Over the weekend, the kids sorted and cataloged their trick-or-treating stash. It was quite entertaining, since Sophia actually counted and wrote down how much of each type of candy she received. Her brother opted to sort his candy the day after Halloween.
As Jaxson sorted his candy, he automatically set aside half of each type to give away. He did this of his own accord, then pressured Sophia into doing the same. In the end, both kids donated half of their stash to my husband’s co-workers.
I was impressed by their generosity. Not because my kids are selfish, but they really do love candy. They’re not allowed to eat a lot of candy. In fact we still had candy from the Easter Bunny. Both kids focused on how happy my husband’s officemates would be when he brought in the candy.
Moments like these wash away the mommy guilt and the feeling that I’m not doing enough for my kids. As Jaxson and Sophia divided up their candy, my husband and I smiled over their heads. “We did a good job with them,” I whispered.
I know I’m hard on myself in all aspects of my life: work, parenting, and personal goals. My husband is my cheerleader and I am his. We remind each other to celebrate our successes and keep reality in check. The need for perfection is self-sabotage.
Our kids teach us lessons more often than we realize. They also gave me all their Heath bars, so score!
How I Made the Kids’ Costumes
I have to share a bit about Sophia’s costume. Every year she designs her costume and draws her concept. I do my best to turn her imagination into reality. This year she requested to be a white ghost cheerleader cat. Did you catch that? A white cat who is a ghost that happens to be a cheerleader.
My friend Grace helped me shopped for her clothes while I was in San Francisco a couple of weeks ago. Then I designed the iron-on in photo editor PicMonkey (making sure to reverse the image) and printed it on t-shirt transfer paper. Sophia braided some white fabric to make the tail. White cat ears were purchased from Amazon.
Pompoms were made with curling ribbon I bought at Ikea (I was already there) using the traditional pompom method. I tied the pompoms to hair elastics so she could where them around her wrists, thereby leaving her hands free to knock on doors and hold her candy bucket. A quick face painting and she was ready. (We bought this face paint set for a previous birthday party on recommendation from a friend.)
I hope she never loses this creativity or excitement about Halloween!
Jaxson decided last Halloween that he wanted to be Spiderman in 2015. A little facepainting to a store bought costume pulled it all together. The costume came with a mask but I thought it’d be too hard to trick or treat in the dark with a mask on.
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