Happy Halloweekend

halloween pumpkin carving boy

This morning I dragged myself out of bed at seven o’clock. I knew the kids were up. I could hear them. I’d been hearing them for hours. But I decided, in the interests of child safety, to do my best to ignore them.

It wasn’t a good decision.

The kids had been up since 5am. They were all in costume, despite having to go to school in their normal uniforms, and they’d fed themselves.

Or attempted to.

Who knew we had enough food in the house for both what was on the floor and their breakfast?

In keeping with the Halloween tradition, I handed out brooms for the kids to ride around the kitchen.

“Get sweeping,” I told them. “And then you need to change into your uniforms.”

“But, Dad,” said Master9, trying it on. “Today’s a special day. We should stay home.”

The kid’s got gall.

I know a lot of people in Australia think Halloween is daft and that it’s ridiculous we celebrate it at all, but at the end of the day it’s an opportunity for parents and kids to have fun together, so I think it’s funtastic. We restrict our trick or treating to the houses of family members (Nanny & Poppy and Grandma & Grandad) but it still gets the kids excited.

How excited?

“Every day at Grandma’s is like Halloween,” Master9 told us tonight as we sat around the table decided what to make of our pumpkins.

“Because of Grandad?” I asked him. “He can’t help how he looks, you know.”

“Because they’ve always got lots of lollies.”

Despite this, Master9 has decided one night is not enough time to collect a year’s supply of sugar, so he’s declaring this a Halloweekend.

“I suspect that’ll catch on,” said Tracey.

And it has. Our kids are already using the phrase like it’s been around since Jack O’Lantern was a boy. As such, I would strongly suggest you never say the term out loud at your house.

Of course, unbeknownst to the kids, the best thing about Halloween isn’t the confectionery, it’s the pumpkin carving.

I managed to pick up three pumpkins tonight for about $3.50 each – on clearance at 50c /kg compared to about $4/kg during the week. It’s a bit risky leaving it until the last minute, but I refuse to pay $20 for a pumpkin when I’ve still got to do all the work when I get it home and I can’t eat it.

Another hitherto unexpected Halloween bonus was the kids getting in some practice with the housework.

“What have we learned from this?” I asked them in my daddy voice this morning once the floor was relatively clean again. It’s always a good idea to make them say these things out loud to help send home the message.

“You can’t stay in bed when we’re awake,” said Master9.

Exactly what I’d been thinking.

Despite the messy start, today was a blast with the kids. Halloweekend looks to continue to be an annual tradition in this household.

Here are my pumpkin offerings to the spirit world this year. Hope you all have yourselves a Happy Halloween! I love this shite!! 🙂

halloween pumpkin carving boy batman cat
Not sure which is scarier, my eyebrows or the shape of my shoulders

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