Halloween was on Saturday this year, but in Salmon, the major Halloween festivities happened on Thursday the 29th, since we are on a 4-day school week. It started off with the school's celebrations the students all dressed up on Thursday, there were class parties happening, and the annual elementary school's tradition of the costume parade was that afternoon.
I found out a week before Halloween that the staff was all going to dress as "Tacky Tourists", but I'd already purchased/made items for my costume this year, so I dressed differently than everyone else. I was a colorful fairy! I bought the wings, neon-striped tights, and a pink/red tie-dye shirt. I made the headband with colorful antennae, and wore the tutu that I made last year for a different costume. I added colorful earrings, a brightly colored swimming top, and a magic wand, and my homemade costume was complete (those are best, I think, because then nobody looks identical to you!).
Kanyon originally wanted to be a storm trooper, but we couldn't find any of those costumes in his size, so he changed his mind to be a zombie. But I told him I wasn't ready for him to be anything super scary yet. So we found a compromise: a skeleton was scary, but not TOOO scary, and that's what he ended up being.
I haven't missed a costume parade since Ammon was in Kindergarten. Thankfully, the ladies I work with were very generous and let me leave for about a half hour so that I could go down to the elementary school to watch it (I work at the preschool in the afternoons which is a mile and a half away from the elementary).
After school was over, I picked up the boys and took them downtown to the Merchant's Trick-or-Treating. It is one of my favorite events in Salmon each year. I LOVE that the stores collaborate and do this together, and it is SO fun to see everyone on Main Street and all the kids dressed up! Jonah and Micah both had scary, creepy costumes this year: Jonah was the zombie, and Micah was the scary clown. It's sad for me to see them leave the cute dress-up stage for the freaky, creepy stuff!
They filled their buckets in the hour that we walked up and down both sides of Main Street, and a few side streets, too.
I have apparently the exact opposite taste in costumes as my boys do. They were all black and white, and I was full of color!!! It's funny to see the contrast of what we looked like that day!
As soon as the Merchant's Trick-or-Treating was done, we went back to the school for the Carnival. I volunteered for an hour in Kanyon's classroom booth, and Jonah and Micah helped me. I got Kanyon a bunch of tickets and he went around to all the Carnival games and activities by himself and with friends, and earned candy and tokens to redeem prizes. His favorite games were the skeleton golf, feed the bat (my booth where you hit a ball with a mallet into a cut-out hole in the bat's mouth), and the dart toss.
He was the only kid all night to score a hole-in-one on the skeleton golf! The principal (who was running that booth), was very impressed!
As soon as the twins and I were done volunteering, we found Kanyon, and took him to the prize room. He picked out what he wanted, and we headed across the street to the church Halloween Party. Our ward joined another ward for the activity, so the gym was packed full of people. We ate dinner, and then there was trunk-or-treating in the parking lot afterwards. I'm used to doing trick-door-treating inside the church, and didn't come prepared with a decorated trunk; that part stressed me out, but I had plenty of candy to hand out out to all the kids who came by, so it all worked out.
On Saturday night--the actual night of Halloween--I took the 3 boys into town with me to celebrate the holiday even more. Josh and Ammon were gone to state XC in Coeur d'Alene for the weekend, and I didn't just want to stay home and do nothing. We went to see the matinee of "Goosebumps" that afternoon. Kanyon has taken an interest in that book series lately, and was so excited for the movie to come out! He enjoyed it, but I was kind of disappointed--I was hoping for something more funny since Jack Black was the star.
After the movie, I took them to dinner and then trick-or-treating to homes around town.
They walked door-to-door on a few of the streets, and then I drove them to various homes of people that I knew. They could never get the experience of walking door-to-door where we live (in our neighborhood out in the country, the homes are at least a half-mile to two miles apart). After about an hour of trick-or-treating, they'd filled their buckets enough and were tired and wanted to go home.
It had been a fulfilling holiday for them, and a happy one for me. I was glad to have so many different fun activities to do with them, and they were happy to get so much candy. They depleted their candy buckets pretty quick--they always do faster than I think they will. It's amazing to see those overflowing buckets diminish to empty within a week! When I was a kid, I remember rationing my candy allowance every day so that my supply would last longer. That's a very foreign concept for them, however! Kanyon was kind enough, though, to put the candy bars that he didn't want in a pile for Josh, as an early surprise gift for him when he returned home from Coeur d'Alene the next night!
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