Our Books, Our Selves

This post by Crissy got me thinking about my family and how different we are when it comes to our books. My sisters are as far from me as can be when it comes to our bookshelves. One likes mostly Christian fiction and Mary Higgins Clark (although I did introduce her to J. Austen, whom she now loves). Actually, the more I think about it, the more I suspect that if she came over and raided my library, she find lots of stuff she would love. But, I'm not sure the opposite would be true, as a) she's more of a library-borrower than a bookstore-addict, like me; and b) she's definitely drawn toward titles that leave me cold.

But my other sis? She's even farther away. She reads... cookbooks.* Or gardening books.* Or titles like, Journey into Motherhood: Inspirational Stories of Natural Birth. (She's a Bradley instructor.) See, I told you I had an Earth Mother sister! If you go over to her house, you will find models of women's pelvic bones and little life-size infants and placentas. Nice, huh? But I digress.

My parents are no good for a book discussion, either, unless it's an inspirational title (with my mom) or something about the South (with my dad).

I do have two close family members with whom I can discuss many books. One is dh, who does not like much fiction, but does enrich my world with good historical titles and titles like All Day Permanent Red, and modern poetry. The other is my Aunt D., mentioned last post, who gave me books all throughout my childhood - encyclopedias, Charlotte's Web, Narnia, Middle Earth - all came from her. Quite a debt I owe her, huh? I have fun returning the favor whenever I find a good title.

(Whoops, make that three family members - forgot about my brother. He and I like similar lit. I just don't get to see him enough, so when we do get together we forget to talk books.)

Finally, speaking of good titles, here's one I just finished this weekend:
The Constant Gardener. (Sorry, sis, not the gardening title you might think it to be. grin) Wow. Heady, deep, tragic, slowly paced but very engaging. Don't know if I'll see the movie, but the book was a good buy. The author is John le Carre, a writer I associate with spy movies from my childhood, so I'd never read any of his work. I was pleasantly surprised. I was also impressed with his ability to jump points-of-view - normally it's so jarring and rarely done well. But here the device works, because it really opens up the characters and adds to the plot - so much of what happens happens because of who the players are.

The only thing I don't understand is the cover art on this book. Maybe it would make more sense if I saw the movie, but if I'm correct in assuming that the picture of Ralph Fiennes is meant to be the main character in the story, I can't figure out why they have him pointing a gun. If you have seen the film, and can enlighten me, please feel free.

Well, time to cook dinner. More later.

** I, too, have been known to read a good cookbook, like anything by Nigella Lawson, or my new favorite, The Gift of Southern Cooking. Ditto on gardening books. But I differ from my sister because I ALSO like novels, whereas she owns no non-fiction that she did not buy for her children.

Back to Our Regularly Scheduled Life

I am ever amazed at the rejuvenating effect of a little vacation upon my homeschool spirit.

This week the boys have a week off from their weekly classes at The Classical School, but they still have assignments to complete. This, to me, is the perfect combination - they have much work to do, but plenty of time to do it. We started yesterday. I took their lists and divided them into daily assignments. We discussed the necessity of following the daily lists religiously - how work isn't so bad if you do it steadily and diligently, but is overwhelming if you let it pile up. Then we got to work.

Math? Check. Book reports? Begun. Grammar? Check. Science? Under control. This, my friends, is a good feeling.

And today we are going to hit Latin. I've decided that every day we will give a joint lesson in a different subject, to break up the same-old. Yesterday I read the Science lesson aloud and then they did their worksheet. (They do this every week to get ready for the weekly Friday experiments.) Today, we'll have Latin Drill, a game we made up that the boys love, to my amazement. I call out vocab words or ask for declensions or conjugations. They shout out the answers if they know them. It's Mom against Boys - and chocolate chips for the winner. (And the loser, too, if she's Mom.)

I think I'm also bouyed by the knowledge that we only have three weeks of hard work to go before another nice, long, break at Christmas. Perfect! Anyone can do the routine for three weeks if they know there are presents and cookies waiting for them at the end of it.

Hmmm. Maybe we should do school this way ALL the time. Three weeks on - one week of presents and cookies. Any takers?

Giving Thanks

It was a good Thanksgiving this year.

Every year for the past... hmmm, 12? years, DH and I have hosted my family's Thanksgiving celebration. It started when we moved into our first house. We wanted to take some of the holiday load off of my mom, but more selfishly, we wanted to use and enjoy and share the blessing of finally having a kitchen of our *own*.

This is a tradition I would not trade.

Over the years, we have perfected the menu. Oh, we don't cook it all ourselves - we finally figured out that it was more fun to spread the load. Mom brings the dressing (mmmmm....) and the sweet potato casserole (nuts on top, please, none of this marshmallow nonsense) and the pumpkin pie. Sister Hi-Energy Tornado brings the green beans and the chocolate pies. (Other people associate Thanksgiving with pumpkin pie... not me. My mother's chocolate chess pie, made by my sister, is to die for!) Sister Earth-Nurturing-Mother brings salad and a veggie and bread (2 varieties this year, including blueberry muffins. Mmmm.)

So what do DH and I do? Ahh, this is my favorite - we, meaning mostly DH - do the turkey!

It has become a familiar ritual now, born of long years of painful mistakes. First, move the turkey from the freezer to the fridge NO LATER than the Saturday before Thanksgiving. To do otherwise means staying up very late the night before the feast, changing a lot of turkey water baths in the kitchen sink. Second, the night before the feast, unwrap the turkey and remove all those little bags stuffed inside it. (How many of us have roasted that baby with all the giblets and such still inside it? Only once, right?) Third, go to bed early and arise before dawn to light the grill, charcoal please, not gas. Give the fire a couple of hours to get good and hot. (You will need a lot of charcoal! And hickory chips for flavor.) And finally, about 7 a.m., put on the bird. Or birds. (We figure if we're going to this much trouble, we would like enough leftovers to freeze for future meals!)

DH smokes the turkey by building his fire on one side of the grill and putting the bird, in a pan, on the other side, the side with the vent. That way the smoke is drawn over the bird and infuses it with wonderful flavor.

I love DH's smoked turkey. It is moist, it is flavorful, it is HIS. And I love preparing it with him.

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What I Gave Thanks For This Year (and am thankful for every day):

Family:
A husband who understands and loves me
Children who orbit us (to borrow MFS' metaphor)
Parents who are still alive and well and involved in my kids' lives
Siblings whom I enjoy, not dread
In-laws who love me and accept me as one of their own, in every good way
A grandmother who endures, despite her age and physical limitations
Aunt D., who taught me to love reading and teaches me still

Friends:
DH who is my soul mate
Sisters and a brother who are also friends
A new sister, courtesy of my dear brother's marriage this year
BFF Ruthie who is there for the long haul
New friends who share our spiritual perspective
Homeschool friends who encourage and commiserate
Neighbor friends who make our home a nicer place to be

An Education:
The many, many books read this year that have transported me, if only temporarily, to a different reality than my own
The travel to other countries and other parts of my own country that have opened my eyes to different ways of living and being
The friends I made in college who stick with me still (you know who you are!) and ground me in who I used to be and challenge me
The Internet connection that helps me obtain books, plan travel, and communicate with friends. (It's also connected me to the NYTimes, Arts and Letters Daily, Miriam-Webster online, Spanish lessons, and the world of bloggers, to name just a few of its other benefits.)
A techno-geek dh who keeps our home humming

Beauty:
A view of water out my breakfast room window and trees in my bedroom vista
A hometown with four seasons
A large number of exotic fish who've taken up residence nearby
The North Georgia mountains

Freedom:
To worship
To read and think and learn
To say what we believe to be true
To disagree and argue and debate
To give
To serve
To choose where and how we live
To choose where and how we educate our kids

A final thanksgiving note: One of the biggest blessings is the act of thanksgiving, in itself: The longer your list gets, the longer it could get. Every blessing remembered brings to mind even more.

(Sea)Lions and Tiger(fish) and Bear(Trout) - Oh My!

(Okay, I'm stretching it with the Bear Trout, as I had to look that up on Google to find some kind of fish with the word "Bear" in its name, but I digress...)

Let me begin this post about the Georgia Aquarium by saying that I have always, throughout my adult life, described Atlanta this way: "It's not a wonderful place to visit. There's not much to do here as a tourist. But it's a GREAT place to live." And I think those of you who may have visited here before will know what I mean. We don't have any great museums (although the High just expanded, so that assessment may have improved somewhat). We have a symphony and several theatre troops, and a ballet, but nothing to compare to most major N. American cities. We have the Braves, and every once in a while the Falcons or the Hawks surprise us for a season, but these are just sports teams... they're fun to watch, but one can hardly call a sporting event "cultural" or "educational."

We do have the Carter Center, and the Martin Luther King Center. And the Atlanta History Center. But these are not major museums by any stretch. No, Atlanta is more the kind of place you want to live. Great weather most of the year... warm, friendly neighbors who wave to each other in the neighborhood... good variety of restaurants... affordable housing, and lots of house for your money... good schools for those who want 'em and low overhead and regulation for those of us who school at home... all of which add up to a good hometown, not such a good temporary destination.

But now... oh, now... we have a reason for people to come see us. Yes, the Aquarium merits a visit down south, all by itself. It's... massive. Yet accessible. Ambitious. Yet user-friendly. Educational. And Joyful.

Yes, I think Joyful is a great word for the place. There are whole rooms - more than one! - where you could happily spend a peaceful afternoon just watching tiny golden trevally and whale sharks and grouper and hammerheads swim in symbiotic balance and contemplate the possibility of world peace. You can crawl through a short tunnel and emerge in an acrylic "bubble" where you are nose-to-nose with a penguin (or ten). You are mesmerized with the pulsations of the otherworldly moon jellies and fantastic sea dragons and you laugh out loud at the playful sea lions who bark and play beach-ball with their ice-encased food. Tiny tropical beauties. Piranhas. Arawanas. Belugas! NEMO!

And there are volunteers and staff at every exhibit, who will tell you where all these amazing creatures live, and what they eat, and how they play their part in the great circle of life.

This place expands you. And it's the first time I've ever, in my 39 years on this earth, been able to say that about a place that I don't have to fly somewhere to reach. (Except the library, and that's different sort of expansion.)

Okay, enough with the words. Here are a few of the shots we took yesterday:

Greeters

These are the fish that greet you when you enter.

Whale Shark

Japanese Spider Crab

These crabs can grow to the size of a car and can live up to 100 years. 

African Penguin

Did YOU know there were penguins who live only in Africa? Neither did I, before yesterday.  

My Little Aquascientist

 

Long Nose Gar

 

Rays

 

Harry and Bono and Ralph and Norman*

Harry rocked!

I liked this movie better than all the others put together. Maybe because I liked the book better than all the rest until #6 came out this summer.

I will say that there are whole plot lines left out (like Fred and George and the goblin gold) and whole characters who never appear (like Dobby the House Elf). And the Quidditch World Cup sequence was woefully short. That was disappointing. Yet I understand why... it was truly amazing that they were able to cover as much as they did, given the time limitations of a movie audience's attention span.

I think I will see it again, before it leaves the theaters.

One more event I am able to review after the weekend is... the Vertigo Tour! I've been a U2 fan for oh, 20 years, and I have never seen them in concert before now. They just sell out too quickly and I have always been unwilling to pay $500 a ticket for a 2 hour show. (Unwilling and unable! grin) But about 24 hours before the show, a friend called and said she had a lead on some tickets in the nosebleed section (read: relatively cheap) and did we want to go? Indeed we did!

The verdict? U2 puts on a great show. They seem to care about giving the audience its money's worth. They did all of my favorite songs, including "Still Haven't Found What I'm Lookin' For," even though they probably gag in private about ever having to sing that, or Sunday Bloody Sunday, or Pride, ever again. But you'd never know it, if they do feel that way. They really gave it their all, which to me is the sign of a real pro.

The best part of the show came at the end, in the encore, where Bono pulled a woman up on stage and held her in an embrace for the entire performance of "With or Without You." A collective sigh went up from every woman in the audience. Who can resist a man singing to her? Not me, that's for sure.

Okay, gotta go for now. Tomorrow is the apogee of my weekend (even if it is on Monday) because tomorrow WE GO TO THE AQUARIUM! Whale sharks! Belugas! And PENGUINS!!!!!! Oh my!

*Ralph and Norman of the title are the names of the two whale sharks featured at the Georgia Aquarium which opens tomorrow.

In Which All Good Intentions Go Out The Window

Hmmm.... plan some interesting lessons where I dress up in period costume and we all eat historically accurate food?

Or go see Harry Potter?

What do you think I decided?

Ha, ha, ha. You know already, don't you?

This week MFS at MMV posted a funny little exchange with her daughters and then mused...

You know how I know that I'm doing good work here? Nah, none of those obvious things. I know I'm doing good work because I often think to myself, "Sh-! If I were home educated, I'd want me for a parent-teacher. I. Am. Awesome."

Ayup.

It struck me that a variation on this musing would be a good pep-talk for those days when I just. don't. feel. like. It. (teaching, that is). You know what I mean - those days you wake up and would so NOT like to teach your kids that you decide to clean the oven. Or call the dentist to see if he can do that root canal you've been putting off. Or, Hey, look! The bathroom grout is filthy! Better get out the bleach and toothbrush!

Instead of going into supercleaning mode, next time I'm going to ask myself, "If YOU were the student here, would you want YOU for a teacher?"

Most of the time, I'm approaching home-education from what *I* need to accomplish. And I don't thing that's a bad thing - it's part of my responsibility to my kids. They don't know what they don't know, and they need the guidance of someone more experienced - someone who knows what they need - to lead them. However... I know their lessons would be improved if I could remember to consider, from time to time, their perspective. As in... Am I boring? Am I communicating in such a way that they find this enjoyable? Or am I passing on the dread disease of monotony?

This is not something that comes naturally to me - either teaching, or figuring out ways to make our lessons more interesting. (Ways that I will actually put into practice, not ignore because they intimidate me.) If any of you have any words of wisdom about how to make that process easier, I welcome them.

This weekend Brennan Manning came and spoke at a church near my home. I had read The Ragamuffin Gospel years ago and was deeply impacted by it, so this was an opportunity not to be missed.

Wow! What an experience. Manning's frail appearance belies his powerful stage presence and booming speaking voice. The auditorium held probably 2000-3000 people and he could easily have spoken without a microphone. But the power of his message was not in the delivery... it was in the content. His basic theme? God loves you just as you are, not as you should be.

I was also impressed by the scholarship that seemed evident in his speaking. He spoke without notes and quoted Pascal, St. Francis, an multiple Scripture references with ease. I am always challenged toward more memorization when I hear speakers do this. Clearly he had internalized the message he was there to deliver.

The two statements he made that I will chew on all week are these (and I apologize for needing to paraphrase - I can't remember them exactly):

"God moved heaven and earth to draw you in to worship Him today, and all He asks in return is that you be astonished that He bothered at all."

"God did not endure being spat upon, flogged, beaten, tortured, and nailed to a cross just to make all of you nicer and more moral people."

Think on that this week, my friends. I know I will be.

Slice of Life

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Things I am Thankful For Tonight:

Crab cakes, made with 12 tablespoons of butter
New CDs that turned out to be really good, not really disappointing
Absolutely GORGEOUS fall foliage this year
A fire in the fireplace
A little girl who likes strawberries
Two boys who wore themselves out skating today
DH who takes care of me and loves me well
Two parents who are alive and love me unconditionally (or as much so as parents can)
Two in-laws who treat me like their own daughter
Siblings who call just to talk
A world so full of new things to know
Life, right here, right now

**********************************************

CD recommendations:

Nichole Nordeman - I've loved her past work, but this latest CD, Brave, is outstanding. Listen to these lyrics:

Hold On
It will find you at the bottom of a bottle,
It will find you at the needle's end.
It will find you when you beg and steal and borrow,
It will follow you into a stranger's bed.
It find you when they serve you with the papers,
It will find you when the locks have changed again.
It will find you when you've called in all your favors,
It will meet you at the bridge's highest ledge.
So baby, don't look down, it's a long way down.
So hold on - love will find you.
Hold on - He's right behind you now.
Just turn around, and love will find you.

Natalie Grant - I wasn't expecting much - but what a pleasant surprise! Not as heady as the Nordeman CD, but fun to listen to and the first song on the CD was written just for BFF Ruthie:

Awaken
Sometimes I feel like I'm just existing
I'm not really living.
I'm only watching the time slip away.
I've forgotten who I am in You,
I'm not who I'm meant to be,
I'm drifting farther away from my destiny.
Awaken my heart, awaken my soul,
Awaken Your power and take control,
Awaken the passion to live for You, Lord,
Awaken me.

(Be careful what you ask for, my friend! grin)

Okay, that's what I'm thinking about tonight. Hope your evening is satisfying to you, too.

Pardon Me, Your Toddler is Screaming

Interesting article today in the NYT about restaurants and coffee shops that are offending customers by asking them to "control" their children. Interesting to me because I can see both sides of the issue. On the one hand, it truly is no fun to go out to eat and be assaulted by the piercing screams of a toddler whose oblivious parents are chatting on their cell phones. On the other, it is truly no fun to take your children out for a treat and endure dirty looks from the young singles and DINKs who obviously think that once you have children you should never be allowed out in public again. Ah, what's a parent to do?

Apparently many restaurant owners are trying to solve the problem by putting up signs requesting that parents be in charge of their children. Many of the parents have responded by "boycotting" the restaurants in question. But what did the offending signs say? According to the article, they say things like, "Children of all ages have to behave and use their indoor voices," and "No lifeguard on duty."

Frankly, while I do take issue with adults who treat children as sub-human, I am not offended by such signs as these. Children do need to learn to use inside voices. (So do a lot of cell-phone-brandishing adults.) And parents DO need to take responsibility for their children. It's sadly true that you can see a lot of bad parenting, or non-parenting, when you are out in public.

The only offense I would take would be with the clerks or fellow customers who believed that a child's bad manners justified a response in kind. Like the server cited in the article who snarked, "We've got a screamer!" I mean, really. If you want children to know how polite people behave, you've got to model polite behavior for them.

What's more, isn't every situation improved when there's a little grace available? Do we have to roll our eyes and assume the worst when we see someone of the childhood persuasion walk through our establishment's door? And on the other side, do we have to bristle and assume that a business owner is a child-hater and Scrooge just because he or she would like to maintain a reasonable atmosphere in said business? I think a little grace on both sides could go a long way.

Courtesy is an invaluable life skill. I hope that more people will give this idea the consideration it deserves.

Under the Sea, Right Here in The ATL

Here is something you may not have known about me.

I love marine life.

Some people have always wanted to go on a safari. Others dream of living on a dude ranch and roping cattle. My big dream is to learn how to scuba dive. One day, one day...

In the meantime, I satisfy my curiosity about all things ocean by visiting different aquaria. (Aquariae? No, I think it's aquaria.) I haven't been to the big famous ones yet, but I've seen some really cool local ones whenever we visit someplace new. Like the one at Clearwater Beach, FL. Or the tiny but fascinating Waikiki Aquarium. (At the Waikiki they had these otherworldly seadragons that looked like they were out of a Dali painting or a Cirque du Soleil costume design. God is so creative. He blows my mind.)

One of the best experiences of my whole life was getting to be a Seakeeper of the Day at the Atlantis resort in the Bahamas. DH had a business conference to attend and I got to tag along. The resort is one big casino, but since I don't gamble, I was thrilled to discover it is also one giant - and I mean massive - aquarium. All manner of sharks, rays, and fish live there - including piranha. It is utterly fascinating. Best of all, they have drawing, daily, in which the winner gets the privilege of spending a morning with the "Seakeepers" - the scientists who make the whole thing work. You get to help them test the pH of the water, treat ailing fish, prepare their meals, and then you can stand in the lagoon with the fish and feed them.

This was HUGE. I will never forget the feeling of velvety-soft manta ray noses gliding over my feet or the sharks bumping gently against my shins. They weren't bloodthirsty and they weren't frenzied. They were simply wild creatures who tolerated my presence in their habitat. I felt all National Geographic. It was powerful.

I also got to feed the piranhas. Didn't stand in their tank, though. (grin)

Anyway, do you know what is opening in Atlanta during the week of Thanksgiving?

The World's. Biggest. Aquarium.

Season passes have been acquired. Reservations have been made. We're going before it even opens to the GP. Yeah, baby. Thank you, Bernie Marcus.

How To Kill Bugs, Um, I Mean Insects

Dy asked, and I answer: How to Go on a Six-Legged Killing Spree.

One, you could make a killing jar. (See instructions here.)

Which can kill one bug at a time. Which takes an hour per bug. Which will not allow for the mass murder of the many insects you might happen to need RIGHT AWAY for your impending science project deadline.

So, you could go to method 2. Cruder, but perfect for a killing spree.

You need plastic ziplock bags, cotton balls, and the kind of nail polish remover that does NOT say "acetone free." You want the acetone. It is your secret sauce. You also want a partner. Insect devastation is no fun alone.

Now, go where there are bugs. Turn a ziplock bag inside out and put it over your hand, like a glove. Pounce upon the poor grasshopper, ant, or stinkbug that you crave. Once it is in your plastic-covered hand, turn the bag back over the bug where it is right-side-in again, with the bug safely inside. Now, have your buddy put some acetone on a cotton ball and quickly drop that cotton ball into your bag. Seal it! The bug will hate it, but he will die quickly, while you have moved on to the next bag, the next bug. And the actone will help preserve him for your collection.

Butterflies and bees can be caught more effectively with little plastic containers - margarine tubs, disposable Glad-ware, old Bell jars. A net helps TREMENDOUSLY. Same acetone-soaked-cotton-ball for the murder weapon. (Note - science books will tell you to pinch the butterfly in the thorax, to keep it from damaging its wings in your killing jar. This is hogwash. You are much more likely to mutilate the wings trying to pinch the stupid thorax than you are just putting it in your container and taking your chances. Trust me.)

There you have it. Now I'm sure I'll have PETA knocking on my door or demonstrating in front of my house. Maybe for good reason... this insect-collecting thing is addictive. I went running this weekend and saw more flying weebies and wanted to catch them! My preciousssssssss.......

Wanna see something REALLY scary?

No, it's not my kids in Halloween costumes.

It's...


It's...


It's....

BUGS!

Or, INSECTS, to be more precise. Did you know that everything we call a bug is not a bug? There is only one scientific order for bugs, and it includes things like stink bugs. Beetles? They're not bugs. Neither are flies, wasps, ants, grasshoppers, or butterflies. All of those insects belong to DIFFERENT orders.

We had a science project due today. For weeks we've been collecting bugs. This week we went on an all-out quest to identify, mount, organize, and label all of them into a massive collection to turn in today. We have 30 of the things from 7 different orders. If that sounds like a lot, consider that at first the teacher wanted EACH of my three children to make their OWN collection of 30. Different. Bugs. Yeah, right. I intervened and pleaded for a family collection instead. Mom only has so much time, right? And my first grader wasn't exactly going to do this independently. So that's what we did instead.

I think my favorite part of this particular science project was last Friday, when we were in a panic over needing about 20 more bugs. We finished our bookwork for the day and loaded up for a field trip. Lunch out, a stop at Publix for plastic bags and nail polish remover (the acetone kills the bugs quickly), then up to the local Civil War park to hunt bugs. It was a gorgeous day and we had both woods and fields to explore. Once we caught the first few, it became an adventure. We spent hours out there, and I think that day will stick in my memory as one of those "This is why we homeschool" sort of days.

Even if it did require me to learn the difference between bugs and insects.

Halloween Skirmish

This year my kids won what they consider a major victory in the kids-vs.-mom wars. For years, I've held my ground against what I consider to be "scary" Halloween costumes. My reasoning was that our family doesn't "do" gory movies like Scream or Friday the 13th or Nightmare on Elm Street, so why should we dress up like characters from those movies when there are so many other choices out there? No blood, no axes, no chainsaws. Not now, not ever.

For years, our compromise was: Ninjas. Ninjas fell somewhere in the middle between cartoony-superheroes and ultra-cool-scary-masks. Ninja costumes came in a variety of colors and decorations, they had cool face covers, and they carried swords. Mom liked the historical connection. Kids liked the bad-guy connection. Everyone was happy.

But this year, ninjas weren't right either. So we stood in the aisle at the costume store for a long, long time. The pickings were slim. They didn't want superheroes, which I understood - it's hard to feel cool as a 12-year-old Batman when the 4-year-old neighbor next door has the same getup. They're not quite mature enough to see the humor in dressing up like a garbage pail or a gorilla, like a college kid might do. And they'd been ninjas forever and forever. Except for the Lord of the Rings year. Which meant that the only section left for us was... Horror.

So I thought, and I thought. And I thought, well, they're preteen boys. With only a scant few years left before people start looking funny at them for trick-or-treating at all. I do understand the desire to be "cool." And, there were a few choices in Horror that weren't Scream or Jason or Freddy. Or bloody.

So we settled on the Evil Jester (with the mask with a wicked grin) and the Crypt Monster (with the creepy chestplate and horns on his head). There was still no blood, still no tie-ins to silly plot-less no-brainer Hollywood drivel. But they were SCARY.

(I did tell them they were not allowed to make scary noises at the little kids. And, to their credit, they looked at me as if I'd told them not to set their own hair on fire. You know the look, the one that says, "Of course not, Mom, what kind of morons do you think we are?")

I think the costumes were a success. They each came home with about 50 pounds of candy apiece, which they'll probably devour in secret in less than 3 days.

Pictures are forthcoming. As soon as I figure out where I put my camera.

P.S. The cutest costume I saw all night was a little boy who'd made his own Spongebob outfit out of a cardboard box. It was AWESOME. He used exactly the right shades of poster paint and he made a paper nose that stuck out just like the Bob's does. He was So. Cute.