Halloween has always held special tradition in our family. It wasn’t calculated, but when our kids were babies, we started coming up with family costumes for Halloween. For one notable Halloween, Justin was “Prince Charming,” Grace and I were both “Snow White,” and Brady and Hayden were dwarfs. We had such fun with this costume unison that we’ve stuck to the group theme pretty much since then.
It’s funny – every single year, I think my kids will have grown out of this stage. I’m certain they’ll unite in asserting independence and concluding that, from here on out, each of us is in charge of our own costume selection. Without fail though, usually by Spring our kids begin debating our family costume for the next Halloween. It’s one of our favorite family discussions / arguments – deciding on each of our characters and figuring out the best way to make our theme come to life with all six of us playing necessary roles.
We did have one year where Grace went it alone. She was in first grade, and Frozen had just come out. That year, just like seven other girls in her class, she decided she was going to be Elsa, and there was no other way around it. I do believe that as Halloween Eve arrived, and she saw the rest of us united as Ninja Turtles and April O’Neil, she regretted her decision, even just a little bit.
This Halloween tradition of dressing up in a family theme has become priceless to me…I love how much the kids look forward to the holiday, and to seeing our costumes come to life in unison. I love the way that they obsess and argue over each person’s costume, weighing in hard on the feasibility of that individual’s aptitude for said character. I love that, in my children’s minds, there is no questioning being a part of this holiday fun. But I also know that it is short-lived. Every year when the kids start the discussion anew, I am grateful to have bought just one more year of this joyful tradition.
I know there will be no visibility to when it’s the last time we dressed up as a family for Halloween. That’s the hardest part, right…not knowing it’s the last time until something just doesn’t happen again. But, you know what? I’m okay with that for now. And that’s because I have some work to do on my costume for this year, and I have four little buddies (Five if you count Justin, who just may be the most excited of all of them…) who are champing at the bit to help me put the finishing touches on our family costume plan.
