Indeed, we have had both a holiday and a momentous day in our history, but I have largely missed them (though I did exercise my civic duty on Tuesday). Where the hell have I been? Um.
Well, first I had the bright idea that since Trout's birthday was three days before Halloween and Halloween was on a Friday, that we could have her birthday party on Halloween and BigDaddyFish could take all the guests trick or treating with our kids while I handed out candy, and then when they got back to our house we could have cake, play a couple of games, and then send them all home on a sugar high. No fuss, no muss, little mess, and no dad-burned treat bags. Brilliant idea, right? Not so much. First one parent called and asked if she could stay and bring her 4 year old. I have a 4 year old, so no problem. Then another parent called to ask if her younger child could come. He's five. Thinking that the parents would be staying, I said yes. That would mean 11 kids to at least four parents - no problem.
BDF was supposed to work from home, but he decided to go in and come home early. My job was to clean the house.
I got the house cleaned, but I still needed to go to the store to get balloons and a cake. BDF was supposed to leave at 3. 3 goes by. 4 goes by. Frantic text messages ensued, to no avail. He got home at 5, at which point I blew out as fast as I could to go get balloons and cake. I live under a rock, so I did not know that the shopping center with the party store was having trick or treating there. The store was mobbed. I got the balloons, but it easily took 35 minutes for them to get them done, and I still had to hit the grocery store for a cake. It was on the way home, but I was still driving when BDF started calling asking where I was at 6:15. The party started at 6.
When I got back, I discovered that the parents of one of the extra kids had not, in fact, stayed. Later on BDF told me that they asked if they could go out to dinner and he said yes. There were kids running all over with no one asserting control of the situation. I tried to get them to eat dinner, but they were too spun up. BDF finally put on the Charlie Brown halloween DVD, and that kept them a little calm, but they were still a bit rambunctious. In particular, the set of kids whose parents didn't stay were running all over, climbing on the furniture, and trying to pull out all the toys I had spent half the afternoon cleaning up. The last two guests finally arrived, and everyone tumbled out the door for trick or treating.
Except Nemo. He was overwhelmed with all the people he didn't know, he hated his costume (Yoda. Little Man was Darth Vader. Great in concept, but the Jedi Master pleased was not.), and just freaked. So he stayed with me to hand out candy. I tried to get him to go just to our next door neighbors, good friends of ours, but he wouldn't go past our property line, which isn't very far when you are in a townhouse. I took his bag and put some candy in it to show him how to trick or treat, and he thought that was great, but he didn't want to leave our property. So I held him on my lap outside, with our big bowl of candy, and he slowly warmed up to putting things in other people's bags.
We didn't have very many trick or treaters this year, but I really have to commend the ones we did. We had a bunch of older kids, old enough that I usually get pissed off and only give a single lollipop to. To a one, they were considerate of Nemo and if they were wearing a scary mask, they flipped them up so he could see their faces before approaching us, or they let him come walking rightuptothem and look up their masks to see their faces. I was impressed and rewarded them generously. We still had tons of candy left.
When the kids got back I fed them and did the cake. Kids refused to eat cake (!) and persisted in trying to take out the toys. So I distracted them with the opening of the presents, and then we played some games, games specifically chosen with 8 and 9 year olds in mind, not 5 year old. Our extra child couldn't cope with losing, even though everyone got prizes no matter what. I guess that being in an unfamiliar house, on an out-of-the-ordinary night, possibly past his normal bedtime, and playing with kids that didn't want to let him lose so he wouldn't freak out was just too much. He had a screaming crying meltdown in my living room for an interminable amount of time but probably only 15 minutes before his parents arrived and helped him calm down. I felt sorry for the kid, but was profoundly relieved to send him home. Then it took me all weekend to recover.
Speaking of the weekend, my husband, we'll call him "Randy," enlightened me that he has recently fallen in love with me again*, and seems to be under some sort of delusion that he is, in fact, 21 years old again. I haven't slept in days, dear Lord help me the man is going to kill me with all this lovin'. I realize I could have worse problems, but it's only recently that I've been able to sleep at all without a two year old mauling me while I tried to get comfortable. I was kind of enjoying sleeping more than 4 hours a night. Still, it was an amazing thing to be able to go together to go vote on Tuesday.
I think from being run down due to the birthday party and Randy, I developed a cold that is morphing into bronchitis, hence the absence. I can currently sing bass. It's...interesting.
So how was your week?
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New post up at DC Metro Moms about why I won't tell my kids who I voted for.
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*When you've been married as long as we have, this is what happens. You don't wake up every day loving, or even liking, the person you're with. It takes a strong commitment to the marriage to stay sometimes. I like to say that I'm lazy and stubborn and that has come in handy to weather the hard times, but in truth it's mostly that my husband is my friend, my best friend, and that's what sustains you when he asks you what you do all day while he's at work because your job is so easy and you really, really just want to ram your fist into his left nostril. Then one day he takes the kids for you and lets you sleep in for four hours and you overhear him telling his friend that he understands why you can't get anything done because gah! and you feel secure that he GETS it and you love him all over again. Plus, it doesn't hurt that he's hot.