Sunday, November 4, 2012

Trick or Treat for 2 hours?!

Our town announces the trick or treating day and hours every year.  This year it was on Wednesday, Halloween from 5:30 - 7:30.

Two hours?!

The sentiment among the moms and dads I know was that during our youth we trick-or-treated for hours.  My cousin's birthday is on Halloween and I remember many times during my childhood trick-or-treating in my aunt and uncle's neighborhood.  We'd come home, unload our candy into a huge bucket, and go out again.  We ran.  For hours and hours.

Only two hours?!

Doesn't seem fair to the youth of today.

Last year my friend and I took 6 of our 7 kids trick-or-treating together.  We rang the first doorbell at 5:30 on the dot.  After what seemed like the allotted 2 hours, our kids started complaining that they were tired (and they were) and that their buckets were full and heavy (and they were) and I asked Tracey what time it was and she said 6:15.

This year we had three surprise visitors - Leath and Joby and Jim Morrison.  You have to say the whole name.  Never, ever, will any of us just call him Jim.

Anyway, I bumped into a mom and we began commiserating about the whole "only two hours" thing and the "when we were kids we trick-or-treated for hours and hours" thing and since three other adults were escorting my children I was able to stand back and watch them.  They were dragging.  Wolfie came up to me and said he was pretty much ready to go home.  Tulip staggered to one more house, Wolfie sat in the curb and I found Luna in Leath's arms.  It was 6:25.

I turned to the mom and said, "You know, I bet when we were kids we ran all around trick-or-treating until we were exhausted but I bet in the end it was only for about an hour and a half."  It was like this big light bulb went off over both of our heads and she said, "You know... I bet you're right."

Here they are, preparing for the 55 minute marathon:


Tulip asked me to draw a butterfly on her face and a heart on her nose (I took artistic liberty with that request and drew the heart where I felt it would look best) and with every stroke of the face paint crayon she whipped her face back and forth to the mirror and gasped, "Oh thank you, Mama."

I don't know what inspired this pose except that she was so into her face and must feel that this is the way to pose for pictures when your face is painted.  Oh that girl.




Saturday, November 3, 2012

Fuzz on a Rock

I've noticed lately that Tulip and I are amazingly in tune with each other.  She has been finishing my sentences and speaking my thoughts out loud.

For example, last weekend was Fall Break and we had Friday through Monday off.  At dinner Thursday night, I was thinking - to myself quietly - how great it was that I didn't have to go to work the next day.  Or the next.  Or the next.  OR THE NEXT.  So I said spontaneously, "I think it's so great that..."
Tulip cut me off and said, "...we have four family days in a row!!!"

She calls Saturday and Sunday "family days" because I think her kindergarten teacher calls them that.  Maybe.  Maybe she made it up on her own but I call Saturday Saturday and Sunday Sunday so she didn't get it from me.

However, she knew exactly what I was thinking, now didn't she.

Okay and then there was today.

I was looking at this soft textile rock designed by Ronel Jordaan:





Not the best image capture but you get the idea, right?  In the background we noticed a blanket made of felted pebbles.  See it?






Tulip was looking over my shoulder and asked me what I was looking at.  I told her that this artist made a rock out of soft fabric so it is actually a cushion or pillow to sit on.  Clever, right?

The website had a magnify-by-scrolling-over feature so I began to do that and in the instant that I clicked on that feature I thought in my head, "I'll say out loud 'Let's look and see if we can notice any fuzz on that rock'" to point out that the oh-so-realistic rock art we were looking at is, in fact a soft fabric object.  But in that nearly same instant I thought, "Why would I say that out loud?"  But then Tulip giggled, "I see fuzz on that rock" as if to confirm that it is, in fact, soft.

And to confirm she read my mind.  Right?