In Which Libby Dresses as an Oven

Starting sometime this summer, Libby began requesting to be an oven for Halloween. When I'd tell people this, they'd universally say, "a what?" Yes, an oven. I don't know where she got the idea, but I kind of loved it because a) I could make it out of a cardboard box and wouldn't have to buy anything and b) she could wear a jacket underneath it. I've had all sorts of great ideas for Halloween costumes for my kids (like last year I reeeeally wanted Piper to be a Treasure Troll) but it's just too cold here on Halloween. Jackets are a must.

We decided to stick with the baking theme and dress Piper as a chocolate chip cookie because again, I could make it out of cardboard and she could wear a jacket. Both of them had a little trouble putting candy in their buckets. People were nice enough to hold out their bowl and let the kids choose what they wanted, but then they couldn't reach their hand across their bulky costumes to drop it in their bucket. Piper wised up and realized she could reach her hand under her cookie, so that worked for her. Libby was just out of luck with her short arms, so we had to help. 

We went to a church Halloween party on Wednesday and then trick-or-treated on Thursday, which wasn't really Halloween and wasn't really called trick-or-treating. Des Moines is weird. Back in the 50s or something, some mom decided that there was too much vandalism going on on Halloween night, so she got her neighborhood to do their candy collecting the night before. Eventually it spread to the entire metro area and it's still going strong. They call it Beggar's Night and kids are supposed to tell a joke or riddle to get their candy. I could go on and on about how little sense this all makes. First of all, Des Moines is pretty tame and most of the "vandalism" involves toilet papering trees and smashing pumpkins. And having Beggar's Night on the 30th and Halloween on the 31st now leaves two nights open to pranksters. My neighbor who is a cop said they get more calls about vandalism on the 30th than the 31st. So...what did that accomplish? But I digress...

Maybe when my kids are older, they will think it's fun to come up with jokes to tell. But this year, it was an accomplishment for them to remember (and be brave enough) to say "trick or treat" and "thank you."

Yeah, she's trick-or-treating with an Easter basket. So what?