Thursday, January 15, 2015

Of Elsa-s and Olivia-s

This year, Halloween was FULL of parenting triumphs. (Late, I know, but worth the telling.)

First, a little backstory:

A couple of months before Halloween, Genevieve, Mom, and I took a trip to the fabric store, and bought a pattern and fabric for an Elsa Dress. Maybe for Halloween, maybe for regular play, maybe both. No biggie.

Genevieve and I talked about Halloween, and I made a few costume suggestions.

"You could be Elsa," I suggested, "Or Olivia the pig-"
"I want to be Olivia," she answered.
"Are you sure?" I asked, "Because Mommy needs time to make your costume."
"I want to be Olivia."

Ah, to be so young and so sure. In any case, as it happened, we got a copy of Gramma Nancy's Animal Hats to review on the podcast. How timely! (CAVEAT, we gave it a very mixed review. Listen here.)

One of the great things about Olivia is that she has a fantastic wardrobe- so we had a lot of material to choose from. So, Genevieve and I looked through the books, and we came up with this for her Olivia the Pig costume:

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What you are seeing are: striped pajamas (which I got on SALE! Also, double bonus of just taking off the outer clothes before putting her in bed that night), a red corduroy jumper from Nantucket Brand, and of course, the pig hat that I knitted for her. [Also, rain boots because it rained right up until it was time to go trick-or-treating.]

A month before Halloween, I checked in... Genevieve still wanted to be Olivia.
Two weeks before Halloween, I checked in... Genevieve still wanted to be Olivia.
A week before Halloween, I checked in... Genevieve still wanted to be Olivia.

And then, I made a tactical parenting mistake.

I went on Facebook (on my phone) while Genevieve was snuggling and slowly waking up from her nap. (This can take up to an hour sometimes.) There, Genevieve saw my friend Julie's daughter in the MOST AMAZING Elsa dress. Why so amazing? Because Julie sewed it herself, and it was bomb-diggety. Julie has skills and skillz.

The following exchange will likely not surprise you.

Genevieve: I don't want to be Olivia. I want to be Elsa.
Me: We are going trick-or-treating with the neighbors in ONE HOUR.
Genevieve: I don't want to go.
Me: Hmmm. Well, we don't have an Elsa costume, and we *do* have an Olivia costume.
Genevieve: I don't want to be Olivia. I want to be Elsa.

Now, I could have freaked out, and cried. I could have yelled. I could have canceled Halloween.

Instead, I summoned Andrew to the bedroom, and had him change Genevieve while I took some deep breaths and collected myself in the living room.

I had an epiphany. A straight-up, lightbulb-over-the-head moment. I went back in the bedroom.

"You know," I said to Genevieve, "Olivia is pretty great. *I* bet that Elsa would want to go as Olivia for Halloween. So, how about you go as Elsa, dressed as Olivia?"

Sold.

SuperAndrew looked at me with wide eyes, and we shared a moment of non-verbal communication done only with eyes and eyebrows that translates to something like this:

I can't believe that worked. (Andrew)
Be cool, or she'll catch on. (Me)

I couldn't believe it worked. THIS was my magic water moment. Less than twenty minutes later one previously-distraught child was now ecstatic. WIN.

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*Literally* jumping with joy

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The other huge win is that I pre-gamed her trick-or-treat bucket. I bought a big bag of lunchbox pretzels and put a few in her Elmo bucket. She trick-or-treated, I let her eat the pretzels, and MAGICALLY when she went to bed, all the forbidden candy turned into pretzels. You would have thought Genevieve won the lottery she was *so* happy. PRETZELS FOR ALL!

And now, the obligatory aging sequence. Brace yourselves.

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Halloween 2012

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Halloween 2013

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Halloween 2014
Fun fact: Our pumpkin looked like grumpy cat a week later, and Mom got a picture. (I'm just so proud that Mom knows about grumpy cat.)

3 comments:

  1. Lately, at bedtime, we're not having "bedtime." We're going on an adventure to Dream Castle. To get there, you have to brush your teeth and say thank you to the Princess of Clean, climb Stairs Mountain, sit on the Mystical Magical Potty Fountain, climb into the entrance to Dream Castle, have a story, fight the sleepy gremlins with snuggly buddies and cozy blankets, and close your eyes and be quiet so you can find the King of Dream Castle. So far, she hasn't caught on to me.

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  2. Great shots of our Red Corduroy Jumper! Thanks for mentioning us (Nantucket Brand).

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  3. Cute costume. Great trick on the Elsa as Olivia the Pig. Gotta embrace those winning moments! For Halloween candy, we use the "Switch Witch", which the girls know is us, to switch out the candy for a present. One year it was more costumes, another legos and I can't remember the third. But a huge win. We negotiate with the kids on the prize - they are excited about the switch and haven't complained, yet. The kids get to keep 10 pieces of candy each, eating one a day - in the morning! The rest we either turn into the local dentist for money, send to troops abroad or Daddy takes to work - or all three. Trick or treating is big here - we go 5-7 times before the main event. We don't eat traditional candy and the girls really don't like it. We've been able to switch out the regular candy for the real sugar, no artificial dye candy or real quality chocolate. Tends to give us less behavior problems.

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