Trick-Or-Treat Party

Every Halloween for the past few years we've been holding a "trick-or-treat party" here at the house. We invite all of our close friends over and just make a big night out of Halloween. We made "mummy hotdogs" for the kids, and chili for all the adults...and then of course we have snacks, snacks, and more snacks. It's always a lot of fun, and the kids absolutely love it. The night wasn't that great for trick-or-treating. It was pretty cold, and kind of breezy. But the kids had a great time going from house to house and didn't complain too much. This was also the first time Megan actually walked up to some of the doors and said "trick or treat." She quickly picked up the routine. After the kids did some trick-or-treating everyone came back to the house and ate more snacks, watched "GREAT PUMPKIN CHARLIE BROWN," and just hung out. And that's the beauty of our little party...no matter what the weather is doing outside the kids still have a great time playing together and dressing up in their costumes. And that's what it's all about.

This was also the first year where I heard people outside coming up to the house like they were repeat visitors from years past. Every year we really decorate the house outside, and this year I noticed people just standing outside talking about the decorations. One guy was standing in our flowerbed with his kids just saying things like "...and check out the skeleton up in the window, and see the pumpkins...and look at the big spider...blah blah blah." The decorations this year included a big strobe light in the back yard lighting up the side of the house, the cemetery with "Mr. Bones," the "pumpkin ghost" in one of the upstairs windows, and "Mrs. Bones" in another upstairs window, and then of course all the lights and things. I think Ben was advertising our house at school because we also had lot of kids from his Kindergarten class throughout the night.

Anyway, after everyone went home the kids got ready for bed and "Nana" read all of us some Halloween stories by the fire. Overall, it was another great Halloween. When Ben went to bed at the end of the day he was almost crying because it was all over. We tried to make him feel better by telling him Christmas was coming soon, but he didn't really care about that. He kept saying "October is over, and Halloween is over, and tomorrow you're going to take down the decorations and it will all be over." I think I've mentioned it before to people...and it's really true. Ben loves Halloween almost just as much as Christmas.

Anyway...it was another fun Halloween, and the highlight this year was having Jackie here with us enjoying the festivities. I'm sure Ben and Megan really liked getting to go trick-or-treating with "Nana," and I'm sure Jackie had a great time as well.