Halloween

Another Halloween over with. It was subdued this year more than other years, I think. It gets me down a bit, how many people in our neighbourhood leave their houses dark. I mean, it makes no sense to me: you live in a neighbourhood with lots of little kids; would it kill you to buy $30 worth of candy and answer the door to a few dozen excited little kids? Is oooh-ing and awwww-ing over some cute little cuties such a difficult thing to do?

When I was a little girl, man, we used to fly through this neighbourhood, and there were very VERY few houses that were dark. Like, you knew who they were, and you secretly hated them all year long. But now, there are huge stretches of people who leave their lights out. We put up lights, a huge blow up ghost, speakers playing scary music, pumpkins...you name it! But the houses on either side AND directly across the street are dark. It's disheartening.

This year, because of the ongoing drama of my knee, I didn't GO trick-or-treating...I stayed home and shelled out. Michael got to go with the big gang. Aaaaaaaaaand...he lost Brian and the rest of the gang within I'd say the first 5 minutes out in the world. I look up the street and see he and Graeme strolling back towards the house, sans Brian. "I lost them!" he says to me. I freak out (because of course, my mother radar, even though I was pretty sure Brian was safely with the other mommies, was going into full-tilt-lost-kid-panic-mode) and start calling to find out if they have Brian, which they do. Then I yell at Michael and tell him where he can catch up with them. 8 years of doing this, I've never lost my kid. First year out, Michael loses the kid. Sheesh!

Still, the boys had a great night. Apparently Graeme was a trooper (gotta be hard being 3, keeping up with 7-9 year olds!) and they got the mother load of candy. Nothing like what I used to haul in back in the good old days, but not bad. And on that note, OMG the chocolate bars are SO small now!!! I mean really!!!! The Mr. Big bar...honestly...there is a marketing opportunity extrordanaire right there...make your bar BIGGER than the rest of the Halloween bars. But nope. It might even be smaller! The winner of the "Oh-My-God-That's-Not-Even-A-Mouthful" Award (this award is for CANDY! Mind out of the gutter) goes to the Caramilk bar. They used to have 2 sections, and this year, it has shrunk to only one. Smaller than the size of a chocolate at Christmastime. Shocking. So there's my fat-girl rant.

Now...on to Christmas!

My little runner

Today was the day of Brian's first cross country meet! I was so thrilled that he made the team (some of his close friends didn't!), and the meet was today after not a whole lot of training. I was nervous for him, because I didn't really know what to expect, and he was a little nervous too. I warned him about the group start, telling him to get away from the other kids, and just pace himself...and that was pretty much all the advice I could give him.

So we arrived, and there he was, looking so adorable in his school jersey. There were 27 schools at the meet, grades 3, 4, 5 and 6...so tons of excited, jacked up kids running all over the place. I'm glad he was in grade 3...I didn't have to wait too long to watch him run. His start was somewhere in the middle of the pack, and as the kids were coming around the first stretch, the track, some of them were walking already, but not my puddin'. He was just running along, pacing himself perfectly, looking like all of this was no big deal. They ran off, into the forest, and we walked down to where we would eventually be able to see them emerging. And when I saw him come out of the forest, my heart nearly burst with pride! He looked so athletic and so competent, running along the path...toward the big hill! The final leg of the race took them up a big hill, across a bridge, and then down the grass to the finish where we were waiting, cheering for him!

He sprinted to the finish line, 60th out of 91 kids who ran, but second place out of the 6 who ran from his school. I was so proud of him! What a kid! And he had so much fun doing it! I couldn't believe how much stamina he had...he looked like he could have run a lot more than he did! Who would have thought that I would have an athletic kid? Yay!!