Mom of the Year

To put it bluntly, I won't be winning the Mom of the Year anytime soon. Halloween, and all the fun that surrounds it, has totally escaped us this year...

I've been thinking about and looking forward to Disney for months now, and in my mind, I realized that Halloween was right before that, but it didn't dawn on me that it was so close.... until Matt and I got talking a couple of nights ago. As we were sitting there making out our upcoming plans, it dawned on me that we are leaving for Disney World a week from TOMORROW. That's right folks -- a week from now I'll be basking in the Florida sun, but before then, I need to get ready for Halloween.

So in my stupor of trying to get everything done (that I had previously overlooked) I figured out that I better start with buying the kids a costume. Good place to start, right??? Last night after dinner, Matt and I packed up the kids and headed out to find the all important beggar's night costume. The only criteria is that Katherine's costume had to be "wholesome". Since she goes to a Christian preschool and they're visiting a nursing home, they don't want the kids to be dressed as witches, vampires, devils, etc. I get that. I wasn't looking for anything like that anyway. Katherine wanted to be Snow White, but as I quickly realized any "princess type" costume would suffice. Let's see.... we looked at Target, Kohl's, Toys R Us, TJ Maxx and finally hit the jackpot at K-Mart. And I wasn't being overly critical or picky... everything was SOLD OUT in her size!! She ended up getting the Sleeping Beauty costume from the Shrek movie. Thankfully she LOVES it. She's already modeled it for us!! Oh, and thanks to my procrastination -- it was 40% off. Can't beat that! And yes, the costume we bought was the LAST ONE in her size.

Caleb wasn't so lucky... After all the running around he came home with ... NOTHING - NADA - ZIP - ZERO. That's right, the poor kid doesn't have a costume to wear this year. I talked to my sister in law, Caroline, and she offered to let Caleb wear Leo's costume from last year. It's a train conductor, so I know he'll love it. Danyel also brought down one of Walker's old costumes. It's super adorable and warm (which is such a bonus) but Caleb won't have a thing to do with it. It's a fuzzy lion, and it freaks him out!! So unless he has a change of heart, I'm thinking that he'll be a train conductor...

So on top of the costume debacle, we were going to carve pumpkins tonight. Yea, we haven't gotten around to that either... Anyway, Matt takes a look at them and declares that one of them is already rotten. WONDERFUL! Chalk up another bonus point in my direction!

So basically this Halloween, Katherine is lucky to get a costume, I'm still working on Caleb's and carving pumpkins.. not yet! But, tomorrow is another day!

Oh, and then to add to my mom of the year tally... This morning Caleb threw a holy fit when I was trying to get him into his car seat. It went on for a good 10 minutes and I tried everything -- trickery, bribing, begging, pretty much everything I could think of. In the midst of my frustration, I shut his door, got in the car, put it in reverse and backed out of the garage. I thought it would scare him into getting in his car seat, but no... I had Katherine screaming and crying that I wasn't being safe with her baby brother. As if I'd really leave without him buckled...

So anyone who wants to nominate me as mom of the year, please do!! I think I've got a good shot at winning this year! LOL