Mommy's Little Monster

I don't want to be a monster!

Jonah is still too young to have an opinion about how he wanted to dress up for Halloween, so Ben and I had some discussion about how to dress him and what we wanted to spend on a costume. At some point, I hope to sew costumes for Jonah, but as I was uninspired this year (and lacked direction from Jonah himself), we opted to purchase one.

We found a great Dumbo costume at a used clothing store and were happy with the price ($6.50), but discovered when we arrived home that the size listed on the price tag (18-months) was not the actual size (18-24 months).  Normally, we would have paid closer attention to the label in the outfit itself, but we had been out for a bit and were reaching the end of Jonah's limits in terms of his patience. He is still a pretty little guy and can wear some of his 12-month clothes, so there was no way that a 24-month costume was going to fit him!

After a period of indecision, I finally decided to order a cute monster costume for him and I felt better about the decision when I discovered that Amazon sold the costume for less than a number of other catalogs and retailers.  It's amazing how much people pay for a costume that kids will wear for an hour or less! The costume arrived just in time - two days before our neighborhood trick-or-treat - and I didn't bother trying it on Jonah in advance, in part because I knew he wouldn't likely enjoy the experience.  In hindsight, that was a mistake for a number of reasons, not the least of which was the fact that the lining in the costume had a twist in it, so it made it even more uncomfortable for him to wear and I didn't discover this until it was "go" time.

After an initial period of tears and unhappiness, Jonah got used to the costume, and I took him to the homes of a few neighbors while Ben stayed home and manned the candy station at our door. Fortunately, Jonah still doesn't realize what candy is, so we didn't have to deal with any sugar highs and the like.  After visiting our neighbors, we came back to our house and let Jonah play for a bit while wearing his costume.  We hoped that he might get a bit more comfortable with it, as they were planning to wear their costumes for a parade on Halloween at day care and we hoped he wouldn't pitch too big of a fit for them.  Eventually, he got somewhat comfortable with it, at least enough to enjoy playing with his truck and reading his favorite book.

Is there a Monster at the End of this Book? (Thanks to Amy for reminding me about that book!)

How much is that monster in the window?

Mommy's little monster

The Marquette Child Care Center has a tradition of having the children dress in their costumes and parading down Wisconsin Avenue. It's a fun time and I appreciate the extra effort they have to go to now that they are in their new location and a bit further from campus.  Miss Lillie and Miss Linda said Jonah didn't have any problems getting into his costume, so I guess the trick-or-treat night fits got him past it (or perhaps it was peer pressure at play already?).  It was so much fun to wait outside the library at work and see the kids come by. Here's Jonah with some of his classmates in the buggy (impossible to get all four of them at the same time):

Jonah with his friends Aurora, Liam, and Hazel.

Jonah's other classmates, Eva and Faisal.

 After the parade, we joined Jonah for lunch and a "harvest festival" party thrown by his teachers. Jonah experienced eating corn from a cob for the first time (I didn't feed it to him over the summer because it was always too hot, just coming out of the boiling water).  It looks like we haven't posted those pictures yet, but watch for them on the phanfare site.

It'll be interesting to see how Jonah's concept of Halloween and trick-or-treat change by next year.  Will he have opinions about what he wears?  Will he insist on having some candy?  We're looking forward to finding out!