Yesterday I was feeling a bit guilty that we’d not really done anything Halloweeny, although in fairness it’s just an excuse for a party rather than anything we really celebrate as such. I don’t much like the whole trick or treat thing and the only way we’d ever do it is on an organised walk to people already expecting us. We’ve given away so many ‘No Trick or Treaters’ signs to elderly people genuinely worrying about having their door knocked on after dark by a gang of children wanting money or sweets with menaces that I really wouldn’t want to be responsible for that. In our own street Davies and Scarlett are the only children and while all the neighbours are very generous to them with birthday and Christmas and even just for the sake of it gifts I would feel really bad about the kids knocking on their doors begging at Halloween.
So fortunately I had organised a Halloween event at work and we’d been invited to a Halloween Harry Potter Party this evening :).
I dressed in my witches outfit from the party (Anna wasn’t the only one recycling her outfit ;)) and Ady ran me in to work this morning as they were heading back later so could lurk and bring me home. So I had a nice morning, spent decorating the childrens’ library with cobwebs and spiders, cutting up paper for cotton bud skeleton pictures and handprint bats and looking at rhymes to read out.
The event went well – we had 16 children all in fancy dress (including Davies and Scarlett. Davies came as a vampire – also recycling his outift, Scarlett was a cat which involved a black T shirt, black trousers (from I believe a fancy dress policemans outfit), ears and tail. Ady had face painted them both very well too). Abi read several spooky short stories, I read one spooky rhyme and then a couple of Roald Dahl’s Revolting Rhymes (Red Riding Hood and 3 Little Pigs) and Frankie read another spooky rhyme and a story. That held all of them for the first half an hour and then we did crafts. They also went well and we awarded one little girl best dressed and presented her with a goody bag. Everyone, other than Ady, Davies and Scarlett drifted away and we tidied up.
I finished at 1pm so we all came home again and took off facepaint and costumes and had some lunch. Ady had brought home a pumpkin each for the kids from someone at work who grows them commercially so they both wanted to carve them. I managed to remain utterly hands-off (oh so hard!) and just helped with digging out flesh and other tricky bits rather than design. I now have a huge pan full of pumpkin flesh and a big bowl of pumpkin seeds to be imaginative with tomorrow. We tried to watch The Story of Stuff as Davies asked something about Fair Trade which I though would be best answered by that rather than me but the internet was being all clunky so we only managed the first five minutes or so, will try that again tomorrow.
Fancy dress outfits for this evening were very cobbled together. Davies wanted to be Harry Potter so wore his vampire cape safety pinned to his black top with shirt and tie printed on (to look like school uniform) and some black trousers. Scarlett wore one of my white tops under a fake fur gilet from a charity shop and the leggings we’d painted to look like zebra print for Adam’s Madagascar Party of about 4 years ago to be the snowy owl from Harry Potter. Ady and I didn’t dress up, me in protest as part of my long running refusing to acknowledge Harry Potter at all really ;).
We arrived and the party was super organised with a Quidditch match on the lawn followed by Herbology, a Harry Potter quiz and various other games and tasks which I have to confess meant nothing to me so I am unable to recount but were clearly HP themed and very well thought out. While the Quidditch was happening (which was very rough and at least 3 children ended up wounded and wailing) the kids had to be searching for some golden ball which apparently Davies actually found first but had snatched off him. He never really recovered from that and although he decided at the end on balance he’d mostly enjoyed the party he did spend a fair chunk of it wanting to go home or looking fed up. I think both Davies and Scarlett struggled with the fact it was an established group of friends at the party who all knew each other with them as the new kids, plus the hosts were not very good at putting them at their ease or making them feel welcome, instead playing on the fact they were the obvious outsiders and making them feel it. I don’t have a huge issue with that really and Davies was playing the victim rather well which always annoys me but at the same time I felt his pain and could relate to him just wanting to leave. He managed to keep it together and participate as much as he was allowed until it was home time anyway. As usual most of it went over Tarly’s head and when she heard Davies was upset about being told he wasn’t allowed in a certain room she demanded to know who had said that and marched off to put them straight 😉 😆
Ady and I enjoyed chatting to I, who was one of the chosen few to attend the round table Select Committee meeting and talking to him about Home Ed, how we do it, why we do it and how it works. He knows a lot in theory but having much younger children still doesn’t have absolute confidence about it all in practise so we chatted a bit about how it works for us on a day to day level.
We then also drifted to the outer circle of the room as the rest of the adults all clearly knew each other and all the rest were school friends. Neither of us really felt like being the token HE parents so we chatted to each other instead. On balance we were all glad we’d gone, had a mostly good time, but were reminded of what a fab circle of friends we already have and how very comfortable we all are with them.
Back home Ady offered the kids a sleepover together and to watch films. They are still very much awake and I suspect it will be a late night for them but listening to the sounds of their laughter together drift downstairs is just heartwarming. The idea that Ady and I created those two little people up there who are now taking such delight in each others company is just wonderful, I don’t think there can be any lovelier sound in the world than their giggles together :).