Halloween, How We Love Thee!
My darlings both embraced Halloween with gusto this year, and a surprising amount of steadfastness—I half expected Asher to change his mind a few times about his costume. Whatever Lucas said to his little brother that made Asher want to be Hedwig the owl to Lucas’s Harry Potter, it stuck.
Lucas made a fantastic Harry Potter. He embodied Harry’s goodness and bravery, and only became more and more excited with each costume piece we gathered. We are very happy with grandma’s sweater and the purchased Gryffindor robe. (I suspect Lucas will get many joyful hours of play out of this robe.)
Asher’s costume was such fun for me! When he announced he wanted to be Hedwig, I easily saw how I could create it myself and forgo the store-bought Hedwig costume (with its impossibly tall and presumably heavy stuffed owl hood). I googled “snowy owls” and looked at some pictures. Then I spent $21 on the “angel” wings, boa, white mask, and black felt for the beak. I bought the sweat pants and hoodie sweatshirt from an Amazon shop. It took very little time to sew on the white boa. Technically, I spent a little more money on this than I would have for the premade owl costume, but I can take the feathers off this and Asher will have … clothes. (Granted, they are white clothes—somewhat incompatible with little boys. But still …)
We had such a fun and busy day on the 31st. Lucas went to a Halloween party at some friends’ house. Asher and I had a marvelous time at the Sacramento Waldorf School’s Pumpkin Path, which I’ll write about later. We all met up again just before dark and had just enough time to eat a simple dinner and go trick-or-treating. (I wish I had some daylight pictures of them together.)
Asher wore a serious “owl face” much of the time (with smiles peeking through) and only hooted (“Hoo hoo!”) the whole time we were out. Grandma VoVo and Tolly joined us for trick-or-treating, as did Auntie and Uncle-to-Be. (Thanks guys!)
Harry and his entourage. Bit like a movie poster, isn’t it?
And even with all that good kid-style fun, Ian and I still got to go to two parties! With grown-ups. And each other. Yay! Fact is, we all adore Halloween, and any reason to play dress-up!
Happy Samhain. Dance around the fires! Welcome the Dark! We hope your Halloween was full of good mischief and sweet play, like ours.
Jack-O’-Lantern, Jack-O’-Lantern,
Your light it doth shine,
Sitting up upon the window
And your light it is mine.You were once an orange pumpkin
Sitting on a sturdy vine,
Now you are a Jack-O’-Lantern,
And in the night you will shine.
November 5, 2010 at 3:17 pm
What AWESOME costumes! 🙂 Lucas is adorable as Harry but I don’t think anything on earth is cuter than Asher as Hedwig. I might be falling in love with that boy!
Has Lucas read all of the Harry Potter books? Or did you read them to him? Or has he just seen the movies? I wonder because, in re-reading books 6 and 7 (in preparation for the movie this fall!!) I am struck with how, well, adult the themes are. Not adult as in sexual but adult as in loyalty and betrayal, heroes and villains, good and evil, death in all of its permutations and meanings for the living. I just wonder how exposed to all of that Lucas has been and how you dealt with all of that.
Again, awesome costumes. Lucky boys!
November 5, 2010 at 5:41 pm
Thanks for your comment, Alyss! I think they’re pretty cute, but then, I’m their mama.
As for Harry Potter, Ian and I are big fans. However, we aren’t too keen on our 8.5-year-old son getting into the more mature themes just yet. We have read book 1 to him and started book 2, but then he asked to put it on hold. There’s plenty of scary stuff in there and he’s a sensitive boy, even though he’d like to be really tough.
With that said, he hears a lot about Harry Potter at school. Many of his friends have gotten through all of the books and they tell spoilers at school. Just today Lucas mentioned something about “when Dumbledore dies,” and I thought what a shame it is that he already knows that will happen. So, Lucas’s exposure is mainly limited to the first book and the first movie.
My friends’ daughter was exactly the right age when the Harry Potter books came out, meaning she was actually Harry’s peer in age. As the books got more complex and the themes more mature, she was able to keep pace with them as she grew up. It was ideal.
My feeling is that there is PLENTY of good literature for his age group, so I feel there’s no need to rush into more mature stories. Let’s save them for when he’s more mature. Fortunately, Lucas is fairly sensible and lets us know when he’s feeling out of his depth with media or books. Right now we’re reading Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Lucas is reading Magic Treehouse books on his own.
November 6, 2010 at 12:54 pm
I’m glad to hear that you (and Lucas) are being so sensible about waiting on the Harry Potter books. They are magical, and amazing, but I do always feel bad when I see 6, 7, 8 year old having read all of them. I remember trying to get through the Lord of the Rings books when I was in middle school and just not understanding it. I was a good reader so I could read the words, I just had no ability to understand or process the themes of the story. It wasn’t scary to me, it was just blank, but I can see how the Harry Potter books could be very scary – heck, books five, six and seven were scary to me and I was in my 20s when I read them!
One of the things I’m loving about re-reading them after studying Waldorf education is how the mythical elements in HP come straight out of European mythology – Fenrir is a Norse wolf, centaurs are out of Greek Mythology, merpeople, werewolves, giants, elves and goblins all have their basis in European stories. Lucky Lucas to get to know all of those characters from the REAL stories about them, and then later he can meet the derivative characters in Harry Potter.