Big Halloween update, and more
Nov. 5th, 2009 10:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mamajoanOK, once again I'm behind on posting. This time my reason is that I've been in a training course all week, 9-5. It's interesting and fun, and sometimes frustrating, but always exhausting. Oy.
ANYway...Halloween was a blast. Having it on a Saturday was great. In the morning we went to a Halloween party (thinly disguised as a "fall festival") at Ruthie's preschool, where the kids had a blast. Then to mom's house for nap, where Ruthie and Baz napped together and mom managed to capture a picture of same, which is undeniably the cutest thing ever.
Then we went to a party at Baz and![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
metafrantic and sandykidd's house, which was fun, and then home and trick-or-treating. Isaac was a Transformer and Ruthie was a duck, and sandykidd did a great job of painting their faces to go with their costumes, but alas I don't think I got any pictures! :( Oh well.
It was a freakishly warm night, which was nice. The neighbors were all hanging out on their front steps/porches waiting for us. The kids got QUITE the haul of candy. After a while their bags got so heavy that they asked me to carry them, whereupon I decided that enough was enough. ;)
Anyway, so that was fun. And then came the Halloween Witch! (Also known as the Switch Witch, but I don't like that one.)
Have you guys heard of this? I had never heard of the idea until a few weeks ago. Basically the "Switch Witch" is like the tooth fairy, except that instead of taking teeth she takes kids' Halloween candy, and instead of leaving money she leaves a toy. The idea, obviously, is to get them to give up some of their candy. ;)
Well, I wasn't at all sure how my kids would react to this idea, since they both LOVE candy, and especially since I had said they couldn't eat any candy for 5 days before Halloween and then eat as much as they wanted on the day (which my mom always used to do with me andmetafrantic and I think it worked out pretty well).
Anyway, so I decided to just give it a shot and see what happened. If they didn't go for it, fine, but it couldn't hurt to try, right?
I presented the idea to the kids a few nights before Halloween. I called it the "Halloween Witch" because "Switch Witch" makes me think of the Roald Dahl book "Switch Bitch" which is, um, not at all kid-friendly. ;)
I didn't say they "had to" or "should" do it; I just said that there is this witch and if a kid chooses to give her his/her candy, that kid can get a toy. They were both nodding along in understanding, and then suddenly Isaac said "wait, you mean ALL the candy we get from trick-or-treating? Oh no. I'm not doing that!" LOL. So I backed off a little and said that you could keep a few pieces to eat over the next few days. I also told them not to decide right away. I said that the witch comes on the third night after Halloween, November 3rd. I did it this way so that a) the kids would have a chance to see how much candy they got and maybe even get a little sick of it ;) and b) I would have a chance to acquire some kind of toy if they did decide to do it.
The next night, which was probably Wed or Thurs, we weren't even talking about it, but Ruthie was getting overtired and cranky, and suddenly started sobbing, "I don't want the witch to take my candy!" OMGLOL!!! I reassured her like a zillion times that the witch would only take candy that you choose to give her. I had to make up a whole story about the witch having a super-sensitive nose, so she pauses at each house and sniffs to see whether there's candy on the front doorstep, and if not, she moves on. I also made up a thing about her keeping the candy in enormous piles in her house and sitting on top of it, which the kids thought was funny. Then Isaac started quizzing me on what I had meant by "you can keep a "few" pieces." How many did that mean? I was like, I don't know! Maybe ten? Whatever! LOL -- I told him it just matters that you give her most of your candy, and not just the ones that you don't like.
So, given the mixed reactions, I half thought that they would decide not to give up any of their candy. Then we went trick-or-treating and like I said, they got a LOT of candy. So the next day Isaac started sorting, which he thought was great fun, and tasting the ones he had never tasted before to see if he would like them, and I casually said "so do you want to put some in a box for the witch?" and he said yes! And he put in all the stuff he didn't like. Then he thought for a minute and said, "I'll give her one of each kind that I have more than one of." So he did that. And then he started putting more and more in! And when Ruthie got up from her nap, she did the same. I was pleasantly surprised.
That evening Ruthie insisted on taking one piece of candy and putting it on the doorstep for the witch, even though I reminded her repeatedly that the witch wouldn't come until Tuesday night. Then I tripped over the candy later that night when I went out to take out the trash. lol.
On Monday I had to enlist my mom's help to go and buy the witch's toys, because I realized I wouldn't have an opportunity to do so in time. I told her what the kids had asked for (a jigsaw puzzle for Ruthie, a marble-track set for Isaac) and she managed to get them both and slip them to me that evening without the kids noticing. I left them in the car. Then Tuesday my car wouldn't start (that's a whole other story) and mom brought me her car and I had to transfer the toys from mine to hers, again without the kids noticing. Oy! The drama!
And then that night, after all the car drama, the kids (and I) were so tired that we all completely forgot about putting the witch's candy on the doorstep! I remembered after they were asleep, and debated about it briefly, but decided it would be best for me to put the toys on the step and tell them that I had put the candy there. So I did. And the next morning they were very excited to open the door and find the toys there. They immediately opened the puzzle and did it together. That evening we opened the marble toy and they had ENORMOUS fun with it. (At one point I found myself about to say "What a great toy grandma got for you!" and just barely managed to catch myself and turn it into "the witch brought you." Whew! ;) )
So, all in all, it was a huge success. They got rid of a lot of candy, and they still had plenty left so they didn't feel deprived at all. And they got awesome new toys, so they're happy. Now I just have to figure out what to do with that darn candy.... ;)
Whee! So that was fun. We're definitely doing that again next year.
ANYway...Halloween was a blast. Having it on a Saturday was great. In the morning we went to a Halloween party (thinly disguised as a "fall festival") at Ruthie's preschool, where the kids had a blast. Then to mom's house for nap, where Ruthie and Baz napped together and mom managed to capture a picture of same, which is undeniably the cutest thing ever.
Then we went to a party at Baz and
metafrantic and sandykidd's house, which was fun, and then home and trick-or-treating. Isaac was a Transformer and Ruthie was a duck, and sandykidd did a great job of painting their faces to go with their costumes, but alas I don't think I got any pictures! :( Oh well.It was a freakishly warm night, which was nice. The neighbors were all hanging out on their front steps/porches waiting for us. The kids got QUITE the haul of candy. After a while their bags got so heavy that they asked me to carry them, whereupon I decided that enough was enough. ;)
Anyway, so that was fun. And then came the Halloween Witch! (Also known as the Switch Witch, but I don't like that one.)
Have you guys heard of this? I had never heard of the idea until a few weeks ago. Basically the "Switch Witch" is like the tooth fairy, except that instead of taking teeth she takes kids' Halloween candy, and instead of leaving money she leaves a toy. The idea, obviously, is to get them to give up some of their candy. ;)
Well, I wasn't at all sure how my kids would react to this idea, since they both LOVE candy, and especially since I had said they couldn't eat any candy for 5 days before Halloween and then eat as much as they wanted on the day (which my mom always used to do with me and
metafrantic and I think it worked out pretty well).Anyway, so I decided to just give it a shot and see what happened. If they didn't go for it, fine, but it couldn't hurt to try, right?
I presented the idea to the kids a few nights before Halloween. I called it the "Halloween Witch" because "Switch Witch" makes me think of the Roald Dahl book "Switch Bitch" which is, um, not at all kid-friendly. ;)
I didn't say they "had to" or "should" do it; I just said that there is this witch and if a kid chooses to give her his/her candy, that kid can get a toy. They were both nodding along in understanding, and then suddenly Isaac said "wait, you mean ALL the candy we get from trick-or-treating? Oh no. I'm not doing that!" LOL. So I backed off a little and said that you could keep a few pieces to eat over the next few days. I also told them not to decide right away. I said that the witch comes on the third night after Halloween, November 3rd. I did it this way so that a) the kids would have a chance to see how much candy they got and maybe even get a little sick of it ;) and b) I would have a chance to acquire some kind of toy if they did decide to do it.
The next night, which was probably Wed or Thurs, we weren't even talking about it, but Ruthie was getting overtired and cranky, and suddenly started sobbing, "I don't want the witch to take my candy!" OMGLOL!!! I reassured her like a zillion times that the witch would only take candy that you choose to give her. I had to make up a whole story about the witch having a super-sensitive nose, so she pauses at each house and sniffs to see whether there's candy on the front doorstep, and if not, she moves on. I also made up a thing about her keeping the candy in enormous piles in her house and sitting on top of it, which the kids thought was funny. Then Isaac started quizzing me on what I had meant by "you can keep a "few" pieces." How many did that mean? I was like, I don't know! Maybe ten? Whatever! LOL -- I told him it just matters that you give her most of your candy, and not just the ones that you don't like.
So, given the mixed reactions, I half thought that they would decide not to give up any of their candy. Then we went trick-or-treating and like I said, they got a LOT of candy. So the next day Isaac started sorting, which he thought was great fun, and tasting the ones he had never tasted before to see if he would like them, and I casually said "so do you want to put some in a box for the witch?" and he said yes! And he put in all the stuff he didn't like. Then he thought for a minute and said, "I'll give her one of each kind that I have more than one of." So he did that. And then he started putting more and more in! And when Ruthie got up from her nap, she did the same. I was pleasantly surprised.
That evening Ruthie insisted on taking one piece of candy and putting it on the doorstep for the witch, even though I reminded her repeatedly that the witch wouldn't come until Tuesday night. Then I tripped over the candy later that night when I went out to take out the trash. lol.
On Monday I had to enlist my mom's help to go and buy the witch's toys, because I realized I wouldn't have an opportunity to do so in time. I told her what the kids had asked for (a jigsaw puzzle for Ruthie, a marble-track set for Isaac) and she managed to get them both and slip them to me that evening without the kids noticing. I left them in the car. Then Tuesday my car wouldn't start (that's a whole other story) and mom brought me her car and I had to transfer the toys from mine to hers, again without the kids noticing. Oy! The drama!
And then that night, after all the car drama, the kids (and I) were so tired that we all completely forgot about putting the witch's candy on the doorstep! I remembered after they were asleep, and debated about it briefly, but decided it would be best for me to put the toys on the step and tell them that I had put the candy there. So I did. And the next morning they were very excited to open the door and find the toys there. They immediately opened the puzzle and did it together. That evening we opened the marble toy and they had ENORMOUS fun with it. (At one point I found myself about to say "What a great toy grandma got for you!" and just barely managed to catch myself and turn it into "the witch brought you." Whew! ;) )
So, all in all, it was a huge success. They got rid of a lot of candy, and they still had plenty left so they didn't feel deprived at all. And they got awesome new toys, so they're happy. Now I just have to figure out what to do with that darn candy.... ;)
Whee! So that was fun. We're definitely doing that again next year.
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Date: 2009-11-16 12:55 pm (UTC)We let our kids keep their age in candy and mostly eat the rest ourselves. Is that rude? Anyway expectations were set years ago, and it's so much fun watching them dump their winnings on the table and go into Serious Decision Mode.
This Halloween I was a Mac, and Olivia was a PC.