This is Halloween

A couple of the grad student Fellows here organized a Halloween event at the Academy, which was truly an epic event. I was drafted (willingly!) to be on the decorating committee, but also found myself on the unofficial buying-stuff, including candy, committee. It's not easy to Buy Stuff in Italy, which I should really explain at length in another post. But to be brief: there's no Michael's for crafts or Jo-Ann's for fabric or Home Depot for random building materials. Oh, no - you really have to hit the pavement, walk everywhere, and/or scrounge.

Anyway.

It was really a labor of love, and I think that I can speak for everyone when I say that the party was a rousing success. I helped decorate the courtyard and the main party room - and some of the people I was working with were incredibly talented. Betsy spray-painted a bunch of sticks black and hung them so that they were suspended over the bar. Jackie painted a wonderful pumpkin patch and gravestone area - and there were so many more great touches. I felt really proud of how things looked.

Indigo especially loved the "pumpkin patch" on the wall, and tried to pet the kitties. I guess she thought they were real. ;)

The first part of the party was geared for the kids It was very sweet: it started with a treat-bag-decorating activity, then the kids were invited to trick-or-treat inside the main Academy Building. After trick-or-treating was done, there was a pizza party, then time for the kids to either run around or have their own little dance party in the party room.

After the kids' party was the adults' party, and I think over 275 people showed up, from all the other Academies in town. I didn't attend, since I was tired and home with Indigo, but it sounded like a good time.

Indigo seemed to enjoy her Halloween. She tolerated her outfit (but just barely - I was fortunate to get a few snapshots of her with her witch hat on before she tore it off and never put it back on). She loved running around with the other kids before festivities started, and seemed to have fun decorating her trick-or-treat bag. Sadly, though, she didn't actually do any trick-or-treating. I'm not sure if it was because she was hungry, or tired, or just overwhelmed by the entire event, but she just couldn't deal with the crush of kids piling into the building to go door to door to ask for candy. I think it was confusing to her, and probably too chaotic. So we went back outside, waited for pizza, and watched it get dark. Indigo is, incidentally, fascinated with the dark, and gets so excited when she spots the moon. When she sees it, she'll point, and run towards it saying, "Come here, moon!" Adorable.

Too bad about the trick-or-treating, but I think she had a blast anyway, and probably doesn't know what she missed. And I wouldn't have wanted her to eat candy anyway, so maybe it was all a big win. ;)  Here's one last shot, of our little family.

Happy Halloween!