Halloween Costumes...

My daughter wants to be yet another Disney princess this Halloween.

I am not thrilled about it (she is a bit obsessed with princesses), but it could be worse. For one thing, I have a rather large collection of princess costumes given to me by various family members and friends, so I neither had to pay for nor make a costume. So YEAH! Also, the princess costumes we own pretty much covers her from head to toe. Double YEAH!

Nevertheless, I am still starting to worry about the age appropriateness of costumes, so much so, that I am starting to dread Halloween (or sometimes wish I had a boy around this time of year). Every year as I look down the aisles of Halloween costumes, all I see are hemlines going up and necklines going down (I also realize that I am becoming a prude). It almost seems that children costumes go from fully covered and 'cute' for the six and younger crowd and then jump right to skirts that barely cover their thighs for the seven plus crowds – almost like for every year, the skirt gets shorten by an inch. I understand that Halloween is a time for dress up and to pretend to be someone or something you are not, but I really do not want my five year old to play dress up as some little lolita.

Even if I ignore the fact that I find a lot of these costumes not age appropriate, these costumes, with minimal amount of material, is highly impractical... most kids still trick or treat. And where I live, it is bloody cold at the end of October; who the hell wants to stop getting free candy to go home because you are freezing your ass off? And, what is the point of wearing a costume if you have to cover the entire thing up with a ski jacket or risk hypothermia?

Yes, you can argue that I can always make a more age appropriate costumes for my little one, and allow her to help and to use her imagination. But I do not always have the time, have no crafting skills whatsoever, and frankly, I am lazy...

So dear retailers and costume makers, I am willing to give you my hard earned cash, but please have something available that I would want to buy my little girl – something that will allow her to still look like a little girl and not some tiny twenty year old.

Is it okay to ask? Or is it too late?

There is a park near my house that my daughter and I love to go to. The park is just the right size, I can see her from one spot, there are lots of communal toys in the sand box, and there is a set of monkey bars (my daughter's favourite playground apparatus).

We especially like to go, because we have a set of 'park friends'. Yep, my daughter has her own posse of little people, and I have a group of moms that I can talk to while the kids play.

Now here is my problem. There are a couple of moms that I see on a fairly regular basis; I know what they are going to have for dinner, I know what their kids like to eat, how fast their kids eat, their kids' extracurricular schedules, if people in the family are sick, heck, I even know about their kids' bowel movements (which is surprisingly quite a common topic of discussion for parents...).

HOWEVER, I have no clue what their names are, and I have known these women for years! I am pretty sure, at one point, we introduced ourselves, but at the time I was probably staring at my kid making sure she was not going to break something.

So how does one re-introduce oneself (I use to have dogs, and we had the exact same problem)? Is it too late to do it politely? Should I just keep my ears open and hopes someone else use their name? Or should I just suck it up and say 'look, I am so sorry, but I have no clue what your name is'?

And, my worst case scenario, which has happened more than once, occurs when my husband drops by. The group of us usually stand around and chat for a bit, and then everyone suddenly quiets down and stares at each other, waiting for me to make introductions. But I can't!! Because I do not know anyone's names.

I swear I am not being rude, I am just incredibly forgetful. Can I blame mental incompetence?

The only good thing I can think of... even if they think I am being rude ... they probably do not know my name either.