We just wrapped up a weekend involving two really fun Halloween themed events. One was a "Trunk or Treat," which involved parents parking and decorating cars in the school lot and then handing out candy. That was Friday night and started a bit late, so because we had a car and had to stay for the duration K spent at least half of the event in the front seat watching video on the iPad. She does not do well much after 7pm, but was a trooper nonetheless. The Trunk or Treat event also involved a lot of locals and other international folks which was funny because many clearly had no idea about proper trick or treat protocol. Such as saying "trick or treat" or opening up your bag so I can drop candy ("sweets") into it. No really, release your death grip on the top of the bag! Opening it is the only way to get more candy. That being said, pretty much everyone was in costume, some of them quite elaborate, and everyone seemed to enjoy. And it was a heck of a lot nicer than the shake down style of trick or treating we got in our Minneapolis neighborhood when teenagers not even attempting costumes would just show up at the door. Not wanting our house to get egged (or worse!!) of course we forked over the candy. So this was much better than that!
The second event was in a small neighborhood (think less than 10 houses) where the kids could just wander around safely. Everyone donated candy so the residents weren't on the hook for candy for all the kids. And the kids could do as many loops around the neighborhood as they could before candy ran out. K did not quite fully grasp the candy collection concept and kept wanting to just stop and eat the candy (not a bad idea, really).
So, for those lucky few of you who have not had to suffer through our pedantic description of the origins of the girls' names, it is important to know that K's middle name is the name of the Greek goddess of war while T's middle name is that of the Greek goddess of peace (feel free to go and look those up, I'll wait...). As such, the owl is K's emblem or icon of sorts. And T is also named after a Byzantine empress and those folks were all about the peacock in their royal iconography. So, the owl and the peacock! I decided to take advantage of what will certainly be my last opportunity to influence T's costume choices and of poor T's small helplessness in general to put them in the costumes I wanted for them, which also happen to be darn cute if I do say so myself. I did briefly consider letting K pick her own but the conversation went something like this: Me: "What do you want to be for Halloween?" K: "A princess!!! No, a lion!! No, a dinosaur!!! No, a princess!!!." And, repeat...
So, without further ado, I present the Owl and the Peacock in all their avian splendor.
