November 2024 – Life Off Headset

Books Read, October 2024 – NaBloPoMo #15

It’s Elementary by Elise Bryant – Mystery novel about a single mom who is guilted into heading the PTA’s diversity committee at her 7 year old’s elementary school. And then the principal goes missing. It’s light and frothy and some of it made me laugh out loud. BUT the main character starts a relationship with the school counselor and I kept thinking how wildly inappropriate that was and by the end of the book, it kind of made it hard to enjoy the book. Even still, this line, where the main character bristles at the idea of being a Young mom, made me snort with laughter:

“I’m grown, just like you! I use Sensodyne, and I have enough white hairs that I can’t keep casually plucking them without looking like a “before” in one of those women’s hair loss Instagram ads I keep getting, and I’m pretty sure my back hurts more than it doesn’t hurt now, and I’m wearing Old Navy Pixie pants. There is nothing more grown than Old Navy Pixie pants!”

― Elise Bryant, It’s Elementary, p. 30

Somewhere Beyond the Sea by T.J. Klune – sequel to The House on the Cerulean Sea. I LOVED The House on the Cerulean Sea, a book about a government worker who is tasked with investigating a school for magical children. This sequel is… fine. It was nice to re-visit the characters, but this book lacked the urgency and plot drive of the first book. There was no tension in this book – it was pretty much magical kids and those who love them vs. big bad government, and some of the book felt very preachy.

A Love Song for Ricki Wilde by Tia Williams – A whimsical romance featuring a florist who leaves her wealthy upbringing in Atlanta to open up a flower shop in Brooklyn where meets a mysterious stranger. In a parallel plot, the book follows Ezra, a jazz pianist whose star is rising during the Harlem Renaissance. The book involves some time travel, which isn’t usually my thing, but I really liked the mix of historical and contemporary settings here. The plot kept me turning the pages, though I thought the resolution of the various elements fell a little predictable and rushed.

There were some really thoughtful contemplations about modernity. In a way it reminded me of Ministry of Time and some of the ideas in that book. For example:

“I like vinyl, so I didn’t evolve past record players. Not a fan of Google. If I had my druthers, I’d only research in libraries. But I do enjoy Alexa telling me the weather every morning. Washing machines, AC, photocopiers, and LASIK surgery? A-plus inventions. Tinder, automatic transmission, Roombas, CGI? Dumb.” He shrugged. *I’m not that impressed by freezers. They made milkmen obsolete. I miss hearing them deliver those glass bottles at the crack of dawn; it signals a new day has started!” he exclaimed. “Social media? None of my business. Websites frustrate me, mostly. What are these cookies I’m always being asked to accept? TV’s probably my favorite twentieth-century development. I always have the newest model, and these days, it’s all so good: prestige, reality, sitcoms, cartoons. I mean, have you seen Succession? P-Valley? And, obviously, I keep up with music. All kinds. Good music’s good music; genre’s just the bag you carry it in.””

― Tia Williams, A Love Song for Ricki Wilde, p. 243

No Two Persons by Erica Baumeister, read by Cassandra Campbell, Stephen Graybill, Carol Jacobanis, Rachel L. Jacobs, Barrie Kreinik, Max Meyers, George Newbern, Jesse Vilinsky, Braden Wright, Gabra Zackman – This book tells the story of a novel and how it comes into the lives of nine different people. The first chapter tells the story of how the novel Theo comes to be written and then each chapter focusses on on person whose life is impacted by the novel. Even though the stories are slightly interconnected, each chapter is more like a self contained short story. This book really believes in the mythology of how powerful books can be. I don’t think I bought into the idea as much as the author did, but I did find each story absorbing.

On my proverbial Nightstand: I’m not finding a lot of time to read these days, but I do have a few things with bookmarks in them. Interestingly theses are all hard copy of books. I’ve been finding that I’m more able to focus these days on hard copy books so I haven’t been reading on my phone these days.

The Unlikely Thru-Hiker – Adventures on the Appalacian Trail.

The Impossible Us – It’s been a page-turner. In the alternate universe Trump does not become president. I don’t know if the author realizes how much that tiny plot detail reverberates right now.

This is So Awkward: Modern Puberty Explained – Insightful.

What I wore, Tech week – NaBloPoMo #14

I thought I’d continue my posts on what I wore, since it’s fun to see how that changes depending on what I’m doing. Also – I thought it might be interesting to walk through how tech week unfolds for me. In addition to rehearsals in the evening (or with Piano Tech Day, one in the afternoon, and one in the evening) tech week usually involves spending the morning cleaning up the messy notations in my book from the night before, then the afternoon is spent in the theatre at the tech table setting light cues and placements with the director and designers. Throughout it all, I’ll be double checking schedules for the next day, and following up on any other notes that have come up. Because I have to drop the kids at the bus, I rarely get to the theatre before 10:15am, but from then, it’s non-stop til midnight. I usually plan out all my outfits for tech week so that I don’t have to think about it in the morning – also I only have five pairs of pants so I pretty much wear the same-ish outfit rotation during tech.

Anyhow, on to the sartorial….

Sunday – Sitzprobe day. Sitzprobe, for folks who don’t know, is the first rehearsal where the singers get to sing with the orchestra. (German for sit + rehearsal because we don’t do any staging. We actually usually wandelprobe – which means we are onstage and the singers can wander – wandel – as they sing, but we don’t move scenery or have costumes or lights or anything.) Traditionally singers will dress more nicely for Sitzprobe since it’s the first time meeting the orchestra. This outfit passes for dressing nicely in my world. I wore: my linen shirt dress (Uniqlo – which you can see in my summer post – I bought this when pregnant with the second? third? not sure. It is nice and loose), black leggings (from Jockey – I know it’s not fashionable to wear leggings and dresses, but I can’t stand wearing tights.), sweater (from a nursing line called Teat and Cosset, which I believe is no longer in business. It’s a nursing sweater, with buttons on the side. I love this sweater because it is so light and slouchy since it was made to transition from maternity to nursing, yet it also has balloon sleeves, which make a nice detail. It’s also cotton wool blend, so holds up well without being too hot.), ubiquitous puffer vest (Uniqlo), and blue boots from Reiker. I bought those boots last year as a possibility for travelling, but they aren’t all that practical for travelling because they are not waterproof. But I love the way they look, so I kept them anyway.

Monday – Final Room Run Day. The Room Run is the last rehearsal in the rehearsal room before we move onstage. It’s where we go through the whole show one last time in the rehearsal room. I try to dress a little more nicely for Final Room Run because there are a lot of guests in rehearsal that day. Blue dress (Wool& workhorse dress that I wear at least twice a week), Black leggings (Again the Jockey leggings. I think I have four pairs of them – I like that they are cotton/spandex and have the tech pocket for my phone), butterfly sweater (I LOVE this sweater. I got it at Nordstrom Rack, I think. I’m always scared to wear it because it is cream colour and I don’t want to get it dirty, but it makes me so happy when I do wear it. Another cotton/wool blend.), boots from Sorel (these are the boots I ended up ordering and wearing when we travelled last year. I love them. They are waterproof and easy to put on and I’ve walked five miles in them and my feel didn’t hurt.) Hat from my sister in law.

Tuesday: Set Looks. Set Looks is when, after the set is loaded into the theatre and assembled, the crew puts each different scenic look onstage so the director and designers can see and adjust and tweak. It’s also the chance for stage management to get a sense of what the pathways are like backstage. It’s a very exciting day. There are 11 different scenic looks in the show I’m currently working on, so set looks took two hours.
My friend calls this look my “Hallmark movie apple picking look.” Pants are Duluth Trading Company’s Cotton Noga Pants. They are super stretchy and comfy and in the dark could pass for khaki pants. The pants don’t have belt loops which makes them not quite perfect for backstage, but I’m wearing a scarf for a belt so I can have my flashlight on me. Black t-shirt, I think is from JP Penny. Plaid shirt is also from Duluth. And Allbirds on my feet.

Wednesday – Piano Tech Rehearsals, two in one day. This is the first rehearsal onstage with performers – we have sets and lighting, but no costumes or orchestra. It’s a long long long day. This is my tech outfit – I wear this for every piano tech because I like to wear a colourful top that will stand out so people can find me onstage and backstage easily if they need to, and also so if I have to go out onstage, it’s obvious that it’s me and not a performer being somewhere they shouldn’t be. Floral print t-shirt (Uniqlo), pants are the same Noga Pants from Duluth that I wore yesterday, but in a different colour, and on my feet my Altra running shoes.

Thursday: Piano Dress Rehearsal- our first rehearsal in full costume, wigs, and make-up. This show has a lot of costume changes, some of them only a minute long. The first rehearsal in costume, we very rarely make all the costume changes on time so it kind of feels like jumping on a runaway train that periodically stops so you can put your pants on. And also the train looks completely different than the train from the night before because someone painted it a different colour. I didn’t get a picture of myself in this outfit. The shirt is the same Uniqlo shirt as Wednesday, just in a different colour. Linen pants, also from Uniqlo.

Friday: Orchestra Tech Rehearsal. We now add orchestra. This rehearsal is pretty much the conductor’s rehearsal- we work at their pace, so they will stop and give notes and fix musical issues if needed. Hopefully the conductor constantly moves the rehearsal forward. Usually we give a conductor a list of places that it would be helpful if he didn’t stop because we have a costume change or a scene shift that we have to do in real time. I wore the wide leg linen pants I got this summer from Old Navy and a blue striped top.
I’ve had this top for over twenty years. I hadn’t thought about it being that old, but I was looking through some college pictures lately and there it was. I think I bought it at a thrift store one summer during college. I find myself reaching for this when I need something that’s one step above a t-shirt. It’s probably the thing that’s been in my closet the longest. Well, I do have a night shirt from high school. I also have a pair of boots that are probably just as old, but I don’t wear those as much because my feet have gone up a size since college. I should just get rid of those, but they were the first pair of real boots that I ever bought- or rather my mom bought them for me as a present. This t-shirt was out of my rotation for a little while when I was in my mid-low rise pants phase since it is a little on the shorter side for a shirt on me. But now that I’m back into high rise pants this shirt has fit right back into my wardrobe.

Saturday: Orchestra Tech #2. Same kind of rehearsal as the night before. I’m wearing a top from Uniqlo, Duluth Trading plaid shirt, and linen joggers from Gap. You can’t really see it in this picture, but I’ve had to patch those pants because they were getting holes. I work in the dark, so I figured it’s okay to wear patched clothes to work. I don’t often wear these pants for tech because there aren’t belt loops and if I’m the Assistant Stage Manager on a show, I need to wear a belt or sash for my headset and belt pack and flashlight. But as the calling stage manager, like I was for this show, I don’t have a wireless headset; I’m tethered to my console so I don’t need to clip anything to my waist. Also that concludes my work appropriate pants. After this night I start repeating pants or just wear black pants.

And back to Sunday, which was a day off. Yay! In the spirit of keeping it real, here is what I wore on Sunday for running the kids to skating lessons and an afternoon nap and a late afternoon walk. Sweatpants- they’re light blue tie dye, inspired by a pair of cloud joggers that I saw a character wear on Ted Lasso. (I think I found these ones on Backcountry.com and they were definitely more expensive that I would pay for a pair of sweat pants, but they are really thick and comfy and 100% cotton and I wear them almost every day off during the winter.). Tunic length hoodie. I’m sure I’m also wearing a shirt there too, just can’t remember what.

Welp that was my sartorial tech week life.

What item in your closet have you had the longest?

I’m writing this post as part of NaBloPoMo – click on the icon below to see who else if participating. You can also leave me questions for an upcoming “Ask me Anything” post via this link. Happy reading and writing everyone!

Looking forward to this week – NaBloPoMo 2024 #13

Another voice recital that I’m doing the supertitles for. This recital features a young singer I’ve worked with before and the program sounds really cool – some opera arias, some songs by John Ireland (British art songs are so my jam), and even John Denver’s Perhaps Love. Also this beautiful song, Homeward Bound, that’s been stuck in my head ever since I heard it. There are a couple pieces in Xhosa – which is a South African language I had to google. As nerve wracking as it is to cue titles for a language that I have zero familiarity with, it’s also pretty cool to learn about a different language.

Thanksgiving – Thanksgiving has snuck up on me and I had done zero thinking about it. It will just be a quiet family affair as I have to work on Wednesday and Friday. The 7 year old made the menu: turkey, rainbow jello, steamed broccoli. The 12 year old wants cranberry sauce as well. And there will be pie. Of course. I’ll probably just do a turkey breast since it’s just the five of us.

Wicked the Movie – is coming! The 12 year old and I have a mommy daughter date to go see it. Not sure when, but it’s happening.

Starting rehearsals for a new show – Didn’t I just open one show? Yes. The opera season this fall is PACKED. I’ll close my current show on Saturday and Sunday we start rehearsals for the next show. I’m excited because the 12 year old is in the children’s chorus for this next show. It’ll be fun to work with her. I hope.

Two evenings at home this week. WOW! Think of all the laundry I’ll be able to fold. You think I’m kidding, but I’m not.

Started this book. The male protagonist is kind of a jerk so far, but the premise is really interesting to me.

What are you looking forward to this week?

I’m writing this post as part of NaBloPoMo – thirty blog posts in thirty days- click on the icon below to see who else if participating. You can also leave me questions for an upcoming “Ask me Anything” post via this link. Happy reading and writing, everyone!

Weekly gratitudes – NaBloPoMo #12

This week grateful for:

A weeknight at home- I got to cook dinner, help with homework and piano, do laundry, and go to bed before midnight. It was amazing.

Opening a show. There was one little snafu during the show, but otherwise it went well. It felt good to finally call all the cues in my book.

Printed spot labels. One of the most time consuming parts of putting cues in my book is writing in the information for the spotlight operators. The Stage Manager tells the spot ops whom to pick up with their light, where that person will be onstage, and what level intensity the light will be (in percentage) and also when to switch the colour in their light and then when to fade out. It’s a lot. Usually it takes a few hours to get it all in my book. My grandboss had this brilliant idea this show for the Assistant Lighting Designer, who creates the spotlight cues, to type labels with all this information. It was amazing. I just took the labels, put them in my book, and read them for the first time during final dress rehearsal. Okay, so it’s not my ideal situation to blindly call the spots for the first time during final dress- I like to have a better sense of what the spots need to do. But I simply did not have time to put the cues in my book ahead of time during this show. Having the spot cues pre-written took a huge chunk off my plate.

Friends who took the 5 year old for an overnight On one of the nights when the Husband had to be at the theatre late to pick up the 7 year old, our neighbors picked up the 5 year old from school (our kids are at the same pre-school) and kept her for the evening and an overnight. The 5 year old had a great time and it was helpful for her not to have to ride along to the theatre.

My hoodie that I keep in the office. I don’t usually love having branded work swag, but having this hoodie was really helpful last week because it was really cold in the theatre. And I spent a lot of time in the theatre.

All the people I work with – I know I said this last week, but it’s still true. I’ve dropped the ball on a lot of things or passed things off, and people have picked up the slack and given me grace and we still get the show up and sometimes we laugh a lot along the way, even while realizing how ridiculous the situation is. I couldn’t do this job if everyone was an asshole.

The Husband – it’s broken record worth listening to. The kids and I could not get through tech week and our busy schedules if he didn’t pick them up, feed them, drive them places, help with homework, bake cookies (he baked cookies on Monday when he was off for Vegeans’s day!), do laundry, pick up the house, keep in touch with contractors, and worry about us driving late at night.

What are you grateful for this week?

Haiku Friday – NaBloPoMo #11

Solid in my hands,
Warmth passing from tea to mug to me
morning tea grounds me.

Open and inhale
Little Free careworn pages
The sweet smell of books.

Cool weather bike rides
These are days I like living.
Perfect balanced joy.

I’m writing this post as part of NaBloPoMo – click here to see who else is participating. You can also leave me questions for an upcoming “Ask me Anything” post via this link. Happy reading and writing everyone!

Things that ground me this week – NaBloPoMo Day 10

A few weeks ago, I signed on to a free online parenting class offered by the Parenting Encouragement Program. It is supposed to be a seven week course, but I could only make one night out of seven. The class I went to was about rituals and routines. At one point the class leader asked, “What routines do you have that make you feel grounded?”

I found myself raising my hand. “What do you mean by ‘grounded’?” I asked.

I can’t for the life of me remember exactly what the response was, but it’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot during this busy busy season. To me, it means those things that make me feel stable and human. Those things that, when it seems like life is out of control and I’m starting to spin in my head, those things that remind me that we are human beings, not human doings. Rituals and routines that give me a bit of mental space so that I have the capacity for more inputs.

I do feel silly about how hard I found this past week. I mean I make opera; I don’t perform heart surgeries on babies. It’s not life and death. (I mean, not literally.) But it was a hard week, mentally and physically for me.

When I was writing the title of this post, asking myself, “What things ground me this week?” I thought – well, to be honest, tech really ground me to a pulp this week. Isn’t there a beautiful irony in that? The things that make me feel grounded are the things that I really need when life is grinding me up and spitting me out.

Here are a few things:

Tea in a mug. I often bring tea in my travel mug, but lately I’ve been re-discovering the tactile sense of connection of drinking out of a mug, the heat seeping into my hands and warming all of me. Drinking hot tea, strong and steaming, pulls me into a moment of just being and feeling present.

Short hot hot hot hot showers. I’m not a shower every day kind of person. I’m not even a shower every other day person. But this past week, I found that three minutes under a steaming hot blast of water was cathartic. I would drag myself up in the morning, after getting home past midnight. Sometimes during tech I decide sleep trumps showers. But these days I have to be up to pack lunches anyway, so I get up, feeling like the hard hard rehearsal the night before was still clinging to me. And even though I barely had time in the morning, I turn the water on super hot and jump in the shower, just long enough to breathe the steam and feel the sting of water burning my skin. And came out feeling like I’m going to make it through the day.

Classical music on the way into work. I have an audiobook for my long commutes to the theatre, but this week, on the way in, I just wanted to listen to classical music – I wanted the soothing, wordless melodies – anything with words would be too much. My mind could trace the musical lines as I listened, but also my mind could wander and problem solve and think about the day ahead. I think while part of being grounded is about being fully present in the moment, there is part of being in the moment that is also about thinking of the problems ahead. The challenges of the day are also part of the present moment. I know that people talk about mindfulness as being in the now, but I think the now is also made up of aspects of past and future as well.

Holding my son’s hand. The seven year old is in my show. (Which, on reflection, wasn’t a great idea for the family – it’s certainly has pushed us to activity capacity and the late nights have messed up a lot of things.) Some days he comes to the theatre before the child minder is on duty, so I take him out to the house with me where he sits in the seats behind me as I put cues in my book. He holds my hand as we walk around backstage and that little warm firm grasp reminds me that here is a living breathing human that I somehow pushed into the world, and how awesome is that?

The routine. Getting up in the morning and packing lunches – two slices of bread, two slices of cheese, two slices of ham. Apple, sliced. Five slices of cucumbers. One cookie. Feed the kids. What is important right now? Not obsessing about how to fit in 40 minutes of chorus break in a 4 hour rehearsal, but rather, packing this lunch so that the kids aren’t hungry at lunchtime. I don’t know how I’m going to fit in all those breaks, but I do know that we will get in the car at 9:55am to catch the school bus at 9:06am.

Expressing gratitude. For the Husband, for good colleagues, for the fine weather (that I don’t get to see). For being so very damn lucky that I get to make opera for a living.

What grounds you these days? What is grinding you up these day?

Looking forward to right now… NaBloPoMo Day 9

Opening Night! Very excited to get this show before and audience and for people to see the story we’re telling onstage. There are some truly stunning moments.

Sleep – I feel like I need to sleep for a week to recover from tech.

A weeknight at home. I’ll have one night at home this week. I’m looking forward to cooking a proper dinner and just hanging out with the kids and being in my pjs by 8pm. (The Husband has a well deserved evening off with a friend.) I’m not looking forward to the possibility of dealing with tantrums and being yelled at over screentime. I guess there are pluses and minuses about an evening at home with kids.

Parent teacher conferences this week. I know they are kind of a drive by affair, but I’m looking forward to getting a glimpse of what’s going on in school with my kids.

A walk with a friend. I have a friend who works by the theatre and I haven’t seen her in a few months. Usually we see each other once a month, but between my work and her travel it’s been a while.

Longwood Gardens – I have one Sunday off in December and we’ve booked tickets to Longwood Gardens to see the Christmas displays. I’m not quite registering that Christmas is so close, though.

A designer I like working with coming back in the Spring – This is more long term, but I just learned that a designer I really love working with will be working on my show in the Spring. Impermanence is a part of theatre. Shows open and shows close; people come in and we work together for a very short time and then we move on. But often, very often, our paths cross again, and there is a sense of familiarity and joy to reuniting with colleagues.

Reading more of this book – The chapters are short but full of adventures, which makes it perfect for me right now. And it’s making me long to escape to the woods.

What are you looking forward to?

Weekly Gratitudes- NaBloPoMo Day 8(?)

A quick list this week. Because tech week.

Things I’m grateful for this week:

Tech- because it was so all consuming that it was a good distraction and kept me from spiralling over election news.

My Stage Management Team – because they kept rehearsals moving backstage, and any time I ask for help or give them a task, the answer is, “Sure, I can do that.” or “What if we did it this better way instead?” This show was really hard for me, and I’m so glad that I had assistants who were beyond competent.

Everyone I work with- for being collaborative and kind.

Post It Notes – Because it seems like all I did this week was run rehearsals or put light and scenic cues in my score. I’m grateful for Post It notes, because it is easy to move the cues around as we try to figure out how really we want scenic shifts to happen. (I think I’ve blogged about how this all works before, but I’m too fried to try to find that post… Maybe I’ll do another post some time.)

Yogurt – for being a complete meal. I feel like a terrible managerial example this week – I always try to tell my team to take their meal breaks and I barely took any the past few days. Thank goodness for yogurt.

Computers and email for sending documents – When I started at this company we were still faxing attendance sheets to the people who submitted payroll. Also when I started at this job, we would type up rehearsal notes and then print the out and put a copy in each person’s mailbox at work. So time consuming. Now we just scan/draft an email, and then hit SEND! Easy peasy.

The Husband – because he has done so much driving this week. And he holds things together and takes care of the kids and the house and still goes to work every day. He’s been the one that’s had to deal with traffic and kids’ tempers and laundry and so much more. Oh and the two days that the kids were off school, he was home with them and one day even took the day off work and took them to the Air and Space Museum. I might have worked 76 hours last week, but he worked 168.

What are you grateful for this week? Have you ever had to use a fax machine? Do you still have to use a fax machine?

Haiku x 2. NaBloPoMo Day 7

It’s been a beast of a tech week. I’m trying to eat and sleep and get outside when I can, though it’s not been a whole lot these past three days. I think I’ve missed a day of posting,for NaBloPoMo. Maybe I’ll catch up and double post at some point.

I’m trying to write more haikus rather than scroll on my phone while walking. As part of The Bored and Brilliant Challenge, I composed haikus in my head instead of taking pictures in an effort to stay off my phone. But sometimes something was worth having a picture and a haiku. Here are two from recently.

Pay attention here –
Someone took a highlighter
to mark the sky pink.

Fairy wings lit up,
We tramp through crisp fallen leaves
pursuing candy hauls.

Hallowe’en 2024 – NaBloPoMo Day #6

Welp. It’s certainly disappointing, the election results. I have no words, just lots of sadness and a need to understand what drives the American people.

On to the post I had drafted before election results came in…

Hallowe’en was so mild here this year. Some years it is so chilly and the kids have to bundle up and you can’t see their costume. Not this year. It sooooo warm. I had brought a light hoodie to wear myself and didn’t need it at all.

The kids’ costumes this year were certainly a mix of things. I love making Hallowe’en costumes, and helping the kids put them together. I selfishly get a little sad when the kids just want to buy one. This year’s costumes weren’t super fancy, but I think the kids were pretty imaginative.

The twelve year old went as a “water fairy”. Not sure what that meant, but it involved lots of fabric and a blue dress. I had taken her to the thrift store to find a dress that we could alter, and we found a iridescent blue dress that would be a nice base. The plan was to attach layers of shimmery fabric and tulle to the dress. We went to the fabric store and got fabric and then picked up some light up wings from Party City.

Well, when we got home, the twelve year old tried on the dress and it actually looked really good on her. And it was also knee length. Do you know how hard it is to find a skirt or dress for a tween that isn’t super short? Also- we discovered that the blue dress has pocket! Can it be more perfect???!?!? At that point I decided this dress was too useful to turn into a Hallowe’en costume and I wasn’t about to ruin it by sewing tulle and shimmery blue fabric onto it.

So instead of sewing the fabric to the dress, I sewed the tulle onto bias tape to tie around her waist. I sewed the blue shimmery fabric into a kind of skirt, and the twelve year old just wore the fabric as an overskirt. Add the light up wings and some glitter make-up and the look was complete.

The seven year old had originally planned to go as Darth Vadar again. But when he heard me talking to the 12 year old about her costume he decided that he needed a new costume too. Well this was two weeks ago and I had told him the window had closed on submitting requests to mom for a Hallowe’en costume so we had to make so with what he had. The Husband suggested that he wear his bomber jacket and go as Tom Cruise in Top Gun. (Note: I have never actually seen Top Gun myself.). I ordered him some aviator glasses – which he lost within 15 minutes of trick or treating. White t-shirt and jeans and a bit of hair spray and he was all set. I tried to get him to give me a toothy Tom Cruise grin, but he went for cool stoic Tom Cruise instead.

The five year old basically pulled a bunch of stuff out of her dress up bin, put it all on and declared herself a princess. She wore a Moana headband that I had made four years ago for the oldest, a Snow White dress, wings we bought at the Ren Faire, a tutu that a friend gave the 12 yrar old. And underneath it all, she is wearing a skirt made of the same blue shimmery fabric as her older sister. Fun fact, the seven year old sewed the pocket for the elastic on the blue shimmery skirt. Ever since he started taking sewing classes, he’s been wanting to make his sister a dress – I guess this is a first step.

Our neighborhood is pretty quiet for Halloween so we always go trick or treating with friends at their place. They have a fun neighborhood to trick or treat in. A lot of people actually sit out in their driveway and wait for the kids to come by, which is nice because you don’t have to play the “The place is dark, should I ring the door bell?” game. One house even had a crockpot with hot apple cider, with optional rum on the side for the parents. The decorations in the neighborhood are pretty fun and amazing. They have a neighborhood Hallowe’en decorating contest, and our friends actually won “Best night time” for their display.

Here are two of my favorites:

i thought this one had really effective lighting:

This one is a little sad now, but I really appreciate it:

This one was my favorite. I think it won “Scariest Display.” The whole yard will filled with dolls. Sooooo creepy.

We trick or treated from about 6:00pm til 8:30pm then went back to our friends’ house for chicken wings and candy counting, sorting and trading. It’s really nice that our kids are of an age when they can hang out by themselves and the grown ups can talk.

I’m glad I didn’t have to work on Hallowe’en this year. Some nights we have tech over Hallowe’en. I wonder when the 12 year old will stop going trick or treating? She loves going, and I figure at the very least she can still go with her little brother and sister, so she’ll have a good excuse to go even when she’s probably aged out a little. Though I don’t know if she’ll get as much candy then.

What was your favorite Hallowe’en costume growing up? (If you did Hallowe’en). What age did you stop going trick or treating?