Happy Halloween!

It's Halloween tomorrow. I don't know about the rest of you, but Halloween is a pretty big deal in our house. This post is about preparing for Halloween, being safe while trick or treating and dealing with meltdowns about all that junk food that will enter your household tomorrow night.

Preparation:

First comes the costume. It's difficult for a child to be excited about Halloween if they don't know what they're going to dress up as. Personally, I was a bit unconventional when it came to dressing up. I didn't want the typical costumes, like a witch or TV character. Where's the fun in that? My litany of Halloween costumes included a pilot (complete with a plane attached to me), a car, and finally a table. Yes, I went as a table one year. I was lucky that my mom was very creative and handy with sewing.

My boys aren't so lucky. I am creative, but I have no skill at sewing or putting things together to look like something real. So far though, J has picked some pretty easy costumes for me to figure out. This year he is going as a Pokemon trainer, which requires a white shirt, blue vest, blue and white hat with a logo (I can figure that one out) and a green backpack. E is young enough that he can get away with a commercial costume and still look cute, so he will be a monkey.

Whether you made a costume, bought a costume, or bought and revised a costume for your kids, once that part is over you can move on to some other preparation. J is not a crafty sort (he must take after me), unless it comes to holidays. He loves themed crafts for the holidays, and he is constantly checking the calendar to see what's coming up next that we can glue something together for. I had to gently let him down about Columbus Day, before he got too excited. Please, if you know of any Columbus Day crafts, do pass them on.

Halloween crafts are much easier. Here's one of our personal favourites. Garbage bag ghosts. We stuff white kitchen garbage bags with balled up grocery bags, and tie a string around the neck. Then we either tie or duct tape them all around our front porch. Drawing a face on them with Sharpie is optional. They are quick, easy, and look great for Halloween. Another quick and easy one is to blow up some orange balloons and Sharpie Jack 'o Lantern faces on them. They can be hung outside or in a window. We purchased a dowel and made some construction paper chains to hang off of it. Fold the construction paper accordion-style and cut out shapes, leaving the edges intact. Use orange for pumpkins, white for ghosts, black for witchy hats and green for whatever you like. Then staple them together so they are longer and tie them to the dowel. Hang the dowel where people can see it from a window and voila! All the crafts above are quick enough that children can complete them without becoming too distracted, economical and easy to store for next year, and they don't look tacky.

Safety:

Now let's move on to Halloween night. Everyone knows it's important to be safe, so I won't dwell on that, but I will provide some easy ways to enhance safety. If you live in a neighbourhood like mine, it's quite possible that sometimes there will be about fifty kids at the same house. That makes it pretty hard to keep track of your own, especially if they are wearing a popular costume. I also have two other children to consider, because some of J's friends want to join us trick or treating. I will be putting a big X on the back of each of my charges with orange duct tape, so they can't get caught up in the crowds. I'll have a flashlight, just in case, but the street lights are probably enough to see the bright, orange tape by. I know many parents like the glowing necklaces for Halloween, but they are quickly becoming popular, and therefore, less distinctive.

Another concern is the weather forecast. We are the lucky ones who are supposed to get rain that evening. It's also possible in this country to have snow or ice on Halloween. Make sure your child's footwear is non-slip and can handle the terrain. Kids become excited easily, and if they're like mine, there will be much running, jumping and dancing. The last thing anyone needs is to get a concussion from the sidewalk. Also make sure that they are warm enough. It may sound obvious, but costumes aren't designed for warmth. Make sure they have plenty of clothes underneath so they don't get a chill.

Even if you are planning on going out with your children, make sure you remind them of the rules about street safety. Cover things like what to do if they get lost and not to talk to strangers. Ensure they know some of the safe houses in your neighbourhood to go to if they need it, and review your telephone number and address with them.

Candy Trouble:

Now that you have a million bite-sized pieces of delicious garbage, it's time to set some limits. Feel free to let your kids have free reign and stuff themselves if that's what you prefer. I am not judging. I will however, provide some tips for those like me, whose children morph into lookalikes from another planet after too much sugar.

When we get home we count the candy. We sort by ingredients and preference into a bad ile and good pile, making sure there's exactly half in each. Then we give the kids a small but special new toy or book, in exchange for their bad half of candy. This way the kids are voluntarily giving away the half of their candy they can't eat, but also getting something they want instead. The good pile goes into a bowl on top of the fridge, and the other pile goes to friends who can eat it (or Daddy). They can have one or two pieces a day until it's gone. No problems, no tantrums, no arguments. It's a great system. J and E are so used to not eating junk food that we end up throwing out most of it anyway to make room for Easter eggs.

Whatever limits you choose to set (or not to set), make sure they are clear before trick or treating. Then it only takes a simple reminder when the kids' eyes glaze over looking at a mountain of candy. If there are tantrums of the "I WANT MORE" variety, I find it useful to say, "Well, if candy is causing this much stress, maybe we shouldn't have it in the house." That always works. Trust me.

Zippers: The bane of my existence!!!!!

I need a moment to vent. Here's the problem. By March of last year, J had gone through four winter coats. Not because he outgrew them, not because they were stained or ripped, but because he destroyed the zipper on every one of them. So it w  sin March that he began wearing a spring jacket, and I'm sure you can guess what happened next.

That's right, looks from other parents (and non-parents) that judged me for being an unfit mother, notes from the teacher saying he wasn't dressed appropriately, and lots of issues about the amount of sweaters he needed to wear underneath his thin jacket.

That's not the only problem we had last year though. He also went through five backpacks and three lunch bags, all due to the zipper being ripped off or broken. The same goes for sweaters. The only reason his pants last so long is because he is so skinny he doesn't need to use the zipper at all; he just pulls them right on.

I know boys are typically rough with their things, but it seems a little ridiculous to me that he breaks the zipper on everything. I was semi-prepared this year with an extra back pack, because I knew he wouldn't last ten months with just one. I was obviously being too optimistic by getting him two, because last week he broke the zipper on his first one. He came home and the entire zip part of the zipper was gone. The zipper itself was still done up, and he didn't bring home homework that night or finish his lunch at school because no one could get into the bag. The teacher tried, other kids tried, I think they even sent him to the office so the principal could try. I ended up opening the front pocket and cutting out the liner so we could get his stuff out of the main part of the bag. It's still usable, but now the opening is much smaller and he has no way to open the big zipper. The day before that, he broke the zipper on his lunch bag.

So it is with great trepidation that I introduced him to his new winter coat. Granted, it's a name brand that claims to repair zippers for free because of their quality guarantee, but he managed to break two zippers of the same "quality" brand last year. I still have the coats though, so I can always mail them to the company and get those zippers replaced so he has some extra. When I think of it, I envision myself sending so many coats through the mail that they forbid me to ever buy from them again. Free repairs can only last so long, right?

So here's where we stand, only a month and a half into school. He's onto his second backpack and his lunch bag has a taped up safety pin where the zipper should be, because Daddy has swiped his extra Ironman lunch bag for work. I fully intend to send the coats from last year back to the company to get the zippers replaced, but I am wishing that someone would invent a Velcro coat that is warm and dry enough for playing in the snow. I watch every day as that poor zipper is pulled mightily every way but up, and my heart stops when it catches the wrong way and only one side zips up. It's not broken yet, but it has only been three days that he's been wearing it. 

If we can make it to the Christmas holiday, my wish list will be several lunch boxes, backpacks, and coats for good measure. If I'm lucky, ten of each may last until April.

Homework

I volunteered to go into J's class every two weeks to help with spelling. I have been in once and I really enjoyed it. It's just me sitting at a table with each child, reading their "sight word" list and having them print it without looking. It sounds boring to most, but I live for that kind of thing. Really. J was doing "homework assignments" by the time he was three, and I would stay up some nights to brainstorm different ways to get him learning.

Before you think I was having him print out the same letter again and again on triple-lined paper, or copying lines, stop. I wasn't doing anything boring. And I know that because whenever J got bored, I would change what I was doing. I want learning to be fun for my children, and if that means I hunt everywhere for a detailed history of transit systems in Ontario, I will. By that, I mean city buses. J has always had a fascination with bus transportation, and although he's not so enamored with the idea now, he spent years trying to learn everything he could about it. In Ottawa, he knew over 200 buses by number and route by the time he was 2. He also knew every stop on the regular routes, and it only took him going on a new route once for him to learn that.

So do I care about buses? Nope, not at all. Do I know a LOT about them? Yes I do. They bore me to tears, but as a mother I am supposed to sigh inwardly and go over it again and again because my child loves it. I'm not sure if J will have a career involving buses or city transportation someday, but the chances aren't high. That's a pretty random job. I'm glad he learned all about them though, because he was interested and eager to find out. That was my way of teaching him that learning is fun and we can always know more about what we are curious about.

It's not only buses that we focused on. There has also been outer space, vehicles of all types, how to build roads and railroad tracks, career types, etc. The list goes on. E is only 2 and he's got his own list that's just as random: bugs, dogs, socks, trains, leaves and types of water toys. I don't concentrate much on learning the alphabet or counting by rote, but by encouraging them to be interested in what's natural, I've found that both of my boys have a great aptitude for this other, standard stuff. J knew all his letters by 18 months, while E knows almost all of the letters and can almost count to 20. When learning is fun, they want to keep doing it.

Speaking of which, I'm currently writing this while listening to E scream, "seven, eight, nine, TEN!!!!" from his crib, as he decided to start another nap strike today. Yesterday I had to wake him up after 2 1/2 hours and he argued with me because he wanted to stay in bed. Today, he's been there for nearly as long singing and playing and telling me to go to timeout because he's ALL DONE! Go figure.

Thanksgivng

I hope everyone had a wonderful long weekend and enjoyed Turkey Day. Our Thanksgiving was a little unconventional, but it was great all the same.

I took the kids up to see my parents and have a turkey dinner there. My mom cooked a wonderful meal and even J tried the roast beef. He really enjoyed the turkey, which is surprising considering he was picky about meat for six years, but he gobbled it up (pun not intended). She also cooked roast beef and potatoes and all the rest. The real kicker was dessert though. We had pumpkin pie of course, but there was also a lovely chocolate cream pie to go with it. The goal was for everyone to have two pieces of pie instead of one, because there were only six of us. Needless to say, I forgot about my so-called diet this weekend.

We came home yesterday and celebrated our family Thanksgiving today. I had planned to try serving duck, because a turkey is way too much for the four of us and a chicken doesn't seem special enough. Duck, although I've never tried it, seemed a good compromise. Unfortunately, the ducks that are sold at the grocery store are still huge, and even on sale they were $30. I've never spent half that much on an entire meal, let alone just the meat portion of it, so we settled for a cheaper alternative.

Instead of a nice duck dinner (I'm not even sure I would have liked it by the way) with all the trimmings, we invested in some dough and pesto and P made a pizza. Homemade pizza is a treat around here too, and we did it last year as well. I dare say it's becoming a tradition for us to have pizza and pumpkin pie for our Thanksgiving meal.

That's fine with me though. It's delicious and we all had fun eating it. I know that turkey is the traditional thing to serve on this holiday, but I wonder if anyone else goes against the grain on a regular basis. We do it for Christmas too, although we don't have pizza. We go to my mom's for the turkey part of the holidays, but here at home we tend to have a chicken or spaghetti. No, it's not anything special and I need to work on that.\

Since buying and cooking a turkey never makes sense for our family, I have thought of a new tradition for Christmas this year. It's actually a borrowed one from my dad, but it was fun all the same. My mom worked as a nurse for her entire career and never got Christmas off. We always had our big dinner on another day, and my dad would take my sister and I around visiting everyone we knew on Christmas, instead of staying home. When I was in University, he would come see me and we would drive around looking for any restaurant that was open. Then we would have dinner there.

It was fun and nice to have an adventure to go on at Christmas. This year I think our family will do the same thing. We will drive around and enjoy the Christmas lights while we search for any place that's open. Maybe we'll have pasta, maybe we'll have turkey, but we will eat wherever we find an open restaurant. I haven't discussed it with the rest of the family yet, but I think it's a great idea. I'm always one for starting our own traditions, making things important for us and not just doing things because they're important to other people. But I do know that we will always have pizza on Thanksgiving.......

I need nap time!

Last week I had perhaps the biggest scare yet when it comes to E: he refused to nap for five days in a row! J stopped napping before he turned two, but it was a more natural process. His naps decreased in length until they stopped altogether. E, on the other hand, was sleeping for two hours or more, every afternoon, when all of a sudden he stopped.

I panicked. Not because I don't know what to do with a toddler for an entire day, but because two hours to nothing seems a bit ridiculous. And it was. E was refusing to sleep, staying awake and locked in a full upright position until he convinced me to bring him back downstairs. It started with some crying, "Mommy, MOOOOOMMMMMMMYYYYYYY!" While this was difficult, it's also not out of the ordinary on occasion, so I let him go for it. But instead of drifting off after a minute or two, he started singing. "Hey Mr. Tambourine Man, SONG SONG SONG ME! Follow YOOOUUUU!" I have to admit, that was funny. But then he started yelling at me from his crib, ordering me to follow the Tambourine Man too, and when that failed, he began jumping on his mattress and flinging toys out of his crib. "Uh oh elephant, uh oh Starfish, uh oh Higgle Piggle and Macka Packa, uh oh Nana Bear, UH OH MR. JONES!"

This was what got me. Mr. Jones is sacred. He is the bear I got from my Grade One teacher when I was six, and have kept and passed along to E. He's just as attached to him as I was and there's no way that child is sleeping while Mr. Jones lies cold and lonely on the floor. So I had to go up and rescue the bear, which is when E would pull his "cute" face and tell me he was all done his nap. When I told him no, he became argumentative and summoned his ATTITUDE. I will tell you my two-year old has the attitude of a teenager. He is just as self-righteous, bossy, demanding and disagreeable as the most professional 15-year old. He ordered me to take him downstairs "RIGHT NOW!" and stop the madness of naptime.

Although there was more, I'm sure you get the point. For an hour I listened to E cry, scream, sing, laugh and manhandle his stuffed friends. There was one day when he slept for five minutes in the middle of all this, but aside from that, he woke at 6 and went to bed at 7, with zero sleep in between.

Before you think I'm a parent who needs their kids to have a nap so I get my free time, I'll tell you that's only half the case. Yes, I enjoy sitting down to actually enjoy a coffee without my little one begging me for just one more latte (that's a Tbsp. of brewed coffee with a cup of coconut milk, and he's nuts over it), but it's more about the fact that he clearly needs his daytime sleep still.\

If you think the resistance to naps was challenging, let me tell you about what happened after. My miniature teenager was so tired he could barely stand up. He couldn't walk in a straight line, and after four steps in a crooked line he would fall over. This paired with the "no no no" to everything and the fact that I had to hold him for 90% of the rest of the day, clearly showed me that he just cannot wean himself off of naps right now.

And that's why I panicked. Five days of a clingy, disagreeable, bossy, demanding, impossible-to-please toddler and I nearly reached my limit. I think I would have cried if there had been a day six. But thankfully, on day six he went back to his regular two-hour nap without a fuss, and things have improved a bit from there. At least I know he's not a danger to himself for half of the day and I can sometimes get him to listen to me. Yes, he's still two so that argumentative side is going to be here for a while. But it's nothing I can't handle with a jumbo coffee under my belt.

I know the day will come when he goes morning to night without a sleep in between. I'm not dreading that day  though.  It just means we will get to go out more, without having to worry about being home for the nap time window. It also means we can stay home and play here if we feel like it. But he's got to be ready. He tried to convince me last week that he was, but I'm not buying it.