In our lovely Leslieville shop, we had the fun opportunity to see dozens of bedazzled and bloodied children parading around before the Halloween weekend.
While I was amazed at the store-bought costume choices (I toast that young man who wore his T-bone steak get-up with pride), it made me nostalgic for the homemade kind.
Let me give you an idea of the hand-crafted disasters I had while growing up. I’d love to hear about yours.
1) My mother worked for TD bank for close to 30 years. Back in the 80s, when she helped execute the introduction of the TD ATMs – then known as Green Machines – she thought it would be so darned cute to dress her two eldest daughters as these relatively unknown machines. Imagine it: Me and my sister dressed in green boxes, our white-gloved hands and white-stocking legs sticking out of the sides and bottom, buttons and slots decorating the outside. “What are you?” we were asked by many school yard meanies. We tried to explain that we were these new bank machines where you could deposit your money without the aid of a live bank teller. They didn’t believe that they actually existed. “How can a machine do that? You’re lying.”
2) There was a darling elderly couple in our neighborhood who enjoyed guessing what each child was dressed in. They were often wrong. They often didn’t care. When my little sister was a bunch of grapes, they exclaimed “Balloon man!” When she dressed up as the Phantom of the Opera, they exclaimed “it’s the magic man!” When, as a heavy handed teen, I came to their door and they asked who I was. I said, “I’m Death.” “Oh,” the lady said, “We gotta speak up because she’s deaf!”
Some tips this Halloween for parents of tiny tots:
Think about the cold weather. Can the costume fit over a warm jacket?
Make sure the costume is easy to take off in case of washroom emergencies.
Be sure to bring a larger bag so that your tot doesn’t have to carry so much. Simply have them hold a smaller basket which they can then unload every few houses.
Image Source.
No comments:
Post a Comment