Sisters on Parade

Today the girls got to dress up and Trick Or Treat "parade" around the church with their classmates from the Child Development Center. All of the kids wore costumes and got candy on the last school day before Halloween... but this was all just a coincidence. wink, wink.

We call it a "Fall party" or whatever and try to stay away from the spooky or overtly "evil" elements of the holiday, but we know what it really was. Not that I'm complaining! As I was just discussing with my husband tonight, there seem to be lots of Christians (especially here in the Bible belt) more concerned about decorations involving ghosts or witches than they are about the number of children dying of starvation as I type this. One every five seconds. But Halloween is seriously a much bigger deal to some people. I've seen nasty comments on The Idea Room questioning her piety because she celebrates Halloween and posts cute & creepy crafts & recipes this time of year. (Really cute- you should check them out!)

Okay, so we do Halloween. Big Sister will be Trick Or Treating this year (unless she decides to reprise her monstrous behavior from the beginning of the week) and Little Sis and I will be staying home to pass out candy. I do worry about some of the especially frightening or gruesome costumes and decorations in the neighborhood. I wish there were a way to keep the holiday a little more child friendly, but I don't think we'll be trading our neighborhood festivities in for a Trunk or Treat this year.

I once heard someone (maybe my wise hubby) say that as the Church, we are constantly trying to get people to come to our services, visit a Sunday School class, come to a community event, etc. But on the one night when the entire community is literally knocking on our doors, we turn off our porch light. Or have a "Halloween alternative" which probably at one point was a smart, original idea but is now just a place for the Christian kids to hang out with each other instead of trick or treating with the world.

Don't get me wrong, I love Fall Festivals. On Sunday, our church will have our annual Pumpkin Patch for the community, and I will enjoy every minute of it. But I just don't like the idea of everybody doing their own thing to compete with Halloween (especially on the night of Halloween) and to compete with each other. How cool would it be if area churches all came together to have one big, fun event? Or better yet, if they simply got involved with other community events like Boo At the Zoo? When I was growing up one of the Cincy malls used to have trick or treating inside, at the stores & kiosks. How cool would that be, especially if local churches provided refreshments or bags or a craft or something? It's traffic-free, weather-proof, kid-friendly and outreach-minded.*

Okay, I'm climbing down off of my soapbox. This wasn't supposed to be that kind of post. It was supposed to be the kind of post where I show you lots of cute pictures of my kids. So here they are:

I have TONS more, but I feel a little uneasy posting pics with other people's kids in them. But ALL of the kiddos looked adorable and had lots of fun. My girls didn't even come home with an overwhelming amount of junk; there were a lot of pretzels & Teddy Grahams & other not-so-bad snacks, which I appreciate.

It made the ride home (at lunch/nap time) a lot more BEAR-able.
Hahaha.


*I just found out that the mall DOES in fact have a Trick or Treat event for Halloween. Thanks Brooke! But it's only from 5-6:00 on the 31st, and I don't think it's a very big event. Maybe someday...