Halos, Hallowe'en and Hijabs

I have to confess. I have been procrastinating with a Halloween post. My delay is largely the result of a camera that decided that November, being the month of the dead, would be an appropriate time to kick the bucket. I tried several attempts to revive the device but, alas, I soon found the do-not-resuscitate document and said good-bye to our relationship. Thus, I am shutterless and was so on the Eve of All Hallows. Therefore, I will describe in letters what you will miss in digital.
The kids trick or treated the first half of the evening and spent the latter half at a Saints party at our church. Consequently, we needed two costumes for each child. This is not an easy task for a mama. Nevertheless, I devised eight outfits; although Joseph turned his nose up at the Saints party (in tribute to his Texan uncle) and celebrated the remainder of the evening in his crib with a bottle. So, if I had pictures and were to describe the Halowe'en finery, the description would sound something like the following.
Jacob began the evening dressed as a pirate. As he prepared to leave to go door-to-door he realised that he had lost his patch, sword and sash somewhere within the confines of our home. Prayers to St. Anthony and a mad dash around the toy room produced the remainder of the costume.
(Earlier in the week, Jacob, who is prone to finding the easy way out, wondered if there was a pirate who had had a massive conversion and become a Saint so that he wouldn't have to shed his piratical gear later in the evening. Neither Dave nor I could think of a Saint who had followed such a course (although, who knows what to expect of Johnny Depp?); however, Hannah piped in that Grandpa Nick had probably once been a pirate... Hmmm.)
Hannah dressed as an angel - entirely in white with wings and a halo and looked, well, heavenly. Benjamin donned his pengolin (penguin) costume although he was adamant about wearing his baseball cap along with the black and white. And, with Benjamin, there are some battles one chooses not to fight.
Joseph was not going to go trick or treating until Daddy left with his three older siblings and he, realising that he was on the wrong side of the door, began to voice his opposition to distributing candy. Luckily Dave had only made it next door and I called him back while trying to force Joseph into a lamb costume. He would have none of it so he went as a Canadian kid in October. While the rest of the family collected horrible food that I will have to throw out when they are not looking, I mean, Hallowe'en treats, I answered the door and finished the Saint costumes. Now, this was our first Hallowe'en in this house and, I am told, we live in a slightly ritzy area of town- fondly known as Mortgage-Hill Drive. (Please keep in mind that housing in a small town is far cheaper than in the city.) Well, who knew that it was the cost of Hallowe'en and not the house payments that would prove our financial downfall. As the evening darkened, the mini vans began to pull in until the street was lined with vans and the asphalt was crawling with parentally-monitored bats, ghosts, pirates and skeletons. The amount of people who came to my door who lived over 30 minutes away was astonishing. For the first time in my life I will shop the flyers for Hallowe'en candy. Dave actually had to ransack the kids' loot in order to keep the shop running. Once the kids arrived back, Dave took over the front-door duties and I dressed our kids in their cassocks and wimples.
Jacob and Hannah are twins so of course I had to send them as the Holy Twins - St. Benedict and St. Scholastica. They wore black altar server robes with black cinctures and both carried books (made from a Pampers box) that said "The Holy Rule" as well as feather pens. Jacob wore a black pirate hat with the skull and cross bones removed and Hannah wore a black slip on her head with a white hat underneath to look like a wimple. Gee whiz, I sure wish I had pictures ... especially since Jacob had a t-shirt, a sweatshirt and a dress shirt underneath his cassock; thus, with the addition of the cincture around his waist he looked like a very short and very corpulent pre-Vatican II priest. Hannah's robe was two sizes too big and the result was a waifish little Saint who looked slightly confused each time she glanced at her name card because she was convinced that she was St. Elastica (who must be the patron saint of heavy metal). They really were quite the pair.
Benjamin wore his lamb costume of last year's Fall line and I tried to simultaneously pass him off as the Lamb of God and the symbol for St. Agnes. Yup, you guessed it, I dressed up as St. Agnes and, as I mentioned, tried to carry Benjamin as my lamb but, as always, my plan failed and when I looked in the mirror and saw my pants sticking out from underneath my long robe and my hair covered by a velvet head scarf I realised that I looked far more like Benazir Bhutto than any Saint of Catholic origin.
So, there you go. Dave and Joseph stayed home and I and the kids-come-Saints hightailed it to the church where I proved to be the only adult in costume unless you count our local naturopath who was wearing a halo. I got distracted talking to other mothers, the kids played every game until the bitter end (games such as Extinguish the Flames of Sin in which one shoots a water pistol at a tray filled with burning candles - satisfying the pyromaniac in us all; and Snakes and Rosaries in which Jacob claims he beat every other kid to heaven), they reaped the sugary rewards of their game playing and ate far too much of the sweet stuff. We came home, went to bed and, from around 3am onwards, they threw up their winnings. So much for the extra hour of sleep with the time change. All in all, they had a great time and haven't asked for candy since. The End.