Time to put on the Cat in the Hat hat
Monday October 31st 2011, 10:11 pm
Filed under: Non-Knitting

…With the googly eyes glued on to either side of the seam to give it that certain Frankensteinian je ne sais quoi.

Or eye. Lost one in the bottom of the box a few years ago.

You can never plan right–but you can never plan on being stingy, sometimes it’s lots and lots of kids. I decided one 150-piece Costco bag was probably enough, though.

Tonight it was just two nice dads saying thank you, looking me in the eye and wishing me a Happy Halloween and meaning it, with their three tiny princesses, one of whom needed me to turn off the loud scary green “Happy Halloweeeeeeeen” rubber hand before she dared reach into the candy bowl. One little boy. Don’t remember his costume, all I noticed was that sweet little face that had clearly been coached to take one just one.  I thwarted all their training.

And with them was a sullen young teen who had either gotten dragged along to keep an eye on him, or maybe was determined to still get his share of the loot in defiance of how much he’d grown in the past year, a combination of the above–whatever. I’ve had four teens, I recognized his look that didn’t quite dare to dare me to challenge his right to be there.

Instead I laughed, “Sure, go ahead,” when he looked at me, and held the bowl of candy out to him too and held it and held it to make clear that he, like the little kids, was just plain welcome to all he wanted–it’s all about having a good time, and I was glad they were making memories together. (With a strong bit of Take it Take it Please Take it!) I was grateful to them for reminding me just how magical all this is for little kids: it’s more real for me when I actually get to see them getting to pretend and wave their wands and stay up late and be all dressed up and be so excited about it all. And candy too! Grownups are so nice!

Had I known they were going to be the only ones who were going to come, they wouldn’t have needed to knock on another door all night. On the other hand, I stayed on the dads’ good side. Pretty much.


10 Comments so far
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You’re a better ma’am than I am, Gunga Din. I’m still sulking a little because candy corn is now verboten. I hid out at the bookstore until all the little gremlins, if indeed there were any, were off the streets.

Comment by Lynn 11.01.11 @ 4:44 am

Alison, you’ve blogged about OWS and OccupyOakland – and we have written to each other our own concerns. If you want to go to a well thought post, with excellent links, go read Yarnagogo’s blog. I find out my best information from my “yarnie blogs.”

Comment by Afton 11.01.11 @ 6:20 am

we had only about half a dozen kids last night — and saw many just walk on by the house even though the garage and porch lights were on — I’m thinking parents here are saying “if you don’t know the people don’t knock on the door” — sort of sad

Comment by Bev 11.01.11 @ 7:14 am

Our last group were some older kids who, when they looked in the bowl, said “you are almost out”. LOL. They left the last few pieces and I turned off the porch light after they left. Went to bed and my scary granddaughter then showed up. Dressed in a really scary costume, she sat on their front porch holding the bowl, not moving, and then would move or speak and enjoyed the reactions.

Comment by Sherry in Idaho 11.01.11 @ 7:31 am

http://thinkrockpaperscissors.typepad.com/my_weblog/2011/10/happy-halloween.html

Scroll on down to the thank you part. Made me sorry we don’t have treaters on our road. Melt.

Comment by Channon 11.01.11 @ 7:51 am

Well, this was the 40th year in a row. We had NO trick-or-treaters. We did have fun at Avenidas.

Comment by Don Meyer 11.01.11 @ 8:56 am

I got a panicked phone call from a housemate at 6:20–“are you going to be home soon? There are kids wanting candy!” I had the candy, just had to negotiate the beltway–but I got home in time for most of it to be given away. (Eight bags! We had a lot of kids this year.) And of course, I made sure to get some candy that grownups like, too . . .

Comment by Lanafactrix 11.01.11 @ 9:48 am

We had about 20 kid this year, better than in the past, all remembered to say thank you, and even the teenagers, were respectful, in the past we had problems with pumpkin smashers, till our neighbor who at the time was in her 90’s caught them at it and recognized , them called the police and they had to clean up every single pumpkin they or any one smashed , street sweeping.

Comment by Kris 11.01.11 @ 11:07 am

We had a good turnout – about 40 or so, all polite from the wee little ones to the teens. I dressed as a pirate with a parrot on my shoulder – more accurately, a stuffed flamingo, but I said my parrot was wearing a costume for Hallowe’en.

It’s nice being in a neighborhood long enough to watch the kids grow up.

Comment by twinsetellen 11.01.11 @ 3:07 pm

We always overbuy, and then no one comes. This year we skipped, since I can’t eat the leftovers and Branden doesn’t need them around to tempt him. Didn’t really see any trick-or-treaters in the neighborhood, anyway. I think they were all gone by the time we got home (at 5:30), or in the posh neighborhood next door, where there is probably better candy. =)

Comment by Erica 11.02.11 @ 6:56 pm



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