Halloween Lazarus Style
Here’s hoping your Halloween holiday was happy! Wow, that was hard to say. Halloween for the Lazari this year can best be described as…exhausting. Between trying to sell our home in the worst market ever, hectic work schedules, two little ones that require a lot of attention and a month where all of us were sick at least once, I’m glad Halloween is over. But we had fun! Here is our Halloween play summed up in three acts. Enjoy!
ACT 1 – THE PICKING
Our annual tradition of wild pumpkin picking continues. Daddy and son take the long walk to find the perfect pumpkin. And I emphasize the long part. There are quite literally thousands of pumpkins in this patch and Logan wanted to look at all of them. He inspected each one quite thoroughly to find one that he deemed perfect. He kept saying, “No, too smashed” or “No, too ugly” or “No, too orange.” Too orange? How can a pumpkin be too orange? It was fun and funny, but frustrating. It took over 21 hours but we finally found the perfect pumpkin!
First Daddy and Logan tried to cut the sucker from the vine but I was too weak from all the hours of pumpkin searching, plus I hadn’t eaten any breakfast. Not to mention that I’m a weakling. So I defaulted to the brains, beauty AND brawn in the relationship…
MOMMY! With a flick of the wrist she lopped the pumpkin right off! (But I loosened it for her.)
Posing with the perfect pumpkin. There’s Logan, Mommy and a big, smelly hollow fruit, known affectionately as Daddy. (Sawyer stayed home that day….lucky bastard.)
Then…tragedy strikes! While walking back to the wheelbarrow with his precious pumpkin prize in hand, Logan dropped the gourd on the hard ground causing it to crack and roll into a little gulley…exhausted and upset, we had to repeat the entire process again.
Logan was so upset over the loss of his pumpkin pal that we decided to buy him over 50 more pumpkins to equal the one perfect one we lost. Here is Logan posing with over $1,400 worth of Halloween happiness. The things we do for our kids.
Okay, so we didn’t buy 50 of them, but we did fill our trunk with more pumpkins than any one family needs…unless you’re a Mormon family or a family who really likes pumpkin pie. And I like pie. So I got a trunk full!
ACT 2 – THE CARVING
Emily loves pumpkin carving. I do not. She likes to spend hours doing intricate patterns and complex images using a pumpkin as her palette. Me? I write BOO on the outside in black marker and then after my wife goes to bed I go outside and add another B to the end of the word I wrote. BOOB! Haha, c’mon, it’s funny! But not Emily. Boob doesn’t work for her. She loves to carve and wanted Logan in on the act.
But Logan wasn’t that into it. Problem was, a) he’s a toddler so he has no attention span and b) he absolutely would NOT put his hand inside the pumpkin. No matter what we said he refused to touch the pumpkin guts. He didn’t like the gooey texture, the smell or the fuzzy pumpkin innards. Emily’s been changing several bad diapers every single day now for over 2 ½ years, she’s dealt with gooey, smelly innards way grosser than any pumpkins, so for her it was a vacation. While mommy scooped, Logan spent the time mixing around the seeds and kept saying they looked like teeth.
Here’s a nice shot of Logan using a precision pumpkin cutter (with Mommy’s help of course.) But when Daddy said “Smile for a picture!” no one was paying attention and Logan almost sliced mommy’s finger off. Mommy’s a dentist and needs those fingers. No one likes a 9 fingered dentist; it’s just plain weird when a dangly fingered glove nub is in your mouth while you’re in the dentist’s chair. Thankfully for Mommy and her patients, all digits remained intact.
After about an hour of intense carving (of which Logan participated for maybe 2 minutes) our pumpkin was officially carved. Logan named him “Jacko Lantern”, very original. He loved his little pumpkin friend. He said hi to him every day before Halloween. But now Halloween is over. And yesterday we had to throw Jacko away because he was starting to stink something fierce and devaluing our already devalued home. Logan was not happy. Until I showed Logan what Jacko looked like inside, all black and furry and smelly and gross with little thingies crawling around. Logan saw how nasty it got and said “Ewww, throw him in the garbage now please! Jacko is yucky!” Pumpkin love is fleeting I guess.
ACT 3 – THE TRICKING AND/OR TREATING
For months Logan knew what he wanted to be for Halloween. Not a ninja or superhero, not a cowboy or Sponge Bob, not a monster or ghost. He only wanted to be a cow. Yes, a cow. So we dressed Sawyer like a chicken, Emily was a sheep and I went as a farmer. This is what Halloween looked like on our farm.
Usually it’s cold here for Halloween but this year, it was 90 degrees. Sawyer’s costume was made out of wool or something, so needless to say he was in his costume for 5 minutes. Enough to snap a few pictures and than it was back to diaper only. But before he started freaking out from overheating, we snapped this photo and its great. What a friggin’ cute chicken huh? What’s NOT cute though are the hairy farmer arms in the background.
Logan’s costume was also quite warm but he LOVED his cow costume more than anything. He’d still be wearing it today if we let him. His was thicker and hotter than Sawyers and he was sweating worse than Mike Tyson at a spelling bee yet he refused to take off his cow costume at any point that evening. He wore it with pride and honor as seen here…keep in mind this photo was taken at 3pm on Halloween eve.
Logan wore the costume in his carseat on our way to that night’s trick or treating festivities, still refusing to remove any part of his cow getup. Other drivers loved seeing him and whenever he had the opportunity, he’d “Mooooooo!” for them. It was hilarious.
Trick or treating with a toddler, and his friends, is more work than fun. They grab handfuls of candy, want to eat it all immediately, cry when they can’t, trip and fall over their costume, get frightened easily by the people dressed in scary costumes, whine about their feet hurting and then want to be carried the rest of the night. But here is Logan and his friends trick or treating at Logan’s Mamie’s house. (Mamie is Ellen, his grandma.) She’s dressed like a mouse. Mamie Mouse.
Here is Logan stealing yet another piece of candy from his bag mid-trick or treat. I caught him on film this time! Since he’s got a nut allergy I had to confiscate and consume all Snickers bars, Almond Joys, Butterfingers, Reeses, etc. he was given. I must have eaten 40 candy bars in a span of 2 hours. But that’s what dads do. They sacrifice themselves for their children. And by sacrifice I mean steal all the good candy for myself and devour it on the walk from the house’s front door down the driveway where Emily is waiting on the street. I shared none of them with her. See, I didn’t want her to “suffer” either. I am a man of honor. A very fat, hungry man of honor. (Note: It is now 6 hours after putting on his costume, Logan is drenched with sweat, high on sugar and tired from walking yet STILL refused to remove his cow costume.)
Finally…close to 9pm…a good 6 hours, 40 houses, 5 lollipops, 216 “Moooooos!”, 3 trips and falls and 2 tantrums after first putting the cow costume on, Logan decides to rest, at least remove the headpiece and enjoy another well deserved lollipop. He was quite a trooper. He is tired. He is sweaty. He has a bad diaper, I’m guessing. He’s done and he’s, he’s, he’s…putting a lollipop in his hair! Nice.
So that was our Halloween in three acts! Hope yours was as fun, as exciting, as exhausting and as memorable as ours. Until next time…
Adam, Emily, Logan & Sawyer
ACT 1 – THE PICKING
Our annual tradition of wild pumpkin picking continues. Daddy and son take the long walk to find the perfect pumpkin. And I emphasize the long part. There are quite literally thousands of pumpkins in this patch and Logan wanted to look at all of them. He inspected each one quite thoroughly to find one that he deemed perfect. He kept saying, “No, too smashed” or “No, too ugly” or “No, too orange.” Too orange? How can a pumpkin be too orange? It was fun and funny, but frustrating. It took over 21 hours but we finally found the perfect pumpkin!
Notice his reaction when he finally found the perfect pumpkin! He was so elated. It was nice and round, not “smashed” or “ugly” and apparently just orange enough for his liking. Now the hard work of extracting it from the earth and hauling it to the car begins.
First Daddy and Logan tried to cut the sucker from the vine but I was too weak from all the hours of pumpkin searching, plus I hadn’t eaten any breakfast. Not to mention that I’m a weakling. So I defaulted to the brains, beauty AND brawn in the relationship…
MOMMY! With a flick of the wrist she lopped the pumpkin right off! (But I loosened it for her.)
Posing with the perfect pumpkin. There’s Logan, Mommy and a big, smelly hollow fruit, known affectionately as Daddy. (Sawyer stayed home that day….lucky bastard.)
Then…tragedy strikes! While walking back to the wheelbarrow with his precious pumpkin prize in hand, Logan dropped the gourd on the hard ground causing it to crack and roll into a little gulley…exhausted and upset, we had to repeat the entire process again.
Logan was so upset over the loss of his pumpkin pal that we decided to buy him over 50 more pumpkins to equal the one perfect one we lost. Here is Logan posing with over $1,400 worth of Halloween happiness. The things we do for our kids.
Okay, so we didn’t buy 50 of them, but we did fill our trunk with more pumpkins than any one family needs…unless you’re a Mormon family or a family who really likes pumpkin pie. And I like pie. So I got a trunk full!
ACT 2 – THE CARVING
Emily loves pumpkin carving. I do not. She likes to spend hours doing intricate patterns and complex images using a pumpkin as her palette. Me? I write BOO on the outside in black marker and then after my wife goes to bed I go outside and add another B to the end of the word I wrote. BOOB! Haha, c’mon, it’s funny! But not Emily. Boob doesn’t work for her. She loves to carve and wanted Logan in on the act.
But Logan wasn’t that into it. Problem was, a) he’s a toddler so he has no attention span and b) he absolutely would NOT put his hand inside the pumpkin. No matter what we said he refused to touch the pumpkin guts. He didn’t like the gooey texture, the smell or the fuzzy pumpkin innards. Emily’s been changing several bad diapers every single day now for over 2 ½ years, she’s dealt with gooey, smelly innards way grosser than any pumpkins, so for her it was a vacation. While mommy scooped, Logan spent the time mixing around the seeds and kept saying they looked like teeth.
Here’s a nice shot of Logan using a precision pumpkin cutter (with Mommy’s help of course.) But when Daddy said “Smile for a picture!” no one was paying attention and Logan almost sliced mommy’s finger off. Mommy’s a dentist and needs those fingers. No one likes a 9 fingered dentist; it’s just plain weird when a dangly fingered glove nub is in your mouth while you’re in the dentist’s chair. Thankfully for Mommy and her patients, all digits remained intact.
After about an hour of intense carving (of which Logan participated for maybe 2 minutes) our pumpkin was officially carved. Logan named him “Jacko Lantern”, very original. He loved his little pumpkin friend. He said hi to him every day before Halloween. But now Halloween is over. And yesterday we had to throw Jacko away because he was starting to stink something fierce and devaluing our already devalued home. Logan was not happy. Until I showed Logan what Jacko looked like inside, all black and furry and smelly and gross with little thingies crawling around. Logan saw how nasty it got and said “Ewww, throw him in the garbage now please! Jacko is yucky!” Pumpkin love is fleeting I guess.
ACT 3 – THE TRICKING AND/OR TREATING
For months Logan knew what he wanted to be for Halloween. Not a ninja or superhero, not a cowboy or Sponge Bob, not a monster or ghost. He only wanted to be a cow. Yes, a cow. So we dressed Sawyer like a chicken, Emily was a sheep and I went as a farmer. This is what Halloween looked like on our farm.
Usually it’s cold here for Halloween but this year, it was 90 degrees. Sawyer’s costume was made out of wool or something, so needless to say he was in his costume for 5 minutes. Enough to snap a few pictures and than it was back to diaper only. But before he started freaking out from overheating, we snapped this photo and its great. What a friggin’ cute chicken huh? What’s NOT cute though are the hairy farmer arms in the background.
Logan’s costume was also quite warm but he LOVED his cow costume more than anything. He’d still be wearing it today if we let him. His was thicker and hotter than Sawyers and he was sweating worse than Mike Tyson at a spelling bee yet he refused to take off his cow costume at any point that evening. He wore it with pride and honor as seen here…keep in mind this photo was taken at 3pm on Halloween eve.
Logan wore the costume in his carseat on our way to that night’s trick or treating festivities, still refusing to remove any part of his cow getup. Other drivers loved seeing him and whenever he had the opportunity, he’d “Mooooooo!” for them. It was hilarious.
Here he is, mid-moo.
Logan and a few friends primed and ready for an evening of trick or treating. Spidergirl, a cow and a butterfly. There were also pigs, lions, killer whales, penguins, biker boys, witches and one little boy who was dressed up like a priest. Ironic huh?
All smiles at 6pm despite Logan losing 9 lbs. of water weight due to the stifling costume. He was wet with sweat, we felt like awful parents, and tried to get him to take the cow suit off, yet the boy flat out refused to remove the outfit. Whenever we tried to cool him off, he just got angry. And no one wants to mess with a mad cow.
All smiles at 6pm despite Logan losing 9 lbs. of water weight due to the stifling costume. He was wet with sweat, we felt like awful parents, and tried to get him to take the cow suit off, yet the boy flat out refused to remove the outfit. Whenever we tried to cool him off, he just got angry. And no one wants to mess with a mad cow.
Trick or treating with a toddler, and his friends, is more work than fun. They grab handfuls of candy, want to eat it all immediately, cry when they can’t, trip and fall over their costume, get frightened easily by the people dressed in scary costumes, whine about their feet hurting and then want to be carried the rest of the night. But here is Logan and his friends trick or treating at Logan’s Mamie’s house. (Mamie is Ellen, his grandma.) She’s dressed like a mouse. Mamie Mouse.
Here is Logan stealing yet another piece of candy from his bag mid-trick or treat. I caught him on film this time! Since he’s got a nut allergy I had to confiscate and consume all Snickers bars, Almond Joys, Butterfingers, Reeses, etc. he was given. I must have eaten 40 candy bars in a span of 2 hours. But that’s what dads do. They sacrifice themselves for their children. And by sacrifice I mean steal all the good candy for myself and devour it on the walk from the house’s front door down the driveway where Emily is waiting on the street. I shared none of them with her. See, I didn’t want her to “suffer” either. I am a man of honor. A very fat, hungry man of honor. (Note: It is now 6 hours after putting on his costume, Logan is drenched with sweat, high on sugar and tired from walking yet STILL refused to remove his cow costume.)
Finally…close to 9pm…a good 6 hours, 40 houses, 5 lollipops, 216 “Moooooos!”, 3 trips and falls and 2 tantrums after first putting the cow costume on, Logan decides to rest, at least remove the headpiece and enjoy another well deserved lollipop. He was quite a trooper. He is tired. He is sweaty. He has a bad diaper, I’m guessing. He’s done and he’s, he’s, he’s…putting a lollipop in his hair! Nice.
So that was our Halloween in three acts! Hope yours was as fun, as exciting, as exhausting and as memorable as ours. Until next time…
Adam, Emily, Logan & Sawyer
posted by Lazdog @ 4:01 PM
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