Suzy Q Homemaker

Halloween Gourd Jack-O-Lantern from Poppy Go Round

How fun would it be to use this instead of that old plastic candy bowl?

Last night I was rubbing elbows with suburbanites at a Halloween block party. Jamie’s work family invited us to come this year, so we got to eat hot dogs and join in the costume contest. After all of the excitement, we went trick-or-treating.

My OB lives on their block, so I got to talk with her and see her new 1-month-old baby boy. Odd thing, really, because she was asking me for parenting advice. She said that nighttimes were hard and I told her that Simon still sleeps with us & it makes night-nursing a heck of a lot easier. She looked at me like I had two heads, but I told her to trust me. I also sung the praises of babywearing (I was, at the moment, wearing Simon is his pumpkin mei tai). She remembered me wearing him into our six-week appointment. After talking a little more, I recommended the Dr. Sears parenting books & website, which she hadn’t heard of. Since she said she’d been “winging it,” I figured she might want to do some reading.

While I was getting my hot dog, a random dad offered to get me a soda, which I obliged. He was trying his hardest to have a conversation with me, but it never got anywhere.

“So, where do you guys live?”
“Well, I’m actually here with my husband. He works for ___.”
“Oh, where do they work?”
“You don’t know them? They live right down the street. There’s ___ over there.”
(I point out Jamie’s boss)
“Oh. Where does he work?”
“I don’t know! Thanks for getting me my soda.”
And I walk away.

So I got my first taste of Suburban socializing. I hate to think of where the conversation would have gone had we made it past where my husband worked.

After hot dogs, we went back to the house to get ready for trick-or-treating. I nursed Simon, put him back on and out we went. We made our first round without any problems. Though not as many houses had lights on this year, the candy-to-house ratio was up and the kids racked up some pretty good booty.

We stopped back by the house to unload & so I could nurse Simon again. I stayed behind with Aiden & the mother of Jamie’s work family while they went out to the other part of the neighborhood. While they were out, I talked with the mom about different stuff and we noted that the neighborhood was getting older. A lot of the kids are turning into teenagers and getting too old to trick-or-treat. Some of them still went out, about half without costumes, and most of them zipping around the neighborhood on golf carts, being generally obnoxious. While I understand how some of the grandparents would rather drive their grandkids around on golf carts to trick-or-treat, it bothers me that the teenagers are too lazy to actually walk from house to house.

And don’t get me started on the people who drove their kids around in their SUV’s.

In the end, we had a good night. Simon was an angel and we had not one meltdown from Aiden or Corey. Now, our candy bowl is sufficiently stocked for the rest of the year.

Make way for Thanksgiving!!!