Halloween traditions

It's been a busy week, and I haven't been feeling the greatest. We had a very nice Halloween, for Halloween, which I don't particularly enjoy. We took Logan and Colton with us, as usual. It's so much more fun for Luciana to have friends to go with. The boys were very well-behaved, the weather was beautiful enough that the kids didn't even need to wear jackets. Luciana had gotten quite upset earlier, when I told her she would need to take her jacket to wear over her costume, as I thought it would be to cold to be without it once the sun went down. Orinda had the same argument earlier in the day at her house with Logan. After all that, the jackets were totally unnecessary.

L. ended up being a big cat. She had been planning to go as a wizard (one of her sister's old costumes) but changed her mind at some point during the day.

Everytime she saw an Obama sign while we were ToT'ing, she happily pointed it out. She only saw one McCain sign, and she sneered. She was not going to go up to the door, but when the boys both ran up, she decided to stroll up, too, to collect the candy. Normally, all three kids give a nice, cheery, 'thank you', when they get their treat. This time, however, the boys responded with their normal 'thank you', but L. muttered a begrudging, 'thanks'. I pointed out that her 'thank you' wasn't very nice, and she replied that she didn't even want to go up to their house OR say thank you. She knew she would get in trouble and have to go back up and thank them if she didn't say anything at all, thus the markedly unfriendly and muttered 'thanks'. I reminded her that manners are still important, but it secretly cracked me up. M & I chuckled about it after she went to bed. Clearly, politics are extremely important in our house, and she pays attention to everything we say (uh-oh)! We also saw a pumpkin with Obama's face carved on it. It looked good and was easily recognizable. I never imagined that they would have pumpkin stencils with the (hopefully) future president's face.

We are generally quite traditional with all of our holiday celebrations. Traditional in the sense that we tend to always do the same things. I think shared traditions are important for children and for families in general. Our Halloween tradition includes eating chili at my parents' house before ToT'ing. We start from my parents' house, right after we eat our early dinner, and make our way to our neighborhood. By the time we get to our house, usually one or more of the kids (and myself) needs to run in for a bathroom stop. We then take the other side of the street back to my parents' house, ending with ToT'ing there. We then drive over to my uncle Norm's, and stay and visit for a while. Then we run the boys back home to Milton.

We had a very nice visit with Norm & Ruth this year, and stayed a little longer than we usually do. It was nice to have that option, as for once, Halloween was on night that we/the kids didn't have to get up early the next day. By the time we got back to Janesville, L. had fallen asleep in the car. Logan had come over at 9am, as his school was off for the day, and they played hard all day long.

Shortly after Winnie's tragic death, we got an e-mail from the Humane Society, letting us know that they had gotten a gerbil in. They notify us when small animals or birds come in, as they don't generally get adopted quickly, and the H.S. doesn't have the resources or knowledge to care for them very well. We either adopt or try to find them homes. Since we had Winnie's nice, big cage, L. decided that she would like to adopt the gerbil. M. picked him up on Thursday. He is very cute! I don't have pictures yet, but he has these giant eyes that are so adorable! As he's L's baby (I know he's a he, because I checked and got peed on in the process) and she is responsible for his care and socialization, she got to pick the name as he didn't already have one. She named him...wait for it...............Botswana. WTF? Really, Botswana! I have no idea why she had that country on her brain, as we are not studying Africa at all right now, but okay. He is not at all nippy, which surprised me, as many gerbils are.

Thursday night (finally) we carved pumpkins. Actually Luciana carved the pumpkins, just a tiny bit of help from Mark. She was planning to carve and then paint some detail, but she didn't feel like painting after she was done carving, and it was quite late by then. She mad a cat face (of course) and a rat.

I cleaned and roasted the pumpkin seeds. We all enjoy and look forward to that treat. We have several other pumpkins from our garden that are still intact, so we will have more seeds to look forward to this fall. We keep it pretty simple, and it makes a nice, healthy snack. I roast them, add a little olive oil and a little sea salt. L. and Hunter both love them and snack on them frequently throughout the day. Tica apparently enjoys them, as she stole the last three in L's snack bowl. Botswana also enjoyed a couple.

Oh, and to totally jump around in time, M & I went to see a matinee of Religulous today. I wanted to take L., and as it turns out it would have been completely fine to take her--the only reason for the rating was language. She lives with me, so there's nothing in the movie she hasn't heard already. Anyway, it was a good movie. Bill Maher was much less smack-down than he could have/should have been, but I suppose you can only go so far in an interview before the people refuse to talk. The ending was really good and had a well-stated and important message. We typically wouldn't have paid the price to see a movie (without a gift card) but would have waited to rent it. Some movies, however, that I feel are very important and can bring about positive social change, are worth paying for. I like to support them and help boost their box-office numbers. There aren't too many like that, but this was definitely one. We both enjoyed it and were very glad we went.