BOO!

Awww Halloween. Probably my favourite holiday of the entire year. Little prepwork, little shopping, no cooking large meals for family – just pure sugar fun.

When we were kids, my Mom and Dad were not Wicked Witch parents like a lot of us are today (ME AND RICH INCLUDED) - they let us keep ALL of our Halloween loot. They didn’t pilfer through it and steal ¾ of it for themselves, their office colleagues or use it to stuff birthday piñatas like my brother in law does (no worries, my nephews are not Working Mommy blog readers). There was nothing in the world like the thrill of pouring out your pillowcase on the carpet to start the meticulous process of classifying your candy. First, you'd just admire the pile and see if it was bigger than your sister’s or not. Then – you rolled up your sleeves and started sorting.

We had a multi-tiered system that required intense concentration. First, you'd sort out the chips because they’re the biggest and you didn’t want them to get crushed. Then you went for the chocolate bars because those, really, were what you went out trick or treating for in the first place. Toostie Rolls, lollipops, gum, caramels, Rockets, any kind of chews (Mojos etc.), etc. Then you’d break it down again and sort out the chocolate bars by brand, the gums and lollipops by colour, the chips by flavour etc. Make a couple of trades here and there and by that time, photographic memory kicked in and you had an intense relationship with EVERY piece of candy that you had collected. If a Wunderbar went missing, I’d call out a search party.

There was even a hierarchy to how you’d eat it. You go for the chocolate first because that was the gold. Eat your favourites, then move down the food chain. Tootsie Rolls and Pops (because they are sort of ‘like’ chocolate), gummy candies, Kraft caramels, Mojos, Rockets – throw in a bag of chips in between to cut down the sweet factor. Then the BB Bats (toffee first then the pink ones) until all you were left with were the peanuts in shells and those candy kisses (the chewy molasses teeth pullers in the Halloween wrappers) which you’d usually just chuck out.

Simon starred in his Halloween play this morning. He was the ‘ghost’ in a cute little production his class put on for the parents. I was so proud – he did such a good job and remembered all of his cues. It was a story about a big pumpkin (played by Anais) that a witch (played by Celeste who truly has a future on the stage) wants to pull it out of the ground so she could make pumpkin pie. She can’t pull it out by herself so a ghost comes along (Simon) to give it a try. They had put a long white sweater on him and sheet over his head with two eye holes cut out of it – but he couldn’t see because it kept slipping so they took the sheet off him half way. The ghost flexes his muscles and tries to pull the pumpkin out of the ground but can’t do it either. Then a vampire comes along (Geva) followed by a mummy (Zaniah) and a bat (Kaitlyn) who all try to pull out the pumpkin but fall into a pile on the floor (Simon was the only one on cue for the tumble – so proud!). In the end, they get it out and make pumpkin pie which they throw over to the goblins (played by the rest of the class). It was all set to a musical recording so the kids knew their cues etc. Before each character had their go at pulling out the pumpkin, there was a line in the song that said “and they thought about pumpkin pie” and the kids had to tap their temples in thought. Rich videotaped and if I could figure out how to upload videos to this – I’ll eventually get it posted.

Photos of tonight’s trick or treating event will follow shortly.

Have a safe Halloween everyone! Bring on the peanut butter cups!