Elmo's head in a pinch

I wasn't paying attention to the date, and I feel remiss that I did not post an appropriate Halloween-ish blurb yesterday.  If you haven't read my previous Halloween posts, click on the links in the text - you won't be disappointed!

Damn fine spider, if I don't say so myself.
 I honestly don't mind that my
sewing machine remained in its case
 for this one.  There were other super-hero
friends, but this was the only one available
 when I dropped Curly off and
headed to the grocery store.

We kind of sucked at Halloween this year.  It is the first year that we failed to even purchase a pumpkin.  Oops.  I got nothing here.  No excuse.  Just didn't do it.  Bad mom.  No one really complained, so I am not anticipating my pumpkin skipping to impact the kids' future therapist bills.

I anticipated have two trick-or-treaters this year. 

Halloween costume creations of yesteryear!
(I never shy away from an
opportunity to repost this photo)

1.  Curly:  Curly and her friends dressed in a super-hero theme costumes complete with a girl wardrobe element:  a tutu.  Curly frowned at me when I suggested that she be Captain Curly or someone who rescued people from bad hair days, etc.  It wasn't that kind of a costume theme.  No imagination required - and clearly, not preferred.  Curly dressed as spiderman - or I guess spiderwoman because she wore a tutu. 

After years and years of costume creations, all I did this year was draw a spider on a red long-sleeved shirt for Curly. 

2.  Reggie:  He stuffed himself in Cookie Monster's fat suit, a shirt, and a black curly wig. Whatever!  Reg is one of those kids that takes candy collection seriously.  He collects intel on which neighborhoods pass out the highest percentage of full size candy bars and he builds his door-to-door path based on that information.  Halloween is no different than sporting events for Reg . . . it's all a competition:  'How much candy did you get?  How many full-size bars?' 

This goes on and on until Tank starts stealing someone's loot and then Reg switches from Mr. Competition to Mr. Survival-Mode.  He stops caring who has more, and focuses on who has had more disappear mysteriously.  Translation:  starting last night, the next several weeks of my life as head referee becomes just a big barrel of laughs. 

Both Reg and Curly were using a friend's house (with dinner included) as base camp for their Halloween operation.  That left Coach and I off the hook.  Besides doorbell duty, which I am pleased to say I did not handle even once, Coach and I had nothing pressing.  There was on Irish dancing.  No basketball practice (for little kids).

Mini wore the Elmo head -
I still prefer what she wore
 to school last year, remember? -
Elmo's danglyneck (that resembles
an elderly woman's extra skin, hey -
remember I did this with no pattern,
so what did you expect?)
didn't look fabulous without
the costume to tuck it into, but
in a pinch it worked.  She also wore
his furry hands and borrowed Ed's
red sweatshirt.  She chose my kitchen
 cabinet for her candy hiding place. 
Just when I thought she was pretty bright.

I took Tank to the DMV right after school.  I will explain more on that adventure later.  I do want to point out here that the DMV is a ghost town on Halloween.  People with younger kids, make a note.  Hit the DMV on Oct. 31st.  You can thank me later.

The grocery store:  another easy-breezy task on Halloween. 

I left the grocery store to pick up Mini from freshman girls' basketball practice.  I had a trunk full of groceries and thought that we would just be heading home to heat up some leftovers.  Mini hopped in the car and asked if she could go to her friend's house to have pizza and then go trick-or-treating.  She wanted to just stop home and grab the Elmo head.  So much for my plan to feed the masses my leftovers.  They manage to all make plans for dinner when leftovers are being served.  Coincidence?

Now I had a 3rd trick-or-treater (one additional loot bag for Tank to steal from).  I was actually happy that Mini's friends wanted to go trick-or-treating because that would erase the awful experience of last year when she missed trick-or-treating.  This was a better note to end on. 

Elmo looks like he is pouting. 
He misses Halloween already.

The Elmo head was still sitting on the kitchen table this morning when the babysitting kids arrived.  They were very excited to get to eat breakfast in Elmo's presence.