An Extravaganza of Pumpkins and Tape

Happy Fatherhood Friday!

I hope you had a Happy Halloween!

Mom-E and I very much enjoyed ourselves, more so than in years past.

Perhaps this is because all small men were eager to ambulate and carry
their own Trick-or-Treat baskets (at least until the very end.)

This enabled Mom-E and I to just sit back and enjoy the boys in all of
their giddy excitement.

The boys made for an exciting entourage of superheros, dressing as
Iron Man (Big Brother), the Flash (Little Brother), and Robin (sans mask-
Bab-E Brother).

Big Brother wore the Dark Helmet-esque talking light up Iron Man mask
that was a favorite present from Aunt-E last Christmas.

Little Brother looked like a mini-Sheldon dressed as Flash.

And Bab-E Brother is just plain stinkin' cute.  Truth be told, he really
didn't even want to wear a costume, but a last-minute diaper change and
seeing his Halloween bucket proved to be enough of a distraction to
put a costume on before he had a chance to protest too much and try to
take it off.

And while Halloween was a great time for all, I'm not so sure that Mom-E
and I feel the same post-Halloween.

You know - the CONSTANT begging and whining for Halloween candy,
that if left to their own devices, would constitute about 95% of the boys'
diet the first week of November.

So, Mom-E and I have insituted a "one piece after lunch and one after dinner"
policy, as well as a "token economy."

That's right, negative behaviors mean that Mom-E and Dad-E confiscate a
piece of Halloween candy, and being extra helpful can earn them back.
So far, it seems to be a helpful motivator - at least after the boys figured out
we meant business and they lost about 10 pieces in a span of a 20-minute
dinnertime meltdown.

That's neat.  Yeah, fun.  Neat.  Neat.  Good times.

And of course no Halloween would be complete without...
PUMPKIN CARVING!

If your kids are like mine, there's tremendous excitement about selecting a
giant pumpkin and talking about carving it up...

...until, that is, it actually comes time to do the carving.

At which point, the crowd murmurs something about the pumpkin smelling
bad, the pumpkin guts being gross, and "hey Dad-E, we're going to go
outside and swing while you freeze on the porch and carve the pumpkin
for us."

Thanks, loads.

However, in an attempt to satisfy the hunger of our Transformer-obsessed
beasts, I we opted to go for a Deceptacon pumpkin this year.  I was a little
leery about the associated level of difficulty, but this pumpkin carving hack
was pretty pleased with the result.

But the pumpkin obsession didn't end there.

No, the boys were adamant that we needed to get some kind of inflatable
Halloween decoration this year, and even offered to chip in some of their
pennies to assist.

Little Brother was delusional was certain that Mom-E had already ordered
a large inflatable BOO sign, when, in fact, they had just perused.

So, after much politeness, comments about how practical such a
decoration would be, how nice the house would look, Mom-E and I
caved and I took the boys to Wally World to pick something out.

Yep, we ended up with a 9 foot tall inflatable stack of pumpkins.

(It was either that or the $98 15 foot stack of ghosts, and my wallet felt
a little light.)

Fortunately, being 2 days before Halloween, the inflatable was 25% off,
so not too bad of a deal, and the boys were THRILLED.

I mean genuinely THRILLED.  Like Christmas level excitement thrilled.
Like actually willing to HELP set it up thrilled (and by help, I don't mean
run around the yard and play while Mom-E and Dad-E do all the work).

You might be asking yourself, "What's that white box atop the pumpkin 

inflatable?"

Well, that's Little Brother's new "piggy bank."

Yes, you heard me right.  

Little Brother, who is more obsessed with coins that that mummy from

the long-ago Scooby Doo episode...

(Coin! Coin! Coin!)

...decided to tape this white box to the top of the pumpkin inflatable

box, which happens to be just big enough to fit all of his pennies.

All I can say is, "That boy's got creative style.  And a black belt in

tape."

Lord help us when he discovers duct tape.

Have a good weekend,

Busy-Dad-E