Halloween 2012 Review

Halloween 2012 starts, as always in the kitchen. In the McKenna family, things are generally executed spontaneously. One out of 3 costumes were acquired in advance this year, Ellie's Sally costume (thanks to Mimi) and Danny & Cassie's were done on the spot!
Danny wanted to be a Mummy this year, and I've got to hand it to him, the kid has a good sense of the classics. Never has he gone as a cartoon character or anything commonery like that. So his Dad ripped up strips of sheet and I hot glued them onto some sacrificial clothes.
Result, adorable Mummy boy!

Trick or treating in historic downtown Concord was ideally whimsical. Gorgeous old houses decked out in full on Halloween regalia. The perfect slice of Americana. The woman who owns this house is an artist and clearly a Tim Burton fan. She made all these Nightmare Before Christmas props herself, and since Ellie was dressed as Sally from the movie, we had to get picture of her in her natural environment. By the way, I am constantly bowled over by how stunningly, exceptionally gorgeous each of these kids are. Can you even stand it?

Above is a picture of the crew before heading out: Cassie-Witch, Ellie_Sally, Zoe-zombie prom queen? Danny-Mummy!
At the end of the night (or so we thought) we found ourselves in my car, parked right in front of Little Robert's Pub, with Brandi on her way from work to meet us. Danny had to pee "really really bad", so we decided to meet inside for food, drinks, merriment and bathrooms.

E As we were walking in, Ellie said "So a zombie, a mummy and Sally walk into a bar..." Cracked me up! It's not a joke, just an observation on questionable aunting. After she lead Danny to the bathroom, she reported back to me that there were kids in the back sorting through their piles of candy; my aunting was indeed acceptable.

After suffering through some...interesting performances on open mic night we were treated to the superfly musical stylings of Melodies Curse, a rockin' jazz band of young super cool musicians. Ellie being a budding musician herself got to see and hear this cool cat play alto sax. It was entirely bad ass.

Pain from my hip was eclipsed by the overall magic of Halloween with the kids. A good time was had by all! The sad part was when I had to retreat to my car during the trick or treating after walking a long way trying to keep up, I do hate to miss any of the festivities. But as I sat in my car, feeling gypped and dejected about my physical state, my pain was eased by the true magic of Halloween happening all around me. Precious little gremlins milling about, everywhere you look, a balm for the soul.
Another precious day and memory made in the lives of my beloved nieces & nephew. A bargain at any cost.

Halloween Nightmares!

Happy Halloween everybody! Now let me tell you the story of The Costume Nightmare.
It was 1981 or so, the Strawberry Shortcake gang was all the rage for little girls like me. There were dolls and a cartoon. I had a Strawberry Shortcake baby doll with a little Cupid's bow mouth, who would blow you 80s chemical strawberry breath kisses when you squeezed her tummy, I was enthralled.
I was a young student at Charlotte Country Day School, and every year they had a Halloween Parade where the little kids could wear their costumes to school and lower classes were marched in line around the entire sprawling campus, which included grades K-12. In other words, you got to show off your Halloween chops to all the kids, even the big ones who were pretty much grown. It was all very exciting.
                             Here I was dressed up for a school play that same year:

I usually stuck to the classics, witch or ghost, but this year I wanted to go as Strawberry Shortcake, or at the very least, her bff Lemon Meringue girl. I reported to Mom my request, and eventually she went to Morris Costumes and brought home my store bought costume in a bag.

I guess everyone wanted to be her that year and I missed the boat, because Mom came home with...... the Strawberry Shortcake gang's nemesis....Evil Blueberry Pie Man!!!

I was horrified! Not only did I not get to be Strawberry Shortcake or any of her cute little friends, or a witch, or a ghost....I had to be the villain! The Villain, can you imagine my horror? Blueberry Pie Man (I thin his actual name is "Purple Pie Man" or some such). What 5 or 6 year old little girl wants to dress up as a man, let alone big mean ugly Blueberry Pie Man, constantly foiling the heroine's merry plans?

I don't remember why this simple conundrum couldn't be resolved to my liking, the short version is I wound up having to parade my Blueberry Pie Man dressed self all over the entire campus, in front of every class, even the 12th graders! I'll never forget the big kids pointing and laughing at me, "HA-ha! Look at Purple Pie Man over there!" Private school kids are so mean! Okay, to be fair all kids are. But that wrapped private school up for Dusti. I was done, I hated it there, and I only had to stay K-2, thank Gods!
Nevermind that it was a vastly superior education. We got to do ceramics in art class, a dedicated room for fine art, when I was in 1st grade, or that I started learning French when I was 5, or even that I got one on one private tutoring when I was convinced I would never learn to read, or that while I was not a stellar student, once I got to public school in 3rd grade I rocketed to the top of the class, a year ahead of my new classmates; I already knew how to write in cursive a full year before CMS students.
Those jerks laughed and pointed at my accidental Halloween costume; the only thing hiding my pain and shame, a plastic villain mask. There's only so much a little girl can take and I stood all I could stand and I couldn't stands-no-more!
So please, for your kid's sake, by God if he or she wants that good damn cartoon costume you let 'em have it!
Priorities y'all.