For the past few years, we've been participating in our town's Halloween parade. Usually it's the Saturday before Halloween, but because Halloween landed on a Saturday this year, it was on the actual holiday! To make the day just a bit busier, Evan also had a soccer game at noon. So we woke up, got in our costumes, marched in the parade, did a little bit of "trick or treat street" at the downtown businesses, ran to Evan's soccer game, ran home for a nap, and then headed out into the neighborhood for trick or treating. That was our day in a nutshell. If only it went as smoothly as that though!
It all started out after we parked to go to the parade. We got the kids out of the car and started putting on their costumes, and then a few big buses drove by. They were loud, and that scared Emma, and that meant she refused to walk or even sit in the wagon. She just wanted to be carried. I managed to carry her most of the way to the parade line up area, then finally got her to walk holding my hand. She still refused to sit in the wagon. We got lined up for the parade and then it was time to start walking. She still refused to sit in the wagon. (sigh) She definitely does not walk fast enough to keep up in the parade and my arms and back are not strong enough to hold her the whole time. Yet, we ended up doing a bit of both; sometimes I'd carry her, sometimes John would, and then sometimes she'd walk. The parade route changed this year too. Instead of walking on one side down Main street and then back up on the other (at which point we usually dropped out of the parade somewhere on our return up Main), it went down a back street and then up Main. This meant we had to walk pretty much the whole thing this year if we wanted to walk in the part of the parade (i.e. on Main) where most all of the spectators were! And Emma still didn't want to sit in the wagon. However, about halfway through Evan did, so it wasn't a complete waste to bring it along. By the time we finished marching (and we still bowed out a bit early), Emma finally decided to sit in the wagon. There were so many people lined up to do trick or treat street that we only got to go to a few places. Evan and John ran ahead and snuck into a few more, but it was pretty much time to leave to move onto the next activity of the day already.....soccer.
Emma fresh in her Dalmation costume ready for the parade (just before a bus drove by I believe)
John and Evan ready for the parade
That's just Daddy in there Emma
The whole emergency response team ready to march in the parade
Evan and a friend before the parade
Me and my kiddos walking in the parade
When we got back to the car, John got out Evan's soccer gear to get him ready for the game only to find that a water bottle in his soccer bag had leaked and soaked his soccer jersey, shorts, and part of one soccer sock. We had about 45 minutes until his game was to begin, and we still needed to get lunch. We decided he'd play in his soccer pants that were still dry (instead of the shorts), and then we hung his jersey out the window as we drove hoping it would dry in the sun and the wind. We went through a drive thru to grab food, and then decided we'd need to do something more to dry his shirt. I remembered a local restaurant had a Dyson air blade hand dryer in the bathroom, so we stopped by there for me to dry his shirt (that worked well, just as it had when Evan dirtied a shirt of mine on a flight in Australia when he was a baby). Then on to the game. We were a few minutes late, but no big deal at this stage of play (more on the game in a forthcoming post on Evan's last weeks of the soccer season). After the game, Evan and Emma wrestled with Daddy in the grass by the soccer fields. It was such a beautiful day, so hard to not enjoy it! Then it was time to get home and rest up for the evening of trick or treating!
Gladly both kids took a good nap, which they should have been tired given all the walking, running, and playing we'd done already that day! We headed out right as the sun was starting to set. We figured we'd just walk around the block like the previous years and then come home to a warm dinner cooking in the crock pot while handing out candy to the kids that came by our house. What ended up happening, however, is that we ran into the neighbors and their kids while we were out and so Evan wanted to keep walking around with them. It was fun to be part of such a large group (and probably safer too given how dark it got!). But we ended up staying out past 7pm without even realizing it. By the time we were home, the doorbell only rang about 5 times, and yet I had bought an extra bag of candy since we had run out last year! Evan loved helping give out the candy. At one point, there was a group of four kids at the door and he gave two big handfuls of candy to the kid closest to him while I handed out small handfuls to the other kids. I felt bad that the other kids got shafted relative to the loads of candy Evan gave. He didn't know better and was just being generous, and we definitely had enough to hand out still! Even after that, we were still stuck with a few bowls of candy left, plus all the goodies the kids got from trick or treating! I don't mind having some leftover, but this was a bit extreme! We still have plenty left now...two weeks later! But don't worry, we're making good progress. I think we're almost out of "smarties", which have turned out to be Evan's favorite. He specifically asked for those when people had them in their bowls, and he's chosen those more than anything else when he's gotten to choose a piece of candy to eat. Now if I can just keep my hands out of the candy jar...all this candy sitting around it way too tempting!
About to head out trick or treating
Proud of his loot!
No comments:
Post a Comment