Would you like some fries with your Snickers bar?

Here's a question.
What is the age at which your kids stop trick or treating?

CJ's last year was two years ago when he was in 7th grade. He hadn't really planned on trick or treating that year until he found out on Halloween night that some of his friends were going and he decided to go with them.
Since he hadn't planned on going, he didn't have a costume ready, so while the rest of us were at the neighborhood "pre-trick or treating pot luck dinner" he was home, improvising a costume for himself.
He took the huge alien head from one of his old costumes, and tied it to the iPod costume that he had worn the year before.
He went as an "iAlien"

This year will be Brielle's last year. In our neighborhood, 13 seems to be the age where the kids stop going out to collect candy on Halloween.

Does it bother you when older kids come to your door? Teenagers? Adults?

I remember quite a few years ago when a couple showed up at our door with their 2 month old baby dressed as a cat. The parents each had a trick or treat bag.

What kind of candy do you hand out?

Some of our neighbors really go all out for the trick or treaters. One older couple down the street from us has their house fully decorated for Halloween. She dresses as a witch and he dresses as a vampire, and not only do they hand out candy, but they have hot cider and donuts available for everyone.
Another one of our other neighbors always hands out full sized candy bars, and some give out juice boxes.
I think my favorite was the time the dental hygienist down the street handed out toothbrushes.

A friend of mine really doesn't like it when teenagers come to their door on Halloween, and she has come up with a great solution.
All year long, her family saves up all of the ketchup, mustard, hot sauce, Arby's and Horsey sauce packets that they get at any fast food restaurants that they go to, then on Halloween night, when an older teenager comes trick or treating to their door, they very stealthly give them a ketchup packet instead of candy.
She told me how one year, the Sunday after Halloween she was walking in the hallway at church and overheard a conversation between some teenagers. One of them said "I couldn't believe it, somebody gave me ketchup in my candy bag!"

What are your plans for Halloween?

What are your kids dressing up as?

Max wants to be and Oompa Loompa, but I can't find a green wig. We do, however, have an Elvis wig, so I'm trying to talk him into being "Elvis-loompa"

He's not buying it.

Cold showers, experimental fudge, illegal drugs, the evils of texting, and other random stuff.......

Apparently, my theory is true about our appliances signing a suicide pact earlier this year.

Today we came home from church to find that our water heater was leaking and had caused a small flood in the basement. (Fortunately, we caught it before the water got too far.......)

Here's the dead appliance list for this year.

Oven/stove

Dishwasher

Disposal

Refrigerator*

Water heater

*I don't think I blogged about the refrigerator. It stopped working a few months ago, but it wasn't very eventful because it didn't cause a flood, just slushy popcicles.

When we first discovered the water leaking, we turned off the main water valve, and told the kids not to use any water until we turned off the water to the water heater then turned the main water back on.

Max has been freaking out all evening because he isn't sure whether or not he should flush.

Super.

We finally get him to actually start flushing the toilets, and now after not being able to flush for an hour, he's back to not flushing again.

No matter how many times we tell him it's OK to flush, he still won't and also when he turned on the bathroom faucet, it made a spitting sound, so..............

"AND NOW I CAN'T WASH MY HANDS BECAUSE THE WATER IS MAKING A FUNNY NOISE!!!!"

So now, we won't have hot water until we get the darn water heater replaced.

And the noisy fans are back.

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I just made fudge, except instead of putting chocolate in it, I used vanilla and root beer extract. It was quite good! (and I say "was" because the teenager ate all of it)

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Tonight I explained to my pre teen daughter that she is required to actually speak full words instead of text speak.

Yes, I will be insisting that she speak the words "I don't know" and "be right back" instead of IDK and BRB.

We thought that not having texting on our phones would avoid such nonsense, but alas, the teenagers are now so lazy that they can't speak full words, and must speak in texting shorthand.

LOL!

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This past week was red ribbon week at our elementary school. They had an assembly where they discussed the dangers of taking drugs.

All weekend, Max has been coming up to us at random times and saying "HEY! DON'T TAKE DRUGS!!"

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I just checked on the homework that Max is doing (What? Doesn't your kindergartener work on their homework Sunday night??) (shut up)

He was doing a worksheet where there are pictures, and he is supposed to say what the picture is, then write down the first letter of the word.

For some reason, he had written numbers under all of the pictures instead of letters.

I took the paper and studied it closer. Under the ant, Max wrote a 6, under the octopus he wrote 8, the goat, table, dinosaur, cat and elephant, he wrote 4s.......

He was writing the number of legs on the object in the picture instead of the first letter of the word.

There were other pictures too, the dress had a 2 under it (someone wearing a dress would have two legs?) the house had one, the fish had 3, the ladder had 8.

I counted the steps on the ladder, and sure enough, there were 8.

I showed Max that he was doing the paper wrong, and he laughed and said "I guess my teacher probably won't like it like this!"

Then he flipped his pencil around and started erasing..........

The day the music died

Last week we were cleaning out the toybox and found an old friend.

It was a musical stuffed animal that my mom bought for CJ when he was a baby. He was the first grandchild, so all he had to do was look in the direction of the stuffed animal on the shelf at the store, and grandma had to buy it for him.

Max hadn't seen this toy for a long time and really enjoyed pressing on it's paw so that its cheeks would light up in time with the electronic chirps, clicks and beeps playing two different Easter songs.

He played with this toy for hours.


At one point, the music became slow and distorted. We were delighted with the thought that the batteries might be running out, but alas, the stupid toy came back to life.

Max named his new friend "Music Bear"

Yes, I am perfectly aware that this stuffed animal is not a bear, but is indeed a rabbit. We pointed this out to Max, to whom it hadn't even considered the possibility that "Music bear" was not a bear.

He was actually quite offended when we revealed this bit of information to him.


Max continued to refer to the rabbit as "Music Bear" but then finally saw the light, and changed his name to "Music Bunny Bear"

(we may or may not have teased him A BIT about calling the rabbit a bear)



Then a few days ago, (after a strangely quiet afternoon) I saw Max's Elmo blanket laying in the middle of the floor with a lump under it. I asked Max to please put his blanket away before someone tripped on it.

He said "I can't, Music Bunny Bear is under the blanket. He died and I had to bury him"


So now we seem to be stuck with a dead musical stuffed animal "buried" in our family room. The biggest problem is that it's right in front of the TV where everyone walks. In fact, if you accidentally step on the lump, Music Bunny Bear seems to come back to life and you can see the faint glow of the red lights inside of his cheeks light up to the muffled sound of his music.



Then we get to deal with Max the Mortician yelling at us to stay off of Music Bunny Bear.





I do find it quite amusing that he buried the bunny under the blanket where Elmo is laughing. Do you think his choice has anything to do with the time I did this?

I think somebody wants a really good Christmas present

Max: "Mom, how much do you love me?"

Me: "I love you more than anything!"

Max: "No, what number do you love me?"

Me: "I love you one million, billion, trillion, gazillion.......... times infinity!"

Max: "Well, I love YOU one more than that!"