Happy post-Sandy Halloween!

Lester did a yeoman's job preparing for the storm after all (I should have known he would) and caulked up some cracks in our outside walls, as well as stocked our house with food and baby formula and other actual necessities like Papa John's pizza and Pillsbury slice 'n bake cookies. I bought batteries and bottled water, and filled up our downstairs tub with water. We had the flashlights at the ready.

In the end, we survived nontropical Sandy, or whatever she ended up being called, with very little damage to speak of. In the three days we were stuck in the house a little bit of water seeped in through the basement, but other than that, we have nothing significant to talk about. Especially not when compared to the devastation in NY/NJ and other parts of the Northeast.

My prayers go out to all of those who lost loved ones, and I pray that people will be able to get back to their normal lives as soon as possible. I know it is a very "1st-world" problem to be so majorly inconvenienced by power outages and public transportation stoppages, but still. This sucks.

In other news, it is Halloween, and I hope the boys and Clair will get at least some trick-or-treaters tonight, as they are crazy excited about wearing their costumes and handing out candy. And since school was closed again today, they missed out on their Halloween party and likely tomorrow's fall festival, too. So since this is it for them, trick-or-treaters better come a trickin' and a treatin'!

We at least got out as a family before the storm and went to the Patterson Park Lantern Parade on Saturday, which was awesome. We ate festival food and saw marching bands and amazingly-creative paper lanterns and kids in costumes and our friends Antwyne, Mari and Antony and Stacey and Hugo. Dean was a little freaked out by the scary costumes -- at one point he said, "Mommy, nooo! The dinosaur is going to eat me!" -- but he still had a really good time. The highlight of the night was definitely the marching bands. My boys LOVED them. See for yourself (this video is 2 minutes long and worth every second!):

And here are some cute photos of them in their costumes, which they thought were the best things ever.

Mater Truck and Lightning McQueen reporting for duty!

Raggedy Ann (actually Raggedy Andy, because I wanted her to have pants.) Yes, my daughter is a cross-dresser. I love and accept her no matter what. :-)

Daddy and Raggedy Ann(dy) at the Patterson Park Lantern Parade. Clair was a huge trooper, especially considering that it got kinda chilly out and it was way past her bedtime.

Every day since Saturday the boys have asked to wear their costumes. And I told them they could wear them on Halloween to hand out candy to trick-or-treaters. Which is why those darn neighborhood kids better high-step around all the downed tree branches and come eat all this candy I bought!!

 (Seriously, people, I ate so much junk during the storm sequestering, I neeeeeed this candy out of my house!)