Ian's First Halloween!

We were really concerned that Halloween would fall flat since Ian was still refusing to wear his costume. It also didn't help that I had lost my voice and felt really horrible. Shawn also found out that the Halloween festivities in his office were by RSVP only and the deadline was last week.

Luckily, I learned that one of our local malls organized a big Trick or Treating event, which seemed like a much better idea than braving the cold, wind, and rain to do it in our neighborhood.

Grandma Trish and Grandpa Tom came over in the morning to handle Grandma's normal Friday duties and planned to help us with the candy-getting, and then stay the night at The Salish Lodge at Snoqualmie Falls, which is just a few minutes from our house.

We headed to the mall, had a wonderful dinner, and then started the trick or treating. Ian actually let us put his costume on, but refused to wear the hood. OK...We'll take what we can get! I had a feeling he would nix the hood. He hates to have his ears covered, which I can understand.

So, we headed into the mall and it was more chaos than I ever knew possible. I had never seen so many people in one place...well since exactly one year ago in Beijing! Ian was wearing his costume with no problem, which was great...however he was not happy about the strangers handing out candy. The first store we went to, there was a giant Jelly Belly bean handing out candy, and he was not planning on getting anywhere close. He actually threw his candy bucket at the Jelly Belly and backed away. We were all laughing so hard we were crying. I only wish I had captured that on film.

Shawn and Grandpa carried him to the next dozen or so stores and he was slowly getting the hang of it. We eventually put him down, but he still had major Stranger Danger. That's good. I like that he is reluctant to go to people he doesn't know.

We continued through the mall for another 30 minutes or so before we were ALL exhausted and ready to circle back to the parking garage. There was no meltdown, no over stimulation... nothing like that. It was officially a successful evening. Ian had learned the word candy, and I no sooner had him in his car seat when he started asking for me to "open it". He had 2 or 3 candies on the ride back home and was really ready for bed by the time we arrived. It was raining by then, so we decided to stop while he was still in a good mood and didn't take him out in the neighborhood. In fact, after he went to sleep, we shut the porch light off, made a pitcher of Cosmos, and pondered what to do about all that candy... We also had roasted seeds and pumpkin pie made from our carved pumpkins in the backyard (turned out awesome).

He slept until after 9am this morning and Shawn unfortunately woke with a bit of whatever I have. Grandma & Grandpa came by for breakfast and coffee before heading back toward their end of town at about 11am.

Polli and I napped through Ian's 3 hour nap...and then we played with his new train track expansion pack, and made a delish butternut squash soup and chicken fried steak. Ultimate fall comfort food! If chicken fried steak doesn't cure my cold, nothing will.

I'll reminisce about Beijing tomorrow... I'm too tired to blog more tonight. In the meantime, enjoy some pictures of Halloween, Ian dad & Grandpa Tom playing with his new train track.

Everyone enjoying his new train track expansion set. I've since reconfigured it to be one big circle so he and Polli can both sit in the middle comfortably. Next, we'll have to get him a train table.

It was HUGE that he let us put him in the costume without incident.

Smiles! It was shaping up to be a good night!

Not sure about the stranger part, but was starting to understand the allure of candy.

Checking out his stash

Riding down the escalator

Getting the hang of this "asking strangers for free food" thing

Eating a Laffy Taffy in the truck...mom's favorite!