In all honesty, I'm a poser. I'm not calm at all, and I never even found my Southern Living magazine. (I was honest about cleaning my porch, windows and door.) This is how last night really was. The trick or treaters started coming at about 4:30. I love opening my door to bunches of little kids in their darling costumes. The costumes nowadays are so so so cute. As the kiddies gathered on my porch with their cute hip mommies, I realized my porch was clean, but boring, so I hauled myself up to the attic and got out two big wooden pumpkins and three wire ones...set them out...and it looked a little better. Answering the door became tricky and panicky because our dog Max runs to the front door and freaks out barking when the doorbell rings. As I'd charge to the door, I'd realize that Max was there - so had to open the door slowly while pushing Max back behind me with my foot, then squeeze out the door and close it. Then I could give the candy without Max barking at the kids. I kept forgetting to tie him up, so this happened over and over until Scott got home to help me.
Then it started to get dark and one neighbor said, "Where's the strobe light you always have?" I realized that the strobe light is a must-have tradition - it makes the house look kind of scary as the light flashes out of the high windows. So in between doorbell rings I started searching our horribly disorganized over-stuffed storage room in the basement. I thought the strobe light was in one of FIVE Halloween boxes (only one of which I even opened this year). I was stumbling over four old violin cases, ugly framed pictures of airplanes that I made Scott take down when we redid the game room, boxes of old Kiwanis award plaques that Scott's dad got forty years ago and we inherited, and loose posters of Aaron and Michael's Eagle Scout projects that should have been scrapbooked years ago. Scott finally came home and pointed to the strobe light - sitting on the workbench with a piece of sandpaper over it. Arghh.
Set up the strobe light and kept answering the door. After an hour I realized that the candy was running low. What - I thought I bought plenty?!? (Maybe the nice weather was a factor.) I talked Scott into tending the door while I ran to get more candy. There were about 40 pieces in the basket when I left. I actually had a secret mission to go to Kohl's and pick up a print that was on sale and then to Kmart for the candy - which I did very efficiently. I hurried home and there were still about ten candy bars left, so all was well. Answered the door a few more times, noticing that the trick or treaters were getting significantly bigger. Still had cute costumes though, so I was happy to treat them.
Mike was at home waiting for his friends to get off work. We were talking about the good old days when it was our tradition to go to grandpa and grandma's house (my parents) to trick or treat every year.
We decided to put on masks and go ring their doorbell. Scott begrudgingly consented to take care of the trick or treaters here. Mike and I didn't fool cousin Michelle who answered the door at grandpa's house, but we were entertained. We visited with them for about an hour, then headed back home. At that point the doorbell had stopped ringing, and Scott had turned off the porch light.
I then started thinking about Sunday dinner and poked through the freezer. So sick of chicken. So back down the hill I went to the grocery store to get a roast, potatoes and veggies. By the time I got the groceries put away and kitchen cleaned up, I was pooped, but still had one more project. So I turned on the TV in the kitchen and found the show Australia, which kept me going for another hour. At 1:00 a.m. I was finishing making sugar cookie dough (another story) and moaning to Scott at how harried the evening had been. He didn't give me a bit of sympathy, just pointed out that it was really midnight (daylight savings time change) and that's not late for me.
Note to self - eight bags of candy - with 22 pieces per bag - is not enough. Needed five more bags. The Mounds are in the freezer behind the year-old hamburger buns. Don't tell Scott.
