It's the Great Obsession, Charlie Brown...

Ok, so Thanksgiving has come and gone, but I am reflecting back on Halloween. Not bad, I’m only one holiday behind!

To prepare Jack for Halloween we did what any loving parents would do – we took him to stores and held him up to statues of Mummies that would come “alive” when you got close to them (he was less than thrilled), carved pumpkins, dressed him in a zebra suit and plopped him in front of the TV to be introduced for the first time to the wonderful world of Charlie Brown.


Now, Scott and I are big fans of “It’s The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” and of course the Christmas episode so we wanted to share this with our son. To this point, Jack has liked the occasional episode of Thomas or Bob the Builder, but he hasn’t been too intent on staying still to really pay attention to whatever show is on, which I’m happy about. Enter Charlie Brown – the kid has fallen in a deep love with The Great Pumpkin (who ironically never shows up as you know).

Since the first time he watched the show he was hooked and thanks to DVR, we have been able to “enjoy” The Great Pumpkin (and on occasion, “You’re Not Elected Charlie Brown” which was taped after it – you know one of the “new” versions that was made 20 years ago instead of 40 years ago that annoys you b/c the voices aren’t right…I know, I digress)…anyway, Jack now asks for The Great Pumpkin at least once or twice a day. And, let’s face it, it is very difficult to deny this adorable kid much but especially when he bobs his head and skips around the room saying “I watch Charlie Brown Mommy!” I’m pretty sure there are worse things.

So we now know every word to the show and the order of the commercials that we fast forward through. I am hoping now that we have the DVR episode of the Thanksgiving episode and the Christmas show on DVD that we can expand beyond the Great Pumpkin, at least a few times a week. On the practical side and with full awareness that it will earn me no “Mother of the Year” awards, that Charlie Brown is very effective in helping me get dinner on the table and the laundry switched over – so there you go.


Halloween –

Well, once again Halloween was a big hit – only this time it actually clicked for him and we didn’t have to feel so much like we were exploiting him for candy. I think 2 is really the perfect age for Halloween b/c our little zebra was so adorable that most people wanted to give him extra candy and he was really into it once he caught on and loved saying “Trick or Treat” and getting the candy, but then that’s where it ended for him. There was no realization beyond that night that he had a bucket full in the pantry, which as you can imagine naturally equates to a bucket full of candy for Mom and Dad – Score! Don’t judge us, we gave him the stuff we don’t like – just kidding, we ate that too! Well, it’s for his own good.


When we first started, we were of course at the close neighbors’ houses so he knew them and he had no hesitation going up to the door and was proud to say “Trick or Treat” – as he came from our first neighbors’ house with two suckers in his hand he could not understand why I wanted him to put them in his bucket (perhaps he was on to our scheme mentioned above – hmm), and then when I wanted him to go to a house he wasn’t familiar with, he wasn’t so interested, until of course we did and the result was 2 more pieces of candy. This was Jack’s Ah Ha! moment. From there, he proudly marched from door to door which is not that easy in our neighborhoods of long driveways, and used his best “Trick or Treat/Thank You” combo. And just to be friendly, he began to invite himself in to everyone’s house – “I want to go in” he’d say after they gave him his candy. We actually had a few folks that would have been fine with a visitor, but we kept him on track and he continued on for the entire 2 hours of trick or treat. I finally had to give up to come home and get dinner ready so Uncle Doug joined him and Daddy for the rest of the way and finally convinced him to get in the wagon so they could speed up the process a little. Our little zebra definitely had a good time!