Suburban Treats

Let's see...

Halloween 2008: Did we dress her up at 10 months? (Mom?)
Halloween 2009: Was this when she wore that cookie monster costume?
Halloween 2010: D wears a mouse costume to one party and a cat costume to another
Halloween 2011: She is Ariel the Little Mermaid, and goes trick-or-treating for the first time

It was a real TREAT spending Halloween in suburban Toronto. In the afternoon, we took D (and baby A too) to visit her Grammy's kindergarten class while they were having their Halloween party. If we lived in Ontario, she would have started school this year (the rules are different in our province) so it was interesting to see her mingle with the kindergarten crowd. They ate junk food and played freeze dance.

In the evening, the doorbell started to ring and D ran to the door to distribute treats. She took this very seriously. At one point I saw her pick up four treats in one hand and expertly drop one into each bag of the waiting trick-or-treaters.

There were lots of kids out, and lots of houses with fairly extensive Halloween decorations. Elaborate pumpkin-carvings are apparently en vogue. D held my hand as we rang doorbells. She said "Trick or treat" and held out her bag. We had to teach her some Halloween etiquette: to say "Thank you. Happy Halloween!" instead of "But I don't like Smarties!" We also had to teach her the logic of accumulating maximum treats for the future because as soon as she got some chips she was "ready to go home and eat my chips!"


I'm not sure how long we stayed out but we only covered a quarter of my parents' street and she had ample loot. It was the perfect spot for her first trick-or-treat experience. What a delight to watch her discover that yes, these neighbour/ strangers were really handing out free candy! One of the most precious elements of parenting is certainly to witness our children experience such joy and wonder.