Halloween! The kids got a pretty good introduction to Halloween in pre-school. The art work, music and whole content in the last two weeks before Halloween was all about, bats, pumpkins and other Halloween 'utensils'. Katrin tried to prepare via a library book about tradition, history and mystic. And myself? Well except some stories during lunch time I had none - do you need any? I guess not, I had my family telling me all about it. Then two days before Halloween we had the pumpkin carving party at pre-school. In absence of any idea about a costume and time to make one I decided to just go as a doctor. I plundered the kids first aid and doctor play box, put on white trowsers, white socks, white shirt and done. At least two people I met were puzzeled in the first moment, asking if I came straight from work ... (sure, with a stethoscope around my neck ... feeling the pulse of the ocean ;-)!). And the kids at pre-school loved my outfit, constantly one was sick, needed an ointment or medicine or wanted to take over. My 'utensils' soon were spread among the kids, but somehow always returned to me after a while. Most of the costumes were really good, much more thoughtful, more effort put into and way more appealing than mine!
On Halloween Katrin went out with the kids to do 'Trick or Treat' while I stayed home with Narne, since it was his sleeping time. As Katrin told me, the kids were a bit shy and unsecure at first. They soon joined with a group of older kids from up the road they knew from playing. And very soon the penny dropped - they started running from house to house shouting 'Trick or Treat' ... trying to harvest as much candy as possible. Being back home they had to try most of it ... . We had some pretty candied kids that night and the next day. We allowed them to eat as much from their candy as they decided to only on the first day. But Katrin and I helped as good as we could reducing the pile and thus it was no longer a topic a couple of days afterwards.
The costumes of the kids that knocked on our front door varied quite a bit, from hardly disguised to completly unrecognizable, from scary to wonderful, from selfmade to bought and from perfect idea to well, just a costume. I definitely had fun opening the door and seeing who was there. One of the older ones that came to the door was disguised as skeleton - but Jonte told me that that surely was not a skeleton but a well known bone-pirate! (Jonte: "Das war ein Knochenpirat!")
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(Narne enjoys the hikes on my back.)
(The stream we did not cross. You actually can see the trail on both sides.)
(Snow is always fun!)
(The road that looked like a river bed.)
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And at last for today, here is a summary of the last weeks what we did not mention so far:
We managed to plant more than 200 bulbs in our back yard. I originally wanted to distribute a share of them to the front yard, but they all ended up in the back yard. Why? Every cut with a spade in the front yard showed 3-5 bulbs. I don't know the type, but looking foreward to spring to see what is going to come up.
It will hopefully provide us with a colorful front and back yard.
In the yard roses, the rhododendron and the dahlias started to flower. Due to lack of water there was nothing flowering when we moved in, but drop watering and the occasional hose did help most of the plants to last to the start of the rainy season. Now it rains pretty regularly - the last weekend even severe. Never the less it is warmer than in Kiel, and the amount of rain is pretty similar to some years in Kiel from my point of view.
By making contacts and friends with many people around, we slowly fill our house: We got a basket for playing basket ball in the back yard, Lego and a kids shopping cart. (Didn't we bring ALL our kids stuff with us? Didn't that already make up most of our belongings? Well it keeps growing incredibly fast!)
We even got a matress for the kids to play and guests to sleep on, a couch and many other things for the kids from new friends.
Here are a few dialogues we had with the kids in the last week. We started to write them down, so we would not forget all of them. I guess I will pretty soon take them offline again - don't want to post to embarrassing stuff, they might not like as they grow older:
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Katrin and I were talking about former times, how we used to cook things.
J.: In former times we were apes then humans.
T.: Right! We were first apes, then babies and now children, later human.
- Kids a bit confused, how can apes turn into human babies and get into the mothers belly? -
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On our way to Mount Rainier hike the kids are talking in the back of the car.
(J. got a small plasitic survival tool with a beer opener)
J.: With this beer opener I can open beer.
T.: Only when you are grown up, not yet!
J.: Yes, when I am a school kid and drink wine, then I can use my beer opener to open beer.
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Katrin and the kids are talking about age.
Kids: How old are you?
Katrin: 30 years.
Kids: How old is daddy?
Katrin: 33 years and he will turn 34 soon.
Kids: When daddy is 34 he will probably look as old as great grandpa Heinz.
(He was 86 - I thoroughly checked if I can find a gray hair on my head the next morning - none so far!)
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Katrin and the kids saw an electric tricycle. The kids wondered about it and Katrin explained them about solar energy and that our car goes on regular fuel. Further that this does pollute the air, thus we try not to use it, if not neccessary. Next day Jonte comes inside from playing outside:
J.: "Outside there is yucky air."
K.: "Why is the air yucky Jonte?"
J.: "Because we did drive with our car such a long way yesterday."
(We only went for a very short 4mile drive to the park)
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J. is a postman for Halloween. Everyone in the house is getting mail delivered regularly.
J.: "Here is mail for you"
T.: "Oh, thank you"
J.: "Nothing special, just advertisments"
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