Embracing Halloween
I typically dislike Halloween and have for years:
I hate the candy, because I have the biggest sweet tooth in the world and all I do is eat all the candy. I usually don’t even buy candy for the trick-or-treators until the actual day of Halloween because it limits my time to eat it. I simply cannot have that stuff in the house! And I avoid buying chocolate all together since I have absolutely no ability to refuse chocolate!- I hated dressing up as a kid. I have no idea why, but I just never enjoyed it.
- I still hate dressing up. I’m too much of a perfectionist to DYI something (because let’s be honest, my creative skills are seriously lacking). And I’m way to cheap to pay for a costume pre-made. So, I just dread dressing up and try to avoid going out at all costs.
- In the past I’ve attempted to skip Halloween altogether. Spending so long being childless, not by choice, made me hate the idea of seeing all kinds of cute little dressed up kids at my door.
- Every year I stress about our dog. The only time she barks is when people come to the door or there is lots of activity on the street. She’s getting more and more protective as she gets older. I worry that she’ll get upset and something will go wrong, so she ends up spending the evening locked in the basement so she doesn’t get as wound up. I despise locking her in the basement.
But this year, I’m trying a bit harder to enjoy it. And so far it’s coming a bit easier for me as seeing Halloween through a kids eyes has proven to be a lot more fun for me.
This weekend we went to a pumpkin patch and petting zoo (thanks to all the IG photos of others doing, I thought we should partake in this adorable event). Baby MPB had a great time, and I took about 100 photos of all the adorable cuteness. And then of course we carved up Baby MPB’s first pumpkin. And of course, I took a ffew more photos of the pumpkiny-gooey cuteness.
We went really early to buy Baby MPB a costume. Mr. MPB was thinking something Star Wars related or maybe Batman or some sort of superhero costume. I put my foot down and said no, I want something cute and cuddly because this is probably the only year I will get to pick his costume. And let’s be honest, as a little boy, in future years he is probably going to want to dress up as Luke Skywalker or Batman or Superman. I almost compromised and agreed to an Ewok costume. But, once we found out Ewok is one of the top selling baby Halloween costumes, we decided to avoid any pop-culture costumes. Mr. MPB was equally opposed to dressing him up as a teddy bear, a dog or some sort of fuzzy animal. So, we eventually found a compromise and he’s going as the cutest little dinosaur.
And as we have no family in town we plan to dress him up, take some adorable photos and then go trick-or-treating at a few of our neighbours houses. (Given my addiction to candy and the fact that Baby MPB will have no idea what’s going on this year, we will probably not be trick-or-treating at multiple houses).
Now, I just need today meetings to speed by so that I can get home and play with my little dinosaur!
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Omg I feel you with the dislike of Halloween for all the same reasons. And now with a baby I am starting to see the appeal again like I did as a kid. Haha we are dressing Avery up as an ewok but only because we did not get around to buying or making a costume, and she already had a brown bunting and we had an old brown rag to adorn it with. Easy peasy, and free.
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I love me some Halloween! It is my absolute favorite time of year and my very favorite holiday (followed closely by July 4th!). I don’t usually dress up myself, but we did this year because we ALL went as ghostbusters (it is all my kids play right now – costumes, goggles, proton packs worn DAILY) and it was fun! We did skip trick or treating because we were in Chicago at my sisters epic Halloween party (apples fall close to the tree!) and our community does it the night before.
I bet you get to pick his costume next year too. This was the first year that Bryson cared and Matthew started caring last year.
I’m glad you’re enjoying it! Everything changes with kids – It’s amazing what you will pleasantly tolerate to make them happy! (I draw the line, though, at pop culture clothing – my kids know that that is a hard NO unless it’s subtle star wars, tasteful superheroes (logo only), or ghostbusters.)
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Awwww! We’re also dressing up our little guy as a dino — we’ve got twin dinosaur babies this year! Glad you’re embracing the parts of Halloween that you’ll find enjoyable and passing on the parts you won’t — with kids this age, it’s all about what’s going to make you and the baby happy. This morning we had our major Halloween festivity of a parade across the campus of the college I work at (because my son is in the campus daycare), with the preschoolers stopping to sing Halloween songs on the steps of the library and the administration building. My little dino snuggled into his carrier seemed to mostly enjoy the walk. 🙂
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I don’t like Halloween either. I secretly hope I don’t have to start liking it if I become a mom. lol.
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I don’t like Halloween either, haven’t since childhood. I do enjoy taking my sons out trick-or-treating, but I don’t dress up.
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I totally feel you on the dog anxiety. Our dogs are barkers, and every year they have a shitfit over the kids coming to our door. Last year we tried having the dogs free in the house (and hoped it would be a good training opportunity), but they just ended up getting so excited about the kids that they’d run circles around them. Clementine even knocked over a toddler on our front step, and I was mortified. I’m sure that the coming years will be different though, with us likely taking the boys out instead of staying in. Happy Halloween to you two and your adorable dinosaur!
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Halloween isn’t my top holiday either. J and I never dress up for it but now that A is in the picture, that’ll change in the next year or two. I used to love Halloween as a kid and have fantastic memories of my Mom and Dad taking us out and not coming home until my huge bucket was filled to the brim and then sorting it all out with my Sisters and trading our favorites. Once I moved back from CT, Halloween just hasn’t held as much appeal as it once did.
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I find the US Halloween thing funny (and impressive!). Like here in the UK it’s sorta big, but only in the way of being something that people with kids do, and they really don’t tend to go all out like my friends in the US do. And also I suppose adults do it too but mainly as an excuse to have a party. Like people don’t spend that much time on it and I think lots of people just ignore it! I’ve lived in apartments for the past 5 years so that makes it less likely that anyone comes round! But when I used to live in a neighbourhood with kids, I used to make sure I had sweets and stuff in the house if they came by. We usually didn’t have many coming by though. Since we got Dog, he has usually dressed up for halloween (not entirely against his will!) but we don’t tend to do much. I will definitely be embracing it if/when B comes along, but probably more in the cute outfits way rather than the whole pumpkin carving thing! Too much effort I think! I bet your little dino looks adorable!
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Oh and I realise you are not in the US btw… I was just musing on the differences as many people I’m friends with and in the blogosphere are in the US, and there is a marked difference in celebrating halloween compared to our low key (low effort!) British halloween!
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