This Halloween

I can’t believe it’s already the last day of October. I look back at this year and wonder where the time has gone. This is the first year ever I haven’t seen Ciara on Halloween and she’s not even dressed up this year. She’s getting so big! It hardly seems possible that she’s already getting to be too old for dressing up. I remember her as a toddler dressing up as a ballerina with her little outfit on, or the year she went as a little black cat. Now she’s almost as tall as me! As I sit here tonight with Danny I realize our years of going out treat or treating are probably over. Even when we become grandparents we probably won’t be taking the grandkids out like we did our own kids. Time flies by so very fast. Now we begin the time of hanging out together on these nights with not much to do. We sit here and watch football and eat candy that we won’t be passing out because we live so far out. Truth be told, we get the candy to eat ourselves because our kids are past the age of being able to rummage through their baskets. As much as I’m relieved to not have a “baby” anymore there are certain things you miss as a parent. I know that you raise them to go beyond these points and to cherish the memories you have. At the same time, you can’t help getting nostalgic at these moments. So goes my first year of not having a little one to take door to door and while I’m ok not “celebrating” Halloween, I still miss the times of being with the girls. I believe all the girls are dressing up this year (outside of Ciara), but we won’t see any of them. We will sit here and munch on our candy and think back to when we were out there with the other parents reminding our girls to say “thank you” and remember their manners (and of course they always did). So to all the parents that are out tonight, cherish the time because it is fleeting. And to the parents we are joining, any suggestions of what to do when there’s nothing to do?

Melissa Fitzwilliam