Happy Halloween 2024!

Phoebe had her heart set on being a puppy for Halloween. Kind of. She went through a lot of other ideas before settling on a puppy but knowing what I know about Phoebe I eventually decided to start putting together a puppy costume for her since no matter what other idea sprang into her mind...she kept coming back to "puppy."

And not just any puppy. Luna Puppy.

So I thought I'd just crochet a little hat for her with puppy dog ears. I pulled her onto my lap and we searched for a pattern for a crochet puppy hat. Many adorable options popped up.

"I want that one!" Phoebe said, pointing at the screen. 

"Which one?" I asked. "That doesn't tell me very much."

"That one!"

"Which one? This one with the cute little face on it?"

"No. That one."

"The one with its tongue sticking out?"

"No."

Phoebe wanted the design by Kristen Holloway—the plain one with flopped-over ears (the middle picture on the top row).

And she wanted it in black, just like Luna Puppy.

She must have a "thing" about hats with faces on them. A friend of mine was explaining how weird those costumes feel to her because the child already has a face...so why does the hat need a face? Evidently Phoebe thought wearing a face on her head was weird, too.

So we went with the more realistic puppy hat. 

My mom was concerned about Phoebe trick-or-treating while dressed all in black (though my mom let me dress up as a black cat for Halloween for most of my childhood—that costume carried me through many years). She needn't have worried, however.

Phoebe woke up on Monday morning and sweet Alexander climbed into bed with her to read her some stories. She is really into construction vehicles right now. The road paving vehicles have been parked all over our neighbourhood and surrounding area for a couple of months now and she always wants to know where their mommies are and where they sleep at night. And then there are some cranes that we can see from the library and she goes simply nuts over those. 

She's been enjoying book like The Digger and the Dark and Where Do Diggers Sleep At Night?

So Alexander read her these stories Monday morning...and then she adamantly announced that she wanted to be a crane for Halloween.

"Sweetie," I said. "I'm almost finished with your puppy hat and I..."

"I will be a puppy and a crane!" she suggested.

"How?" I asked.

"I will be a puppy driving a crane!"

Do you know how many times I will be able to give into her two-year-old whims on Halloween? 

Exactly one time. That's it!

So of course I told her she could be a puppy driving a crane for Halloween and it made her so happy! Zoë and Alexander and I set to work gathering supplies from around the house—a cardboard box, a tube, some tape and string, some glue and paper, some paint and wire...

And presto—we had the beginnings of our crane!

We painted it pink and yellow.

And got plenty of photographic evidence affirming that Phoebe is a born-lefty:

Here she is trying to be ambidextrous:

And here's the finished product:

She was thrilled so our efforts paid off. Here she is trying it out on a walk we took that afternoon:

And here she is all ready for Halloween, dressed up as a puppy construction worker (see that lovely reflective vest—she was extra visible walking around while begging for candy) and carrying her puppy crew—Bernie on the right—he's a Saint Bernard—and Bean Bag Puppy on the left. Bean Bag Puppy is a pug who, despite really unfortunate luck in the naming department, is basically a VIP member of the family right now. We have to know where Bean Bag Puppy is at all times.

She has a couple of other little puppies she likes to carry around (a black puppy named Luna, another puppy named Luna, a pink pig that she insists is a puppy, and a mountain goat that she named Kitty, and my pink kitty named Nancy that Phoebe insists is also a puppy), but Bernie and Bean Bag Puppy are the current favourites.

Here she is driving her crane:

Here she is crooning, "Hellooooooo!" to our kitty:

And here is kitty coming up to give the phone a curious boop with her nose:

And here are still more pictures of this girl exuding absolute joy over getting to be a crane-driving puppy:

And here she is trying on a gorilla mask:

Let's see...for some reason I have this picture of Benjamin and I dressed up as Stark Trek people. He is Captain Pike, specifically. I am no one in particular. Benjamin made our badges:

I think that picture was technically from co-op day. We all wore our costumes to co-op, since it was the day before Halloween. And then I had to make sure all the costumes were still functional on Thursday for Halloween. And then we had our ward Fall Festival on Friday so I had to make sure our costumes were still usable then. 

It was a lot of responsibility, honestly.

Anyway, here are Miriam and Rachel as Greg and Wirt (using Alexander and Benjamin's costumes from last year, which in turn had used bits from a Snow White costume of earlier days):

They had a lot of fun with this costume!

Here's Phoebe, ready to take over in front of the camera:

I was crouching down to take pictures of her so she also crouched down and refused to stand back up. "I want to crunch!" she said.

After much coaxing, we convinced her to stand up again:

It was a hot Halloween. We easily could have gone out trick-or-treating in t-shirts. The kids were sweltering under their costumes. Alexander, as Dumbledore, chose to wear shorts instead of pants with his costume. Zoë, as Fleur, wore shorts under her dress instead of putting on tights.

You can see more of their costumes here.

Here's a picture of everyone:

And here are a few of Benjamin and me, taken just before I ran inside to hop on Zoom for my class.

Here are Captain Pike, Dumbledore, and Fleur Delacour by our pumpkins and garbage can ghosts:

And then...that's it from me! I went inside. The kids went trick-or-treating with various neighbours (who all knew that both Andrew and I were otherwise occupied on Halloween, so were planning on having our kids tag along with them). Rachel and Miriam were indispensably helpful—not just for me, but for the neighbours as well! 

Our little friend John was too scared to go up to any doors by himself, but too embarrassed to go up with his mother. Going up to the door with his good friends Phoebe and Alexander and one of his favourite babysitters Rachel? That was just the support he needed. 

So Rachel ended up taking both John and Phoebe and Alexander up to each door while Miriam stood by the stroller and presumably chatted with John's mom.

Here are some pictures Miriam took:

And here are the kids home from their evening out in the neighbourhood:

My class ended a little early (because only four people showed up) so I texted the kids to tell me where they were so I could meet up with them. I came downstairs just as Andrew walked in the door. 

"You're done with class?" he asked.

"You're done with class?" I asked. 

He usually gets home before I finish my class, it's true, but he was home even early for him.

"We worked through our break time and then dismissed early because only, like, four of us were there," I explained.

"Same," he said. "I only had six students show up."

"I'm going to head out to meet the kids," I said. 

"Don't bother," he said. "They're on their way home—I passed them."

And, yup—they arrived home just about at that very minute. 

"You're done with class?!" they all asked. 

"Yes, yes! We finished early!"

*****

Somehow in the rush of everything there is to do on Halloween, I forgot to have Benjamin wear the gorilla mask for our Over the Garden Wall photos! So we made sure to do that on Friday afternoon before leaving for the Fall Festival:

Phoebe had so much fun on the bouncy houses. Her hair was so matted I spent a good half an hour detangling it. But she had a great time. 

Benjamin found a toad.

I dressed up our trunk for the trunk-or-treat, recycling an old idea (and getting a second use of our the sheets before washing them, since they're the same ones I used to dress up our garbage cans and mailbox):

And here's Benjamin "taking care" of the pumpkins at the end of the evening:

Such a helpful lad!