Hallowed Tales

For the last week (since last Saturday night), SweetPea's grandmother has been in the hospital. Things have been a little crazier lately than is normal, but such is the ebb and flow of our life.

I'd love to get into a whole flaming rant on Kaiser and the treatment grandma's been receiving since being admitted (last Sunday), but I just don't have the energy for that.

Friday was Halloween and trick or treating. Halloween is my favorite day of the whole entire year, and I usually go all out with the Halloween goodness. This year I just didn't have it in me. Decorations weren't put up, costumes were not as elaborate, candy wasn't bought, plans weren't made.

Usually we split the holiday with the Monkey's dad. He gets one year, we get the next. And always, always whoever has them takes them to visit the other while in costume. When they're ours, we usually have a special dinner somewhere, followed by trick or treating, usually trolling different neighborhoods. One year, we went out with some friends and their three children and every last one of us was dressed as a pirate. And the kids and us moms went door to door holding our bags out. The one dad waited in the car or on the sidewalk.
This year, I took the kids walking our neighborhood. We have literally never just walked our neighborhood, and had no idea what to expect. Which houses had the good stuff, which ones have the good decorations. Which houses are the most likely to stage someone on the porch waiting to scare small children (*ahem*). The one house we know always puts out a great haunted yard has been vacant this year, and another house that usually gets good and dolled up was dark.

It was sprinkling when we started, but then started to rain. I sent MonkeySee back to the house for an umbrella and he came back with a busted one (no, I have no idea why we had a busted umbrella, but I'll bet SweetPea was convinced it wasn't that bad and she could fix it)(not anymore because it's in the trash). That was effective for about five minutes and then I gave up on it and just carried it around. Nothing more suave than walking around with two kids in the rain with an umbrella under your arm.

We walked down street after street, picking off the houses that weren't dark. The standard ratio was about one in every four houses was lit up. MonkeyDo refused to go to any house with a Yes on 8 sign, and that eliminated a couple of lit houses. She was also super excited to notice the one house with a No on 8 sign.

We walked and walked and walked. When the kids finally asked if we could go home, we didn't go back the way we came and hit the lit houses on the way back home.

They ended up with quite a haul, and had a great time.

I did take pictures, by the way, before we headed out in the rain for trick or treating.

Want to see them?

Me, too.

Apparently, though, the card wasn't in the camera when I took the pictures. Which is exactly the kind of stupid ass mistake that tells you exactly how my brain's been these last couple of weeks.