Happy Halloween!

It's 9:00 pm and we haven't seen a single trick-or-treater tonight.  Last night, we probably had about a dozen kids knock on our door.  Total.  I shouldn't have even bothered buying candy!

Some people say trick-or-treating isn't an appropriate activity for the Sabbath.  I think if it's a family affair (like trick-or-treating was for my family until I was, like, 10) it's totally appropriate.

When I was 12, Halloween was on a Sunday.  That was the first year I really had friends (haha) and I went trick-or-treating with my friends Katie and Sara.  We were members of Team Rocket (I can't believe they're STILL DOING POKEMON).  Everyone thought we were cheerleaders from the Archie comics, what with our white miniskirts and the big red letter "R" ... oh well.

When I was 4, I dressed up as a black cat and everyone thought I was such a cute little mouse.  I remember eventually pulling my headband and trying to make the ears pointier.  Come to think of it, those ears were awfully rounded ... I wonder if Mom could only find us mouse costumes and tried to pass them off as kitties?!  MY WORLD IS SHATTERED.

Anyway.  I didn't have to worry much about trick-or-treating on the Sabbath this year.  Carmen is 18 months old and doesn't notice or car.  Braxton, the 22-month-old down the street who is our best friend, came trick-or-treating with his parents.  Carmen freaked out when she saw him and wanted to go outside.  "Bwaboo!  Bwaboo!"  ("Braxton!")  We walked with Braxton's parents, Chris and Cat, to the last 5 houses in the neighborhood where people were home.  I think we got, like, 8 whole pieces of candy.  What a haul!

I've been trying to get Carmen to practice saying "trick or treat" for the past few weeks.  The best I've gotten from her is, "Twee!!!"  For the most part, she walked up to people's front porches and started panting and squealing "Ooh! Ooh!" when she saw people hand out candy.  It was kind of hilarious.

Here's Carmen's costume:

From now until the end of time, our kids will be Ewoks when it's Halloween and they're big enough to walk!  Yay for being geeks!

I loved Braxton's costume.  I was at DI last month and saw this really cute plastic Elmo Halloween candy basket.  Braxton *loves* Elmo and I thought it would be perfect for him.  He dressed up as Cookie Monster this year ... so we had this almost-two-year-old Cookie Monster running around carrying Elmo's head.  Yup!!

Luckily, I'm not going to have to worry much the whole Halloween-on-a-Sunday thing for another 11 years.  For now, I figure if the kids want to go trick-or-treating, I'll tell them it will be Sabbath appropriate if all the siblings go together and therefore turn it into a "family outing".  Carmen will be 12.

I vote we say Halloween falls on the last non-Sunday of October!  I mean, election day is "the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November" (which is just a complicated way of saying election day can't be November 1st) ... but then, what about the Jewish Sabbath?  I think Friday night is the BEST night for Halloween!  I guess Christians will just have to deal with this moral dilemma every so often.  Sigh!