Rain, rain, go away

It has been a rainy few days. It started Thursday evening, and is just now letting up. Sadly this meant that Claire's school fieldtrip to Pumpkinville had to be rescheduled for October 23rd. And if any of you know a 2 year old who is ok with "we can't go today, but we'll go in only 17 more days!" I'd love to meet that droid child. Needless to say we have had a lot of requests for the "punkin patch!" and Brian and I told her we would go together when things dry out.

It made me think back on our Halloweens since Claire had been born.

Her first Halloween I had visions of taking her to pick out a pumpkin. I was going to take adorable pictures of her surrounded by giant orange jack-o-lanterns. She would be enthusiastic, and curious. The reality? The day we had set aside for getting a pumpkin? It rained. We went to one of the many places around here that setup in the corner of a grocery store parking lot - I dashed out of the car in the rain, found the first one that looked reasonable, quickly paid, and jumped back in the car. Claire did get to enjoy feeling the mushy insides when we scooped out the pumpkin. But then Brian carved it with his college's emblem - no wide-eyed gap-toothed grin for us. However, Claire was of course, adorable.


The next year? We were in our current house, in a big neighborhood where we were virtually guaranteed lots of trick-or-treaters. Hooray! We again waited a long time to buy our pumpkin, and had to go to two nurseries before finding one with a reasonable selection. It took all of my coaxing to get Claire to go down the fun slide at the nursery. She did, however, enjoy the free hot cider. I had purchased Claire an adorable frog costume, and planned to let her walk to the nearby neighbor's homes early in the evening to visit the families we knew, and then we would man our door - handing out mini-Snickers to all of the neighborhood kids. The plan was great until I contracted a horrendous stomach virus the night before Halloween. I spent all of that day in bed, and when I wasn't in bed I suffered for it. Who knew that the smell of Snickers on your daughter's breath would make you have to run for the bathroom - or make your husband laugh far too long. Since Brian was also starting to feel sick, there was no costume, no trick-or-treating, and he simply put all of the candy in a big bowl with a sign on it asking them to only take two, and set it on the porch. Whee!

Here's to hoping things go more smoothly this year.