The JOYS of Parenthood!

Halloween was a big day for our family and not just because of the holiday. DJ had his evaluation with Alabama's Early Intervention. On one end, a huge sigh of relief since he is developmentally on track socially and with fine & gross motor skills. One the other end, he did qualify for services in speech & language. I'm not in the least bit surprised since this is the area that we were concerned about to begin with. Still waiting on pins and needles for his appointment at the University on Thursday to have his speech and hearing evaluated. Still not sure how to feel about this one, especially since I have NO idea what's going to happen.

For Trick or Treating, Michael was a Ninja (again), Elli was a princess (of course), DJ was a dinosaur and Andrew was a lion. Michael and Elli were hopped up before they even got their costumes on - we barely got dinner into them! As a result, trying to get a picture of them all together was akin to wrangling cats.

Once we headed out into the neighborhood, it didn't take Elli long to figure out that if she knocked on a door and smiled big - she got candy. It became a race between her and Michael to see who could make it to the door first to knock. I had to giggle at the fact that she never did figure out to say "trick or Treat" she'd simply flash her big smile and shout "HAPPY HALLOWEEN!" then stick out her bucket. Once the candy was inside she'd shout her thanks as she was running off to find the next house. 

As if running from home to home with the kids wasn't enough - they decided to add to the excitement by requiring us to search for the homes giving out candy . . . apparently it is NOT common sense to turn off your porch light when you are not giving out candy. It was a rough start since we were one of the first families that went out. Towards the end it was a cinch as you could just fallow the line from house to house. Believe me, I will be hitting the "suggestion box" next time I'm in the office. A complex this big and confusing (the layout can be a bit of a labyrinth)  I don't see why they can't hand out a flyer, or the like, for people to put on their door if they are handing out candy. It would make things easier on everyone involved.

We were out for about an hour or so when the little ones had enough. (pretty impressive considering Elli walked the entire time AND refused to take her afternoon nap.) Once we got back home it became meltdown city. Michael sat out front to hand out candy so Drew and I could get the kids changed and "ready" for bed. I'm pretty sure Elli threw a tantrum for the hour from when we got home until we finally got her to bed. (of course, she didn't get to sleep for another hour. sigh) Michael was having so much fun handing out the candy that he was giving handfuls to each kid and not paying attention to who he was giving it to . . . (some were coming back for seconds) and we were running thru candy pretty quick. That changed once I told him if we went thru all of our candy we'd start using his stash. :)

By about 9:30 everyone was asleep, the remaining candy was "hidden", the house put back together, Drew was back at work for re-merchandising and I was desperately trying to find something not gory to watch. (Thank goodness for DVR!)