A Simple Halloween

Halloween happened.  It wasn't super wonderful or anything really special this year - but it was nice, very nice.  Jared and I didn't host the adult Halloween costume party we've done every year for our friends for about 10 years - between my Boston trip and the impending move, it just couldn't happen.  I took the kids to get costumes and pumpkins the day after we got back from Boston (luckily they all opted for a few simple accessories to help supplement what we already had on hand - no one had any elaborate costume ideas this year - so grateful for that).  I went to the simple little Halloween parade they had at the school on Friday morning and we had the ward Halloween party on Friday night.  On Saturday we carved pumpkins, had our traditional black bean soup (the kids love the way the murky black soup looks with a "ghost" - a dollop of sour cream - on top and I love getting something healthy in them before all the sugar hits), trick-or-treated for an hour or so and ended up hanging out with another family for a while at the last house we visited.  That was it.

I felt bad at first that Halloween was just sort of squished between things this year and that we didn't do much.  But actually it was perfect.  The kids were totally and completely happy about everything and I was able to enjoy the few easy things that just sort of happened with little effort on my part.  Maybe this is the way Halloween should be.  I love the fun of dressing up but really, I think Halloween has turned into way too big a deal in general.

One thing that I don't love about Halloween is the plethora of sugar involved and the wildness and bad moods it brings on in my kids.  But we've been able to minimize that in the last couple years thanks to the Halloween Fairy. A few years ago, someone told me about this wonderful fairy who gathers up the candy that kids choose to leave in a bag on on their front porch (you know, the candy they were handed that they don't particularly like but would eat anyway if it were lying around) and leaves dollar-store-type puzzles and games and fun stuff in its place. I love how that fairy helps us get rid of some of the sugar my kids don't really want or need!