Cinder-belle-a and friends

So...we had a a couple major dillemas this year in figuring out Halloween costumes (well, major to a 4 year old anyway). I asked Lillian a couple weeks ago what she wanted to be for Halloween. She said, "princess!" (shocking, I know....) So I said how great it would be for her to wear her new princess dress she got for her birthday from Grandma Carla and Beso! And she looked at me and said, "MOM! That dress is NOT a costume!" Apparantly that's a *real* princess dress, and not suitable for Halloween.

First dillema: find a princess costume that's actually a costume.

We went downstairs to our costume container thing which is practically overflowing with sparkly pieces of a variety of princess costumes. She finds the top to a Cinderella costume and thinks it's perfect. Judy loves Cinderella, so of course Cinderella is the winning princess this year. However, the Cinderella costume doesn't have a bottom. And princesses DON'T have non-matching parts of thier dresses. So she settles for Belle. Now, the Belle costume does actually have two parts-a top and a bottom. But chances are, if you've seen my child at home within the last year, you have seen the Belle skirt. It was worn about 5 out of 7 days a week for probably 9 months. It's nasty, it's stained, and it's way too stretched out to wear while walking from house to house for trick-or-treating. So I tell her we might need to think of something else.

So a few days pass by and I asked again if she was going to wear her new dress. And this time it was "Of COURSE I am!" But don't go thinking we have this all figured out yet.

Second dillema: if she wears her new princess dress, should she be Cinderella (because Judy tells her she looks like Cinderella in that dress) or should she be Belle (because it acutally looks kinda like Belle's beautiful dress in the movie. not the cute one. the cute one is red. the beautiful one is yellow.)?

So I come up with my most convincing, excited-to-tell-you-something face and say, "LILLIAN! I know! You could be both! And we'll call you 'Cinder-belle-a!'" AND SHE BOUGHT IT! I thought I was done with the oh-so-serious drama of princess-choosing, but only for a day. :) Turns out she decided on her own that she was going to be Belle. I can only imagine her laying awake in her bed during naptime weighing the pros and cons for each princess. And in the end, Belle won. And she was a beautiful Belle.

It was a dream come true for Lillian. I even allowed her to wear make up (she begs every day, and every day I say no) and sparkles. She felt beautiful. And I loved it. I watched her prance around in her fancy dress with her hair all done, and you could see that she FELT beautiful. And I know that all too soon she be at the stage in her life where she'll never be beautiful enough. So even though I had to explain that not EVERY person has to comment on how beautiful she looks (Mom, that man didn't even say I look beautiful!), I didn't want her to forget this moment. That she really is beautiful. No matter what she'll tell herself in the years to come.

Belle was accompanied by Thomas the Train. What can I say...when there's no truck costume out there, you go for the next best thing...a choo choo. We are HUGE fans of the Thomas Wooden Railroad (Steve and I included) and Josiah thought it was pretty cool to wear that conductors hat around all day. He LOVED trick-or-treating this year, and has already been found a few times hiding under the table with a secret stash. :)

And Miss Brielle started the day as a pumpkin, and ended as...what else...a sweet pea. because she is. :)

Hope your Halloween was as 'sweet' as ours.