helped. Let’s get dressed-up again. We all had fun making spiders and picture frames, playing bingo and Pin-the-Tail-on-the-Cat.

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And I love this photo of Nicholas. His job for the day was Flag Holder. In his astronaut costume, it could not have been more fitting (and a big thank you to my friend, Christine, for these gorgeous pictures). 

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Last night it was off to our town’s Halloween parade, where the boys dove for candy (in costume!) as the parade noisily made it’s way down Main Street (yes, I live in that kind of town. And I love it!!). It was good fun, and only the jet-packs were worse for the wear.

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Houston, we have a problem…Sorry, it was too good to resist!

So, now it’s off to fix those jet-packs so my little astronauts can blast-off for THE night of trick-or-treating. Pumpkins? Check. Costumes? Check. Candy? Check, check, check. Let’s go make some more memories. 

More pictures of the big night to follow soon.

Happy Halloween everyone. Stay safe.

xo Naomi

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