Plight of the Mother

On Friday night, Sam and I had some one-on-one time while Annie was away playing with a friend.  I asked my son what he wanted to do, and he said he wanted to play pretend with me.  I was the doctor, and he was the dad.  He had two babies, Flowers and Forty-One.  I had a doctor kit filled with Legos.  I don’t often have time to sit and play with my kids like this, but I relish in these moments because children's play is a window into their minds, and I get to experience the world from their perspective.  Let me tell you, Daddy Sam was adorable.  He was so tender and loving to Flowers and Forty-One.  Both kids were very sickly and constantly throwing up, but when I (the doctor) tried to help take care of them, Daddy Sam would brush me away and say, “No.  I know how to take care of my sick babies.”  So, I sat on the couch and watched him nurture for the rest of the night, marveling at his perception of what I do day-in and day-out.  What I learned was Sam thinks being a parent is cleaning up a lot of puke and putting drops in all the facial orifices.  And, I mean, he’s not wrong.

This was a tough week for me.  That sweet, nurturing boy has been struggling with some health issues that doctors can’t seem to explain.  Sometimes it means staying up with him all night while he writhes in pain and begs me to make the hurting stop.  Sometimes it’s rubbing lotion all over his entire hive and blister-cover body.  Sometimes it’s cleaning up spontaneous vomit that arrives without other symptoms that might give a clue to the cause.   But this week, after two bad nights in a row, I decided to have Sam tested for allergies, hoping to find what was triggering these episodes.  In a bittersweet turn of events, he tested negative for everything.  It was a relief not to have to take away his favorite foods or drastically change his lifestyle, but it was also frustrating.  These results have left us in the dark, still scrambling for answers as we try to keep this boy healthy.

While these medical issues have been a part of my life as long as Sam has been in it, it felt insurmountably difficult this week because of that poignant moment watching my son clean up pretend vomit off the chin of his “baby.”  I feel incredibly helpless.  I have tried so many things to make Sam’s life more comfortable and had so little success that the constant maintenance of his health has become the cornerstone of Sam’s vision of adulthood.  To cope with my perceived ineptitude, I think I overcompensate by trying to help others.  I try to lift them when they are down, make them laugh, fill their bellies with delicious things, and flood them with hope and positivity.  I lay awake with racing thoughts of Who can I help?  Where can I volunteer?  How can I make someone’s world better?  But I love too deeply sometimes, and I take on other people’s impossible hurts only to realize that I am just as helpless curing their pain as I am curing my son.

Perhaps this is just the plight of the mother.

Halloween: A Day When Moana and Bob Ross Coexsist

In my household growing up, Halloween was not a beloved holiday.  My mother often begged and bribed us not to go trick-or-treating.  She told us she'd buy us a bag of whatever candy we wanted if we would just skip the ritualistic neighborhood scavenge for sweets.  Each year we declined her offer, so each year she reluctantly made our costumes out of sweats or borrowed them from friends and family.  I rarely got to choose what fantasy to live out on All Hallows Eve, so when my children reached trick-or-treating age, I swore I'd let them pick their costumes (within reason) and do my best to make their dreams come true.  This has led to some interesting costumes.

 Exhibit A: Bob Ross

Last winter, Sam discovered Bob Ross on Netflix.  Always the art aficionado, he was immediately mesmerized by the soft-spoken man.  Every morning, he would beg me to pull out his watercolors, and he would lay on floor and paint with Bob Ross.  When he had the flu, he laid on the couch and watched Bob Ross for hours, falling asleep to the gentle scratching of his a paintbrush on a canvas and waking up if I dared turn off the show.  It was during this time that he overheard Annie and I planning her Poppy costume, and he requested to be Bob Ross.

Though Annie changed her mind several times before Halloween, Sam never faulted in his desire to be Bob Ross.  So, I procured a Bob Ross wig from a Halloween store, bought a large paintbrush from dollar tree, and purchased a paint pallet from Wal-Mart for five dollars.  Using puff paint I already owned, I added paint globs that looked glossy and wet, even when they were dry.  To complete the ensemble, I drew on a beard and some eyebrows, and dressed him up in a pair of jeans and a partially unbuttoned collared shirt with the sleeves rolled up.  Keeping the shirt tucked in on that wiggle worm was a challenge, as was keeping his hands away from his "beard," but I suppose it was worth it because he absolutely LOVED his costume.

He won the costume contest at our church party, and strangers stopped us and asked for his picture everywhere we went.  I guess it's pretty rare to see a  happy little four-year-old Bob Ross super fan.

Exhibit B: Albino Moana

I will be honest, I was hoping Annie would stick with Poppy as her costume of choice because I knew about the controversy that surrounded Moana costumes last year.  There are some who believe that unless you are of Polynesian decent, you shouldn't dress up as Moana.  I respect that opinion, and they are welcome to enforce it on their own children, but that doesn't mean it directs my life. I have worked hard not to point out race to my children. Annie attends a diverse school with people that are different colors and religions, but she doesn't care. She sees people with blonde hair and brown hair. Different skin tones are seen in the same way, as diverse physical characteristics. I don't want her to be afraid of celebrating the things that make us all unique. I want her to love and appreciate other cultures and beliefs so she is not bound by the prejudice of her ancestors. I want others to do the same. I love seeing girls with deeper skin tones dressed as Elsa or Belle. If we ever want to get past the racial divide, then we need to stop reinforcing it with hypersensitivity.  Lest I be misunderstood, I don't think we should darken skin for a costume.  Children should be educated about a culture and taught to respect it and celebrate it, not mock it.

With that said, I thought Annie made a pretty adorable Moana.  

The dress and necklace came from a Halloween store.  I added the sleeves using a white knit fabric that I dyed to *almost* match Annie's skin tone.  This helped hold her dress up and keep her a little more warm and modest.

Keeping with tradition, my aunt and I made the wig.  My aunt crocheted a tightly fitting black beanie, and then I looped in this yarn (which looks like wavy hair) using this technique:

 And then I hand stitched the top hairs back so they would lay more like Moana's unparted hair.

I darkened her eyebrows a bit so she wouldn't look so washed out.  My poor kids and their blond eyebrows.  On Halloween morning as I helped Annie into her costume, she said to me, "Mommy, you would make a good Moana because your eyebrows are so black and bushy."  Later that day, Sam told me I had Bob Ross eyebrows.  Gee, thanks, kids.

Annie loved her costume.  She even gave me a "Moana dance of joy."

These two were quite the not-so-spooky pair, but they were a happy pair, and that made all of the Halloween chaos worth it.

For previous Halloween costumes, click here or here or here.

Villainous Halloween

Halloween is one of my favorite times of the year.  My mother has never been a big fan this holiday, but she was such a good sport about letting me and my siblings participate.  Almost every year, I hovered behind my mother marveling at her talents and creativity as she sat at the sewing machine piecing together homemade costumes.  Inspired, I swore I would make all of my children's Halloween costumes when I was a perfect little homemaker.  Predictably, that naive dream was shattered on Annie's first Halloween.  Lack of finances and energy led me to dress my first born in some hand-me-down pumpkin jammies and call it a day.  In fact, Annie didn't get a real costume until after her brother was born, and it wasn't homemade either.  She wore kitty ears and a tail from the craft store. Although I had to wade through mothering guilt and fear of disappointing my children with my laziness, I realized that no one else on the planet cared.  The world did not stop turning because I purchased a costume.  Go figure.

Still, I loved the look of homemade costumes, and I realized that adding some homemade aspect to a store-bought costume gave the ensemble that custom appearance my mother's loving hands always infused into her projects.  I have used this method ever since, and this year was no exception. For Halloween 2016, my children wanted to dress as their favorite bad guys: Darth Vader and Wreck-it Ralph.

I considered buying Annie a Darth Vader suit but was stricken with an idea to save money and incorporate that homemade touch I love.

I purchased a three dollar, long-sleeved, plain black t-shirt from Wal-Mart along with eight 8.5"x11" sheets of felt ($.26 each).  I studied pictures of Darth Vader and cut out matching buttons and mechanical boxes which I easily hot-glued into place.  (You'll notice I forgot to mirror the belt boxes. Opps.)  The belt boxes were not glued to the shirt.  I glued more black of felt to the top and bottom of each box to create a loop which I could string a belt through.  The shoulder piece was also only glued to the shoulders and neck, leaving the bottom free to float away from the body and create a 3D effect.

The boots and pants were just black things we already owned.  The gloves were as well, though they had white fingertips that I colored black with a permanent marker.  I sewed the cape from an old bedsheet that my sister, Janell, was no longer using.

The lightsaber came from Janell too (just borrowing), although I did see some faux lightsabers at the Dollar Tree that I could have picked up had I not had access to my sister's.  The obviously manufactured part of the costume was the mask, which Janell was kind enough to buy for Annie. Behind the mask, Annie wore a hat to mimic a helmet.  I had a winter cap from the Dollar Tree that had ear flaps. I had to snip off the tassels and turn it inside out to hide the white snowflakes, but I love the way it turned out.

At school and Trunk-or-Treat, no masks are allowed.  For those events, Annie just wore the hat with a Darth Vader face I cut out of some clearance fleece from JoAnn Fabrics.  I spent maybe a dollar for the fleece.

Overall, I think Annie made one killer looking Darth Vader.  Pun intended.

Duun Duun Duun Dun da Duuun Dun Da Duuun!

My total cost: Less than $10.

You can buy the mask for $8-12 at a party store or Wal-Mart, so if that cost was included, it would be about $20 to replicate this look if you already own the pants, gloves, and boots like we did.

To match her costume, I slipped on my Yoda pajama shirt.  It wasn't very elaborate, but it made her happy.

This year was the first Halloween that Sam expressed an opinion.  Honestly, after seeing me create Annie's costume, he wanted to be Darth Vader as well.  I talked him off that ledge, and we settled on Wreck-It Ralph instead.   Sam loves this movie and equally loved this costume.  The best part was, it was sooooooo easy and cheap.  My kind of costume.

The green undershirt was something he already owned.  The orange shirt and overalls were purchased at the thrift store for $5.  I cut the sleeves on the shirt to make them look torn like Ralphs, and I dyed the once-white overalls a beautiful shade of brown.  The gold medal was $.99 from the party store.

I drew eyebrows and sideburns on that tiny head with my eyebrow pencil, and then I spiked up his hair.  Originally, I bought a "70's" wig to spike up like Ralph's hair, but it was sewn in a way that forced the hair to lay flat, and when Sam wore it, he looked more like Uncle Rico from Napoleon Dynamite than Wreck-It Ralph.  So, I vetoed the wig.

I think he turned out pretty cute anyway, even sleeping in the brick-filled dump.

My Total Cost: Less than $10.

I love that I was able to put together this adorable costume that didn't wreck my bank account.  Get it?  Wreck!  You know, 'cause it's wre-- nevermind.

 Because I'm a dork, I made Paul play along this year as well.  He was Sam's counterpart, Fix-It Felix Jr.  This outfit mostly consisted of clothes Paul already owned with the exception of the hat and the hammer.  Together, they cost about $12.  The dang hat alone was $8.  I'm still a little salty about that.

I did this more for Sam's benefit than anything else.  He is so obsessed with his daddy's costume that he has since insisted that I am incapable of helping him with anything because I do not have a golden hammer.  When the handle of his Halloween bucket broke, Fix-It Felix saved the day.  When his glow stick burst, Fix-It Felix rescued him.  When he got tangled in his car seat buckles, he screamed for Fix-It Felix.  I've created a monster.  A cute monster, but a monster nonetheless.

Overall, I'd say this was a successful All Hallow's Eve.  To celebrate, here are more pictures of my cuties:

Don't tell me this isn't the cutest thing you've ever seen.

My blue-eyed Rowbabies.

Ringing the doorbell with the force.

"Smile for the camera, Vader."

"Don't tell me what to do, Ralph."

If you choke Ralph, he will wreck you.

For previous Halloween costumes, click here or here.

Frozen Halloween Costumes

Annie has been begging to be Elsa literally for the first time in FOREVER.  I tried to talk her out of it by any means necessary because last year every little girl and her dog was Elsa or Anna.  But my little winter baby is persistent to a fault, so I caved.

Because Annie was Elsa, I had Sam be Olaf so they could match.  Sam likes the friendly snowman, and since he's so finicky about clothes, I thought the more simple his costume was, the more likely he was to keep it on.

His outfit includes: a pair of white pants we borrowed from Annie, a white t-shirt we already owned with left-over Tinkerbell pompoms glued to the front, hand-me-down boots, and a hat I bought from the party store.  Total cost: $20.

That total cost of $20 was actually the cost of the hat alone.  I had no idea it was that expensive because I couldn't find a price tag, however, I brought it to the register thinking, How bad could it really be? Ten to twelve bucks?  I was wrong.  So painfully wrong, but I puchased it anyway because there was no way I was making an Olaf hat.

Annie's costume includes: store bought dress from Costco (I searched and searched for one that was not itchy), crown that came with the dress, dress-up shoes from Wal-Mart that I clipped the bows off of and painted with Modge Podge, glitter, and an extra coat of Modge Podge just to seal in the sparkles, a yarn wig that my aunt and I made similarly to the Tinkerbell one from last year, and a little purple eye shadow. Total cost: $30ish dollars.  Way too much much if you ask me.

 But how do you say no to the queen of Arendelle?

On Saturday, we had our annual Halloween photo shoot.  I needed this one to go smoothly because I am using some of these frames for our Christmas card this year.  Samuel did not get that memo and kept walking into the shots of Elsa.  As cute as that little Olaf head was, I needed some very specific shots that didn't involve the wintry sidekick.  I also needed some hugging pictures that mostly ended in Olaf screaming, "No hugs!" while Elsa chased him, giggling wildly.  In the end, I eventually got what I needed for our Christmas card and a few extras to play with.  Annie requested I give her magic like I did last year, so I obliged.

 "Here I stand in the light of day!"

I hope you have another magically Halloween!