The craziest thing happened. This morning Scout and Tillie woke up at 6:30 ready to dive into their Halloween loot (this isn't the crazy part), so Catcher came upstairs to report and ask me if it was okay to organize his candy and trade some of his with Scout (still not the crazy part). Five minutes later he returned to tell me he had exchanged a Kit Kat, a Twix and Peanut M&Ms for three Almond Joys. This is the kid that hates chocolate, remember. He got the Almond Joys for me (sigh). This still isn't the crazy part--bear with me.
Fast forward through a morning soccer game and civilized lunch at home--the first one since Tillie threw my salad all over the kitchen floor in a rage yesterday, but that's another story--to the great candy sort of 2014. Somehow I managed the trick these children into keeping only ten pieces of candy (each) from their spoils. We're donating the rest to the church tomorrow, which will then be given to Mobile Loaves and Fishes. So here's the crazy part: no one complained! No one fought over candy! They were asking me if I thought it was better to keep a Twix or a Nestle Crunch Bar (Twix, obviously). They had so much fun during the trick-or-treating portion of Halloween that the candy rewards seemed secondary. Or maybe I really lucked out. Maybe the stars were aligned just right today. Either way, I was so impressed and pleased with their behavior that I rewarded them all with a "bonus" piece of candy that they could pick from the donation bag. Again, there was total compliance on their part, and no one tried tricking me (even Tillie) by taking more than he/she was allotted. They were just stoked to get a bonus piece of candy. Side note: Catcher won the gold star child award for the day because he never nagged me for a piece of candy...not once. He ended up getting three bonus pieces, actually--don't tell the girls!--because I couldn't believe what a magical day it turned out to be. I imagined the day after Halloween to be filled with groggy ghouls and candy hangovers.
So now I'm sitting here at the dining room table with a five-pound bag of donation candy sitting beside me finding it hard to show as much restraint as these children have shown. I really want a Twix. And I don't even love Twix that much...
Now let's back up to before all this generosity took place. Catcher, Scout and Tillie had to get to work collecting the goods. They don't look so thrilled here, but that's only because they were eager to get started knocking on doors and not posing for pictures. Besides, I didn't have my handler Alex with me for support...he's in Vegas for work this weekend (yikes!). Behold the Jawa, Fairy Princess and Snow White of Halloween 2014:
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