We started out our holiday weekend with Ben's first daycare Halloween parade. Well, I can't really say that it was much of a parade though. There were a bunch of little kids dressed up in costumes, but you can hardly call it a parade when they were all just running across a parking lot to get to the area with all the candy. It was still a great event though.
Ben was a skeleton for this first Halloween event. It was an easy costume that didn't require any head gear, which Ben hates. Well, actually, to be honest, this 'costume' was a pair of pajamas that Jill had bought. It didn't matter though. Ben was very excited to be a part of this event. Can you tell?
After the 'parade' the older kids all sang a few songs, but there real focus was on all the little tins of candy placed around the edge of the play area. After a few songs they let the kids all go 'trick or treating' to each of the little tins where they got to choose a piece of candy from each one.
Ben, never really having experienced candy before, got a little extra help from Mom & Dad as to which pieces of candy to choose. We made sure he picked things that we liked... This whole event was all very interesting to him at first... Once he got his first taste of candy, then it was all about the candy!
Ben enjoyed going around and picking pieces of candy to put in his bucket. But then he started getting a little carried away as to what he could take...
No, no, Ben... you can't take the pumpkin.
One of the really nice things about this afternoon was that Ben had BOTH of his Grandma's there to help celebrate Halloween with him.
The next day of the weekend was not a Halloween related event, but we spent the day with Jill's cousin and his wife at their home in North Jersey. This was the first time we were visiting them and they live in a beautiful old farmhouse right on the Delaware river. We all enjoyed our time together with family. Then the next day was Halloween and it worked out that my brother and his wife (who live in Kentucky) were able to spend the day with us on their way back from visiting their daughter in Boston. This was the first time that Ben got to meet his Uncle Dan and Aunt Jan.
But when it came time to go out Trick or Treating, he didn't care much at all about anything. We tried getting him in his Elmo costume first, but let's just say that it didn't fit right. As a result, it put him in quite a sour mood. But it was Halloween and he had to dress up. It was too cold for the PJ Skeleton outfit, so we put him in his 'backup' Monkey costume. As you can see, he wasn't happy about that either.
Not even Grandma could make him smile at this point.
But can you guess what finally did make him happy?
I bet you guessed it... CHOCOLATE!
Trick or Treating was a little bit confusing for Ben at first. He didn't want to carry the bucket.. he didn't know why were were going up to the houses when we normally just walk past all of them on the street. And what were all these other strangely dressed kids doing out running around? I think he thought we were nuts, but he was a good sport and just going along with everything.
At first I think I was happier about Trick or Treating than Ben was...
But once we realized that he needed to taste a piece of candy to understand why we were doing all of this, things changed. Then it was all about getting to the next house to get more candy.
Ben led the way...
Even with both hands were full with Candy,
Ben still indicated the way to go!
Ben still indicated the way to go!
Oh, and if there was a dog at the house... well, we were there for a while.
(Got to love that little curly tail!)
We weren't sure how this idea of Trick or Treating was going to work out when we started, but it definitely turned out to be a fun time.
Especially because both Ben's Aunt Donna and Uncle Dan were there too!
So the, what do you do after a hard day of trick or treating?
Well, now its time to trade up..
How about if we trade these peanut butter cups for that big bag of M&M's?
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