Ep 25 Halloween Episode

This week, they discuss their approaches to Halloween traditions, from costume planning to navigating trick-or-treating with neurodivergent children. Learn about the unique ways they create a fun, inclusive, and stress-free Halloween experience for their families. Whether you're dealing with young kids, teens, or navigating midlife changes, this episode offers heartfelt advice, plenty of laughs, and fresh perspectives on managing the seasonal chaos. Don't forget to check out the Vault for additional resources and tools!

00:00 Welcome to Motherhood and the Messy Middle

01:02 Cozy Conversations and Heated Blankets

04:26 Halloween Traditions and Neurodivergence

09:33 Trick-or-Treating and Safety Concerns

15:43 Navigating Health Challenges and Candy

17:43 Managing Sugar and Dye Sensitivities

18:42 The Switch Witch Tradition

20:53 Inclusive Halloween Celebrations

23:07 Creating Halloween Routines

24:46 Halloween Costumes and Themes

29:17 Teenagers and Halloween

31:04 Halloween Joy and Grace

32:59 Conclusion and Podcast Information

Connect with me on Instagram: @heygirl.itsnicole
And explore more resources for estranged moms at nicolecoates.com.

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This podcast is created for moms walking through estrangement — a place to be understood, encouraged, and reminded you’re not alone.

Transcript

Speaker: 0:00

Welcome to Motherhood and the Messy Middle where grade school meets grown kids, hot flashes, meets holy fire, and no topic is too messy for this village. I'm Robin.

Speaker 2: 0:11

I'm Nicole, and we're two moms who slid into each other's dms, built a deep friendship without ever meeting in person, and now we're creating a virtual village where we're inviting you in. This is season two and we're continuing our mission of normalizing the messy middle through real connecting conversations between two friends who are living it right alongside you.

Speaker: 0:30

We'll be experimenting this season with themed miniseries on topics like estrangement, difficult conversations, holidays and personal growth, always with honesty, hope, and maybe even a little laughter. Because we know that motherhood and midlife, it can stretch you spiritually, emotionally, hormonally, sometimes all before breakfast.

Speaker 2: 0:52

So whether you're raising littles, navigating midlife, or just tired of pretending that you're fine, this space is for you. So let's dive in.

robin: 1:02

Well, Nicole, it's that time of year where we are getting our cozy on.

nicole: 1:07

I'm under a heated blanket as you say that.

robin: 1:09

Oh my gosh. I am, hold on, we gotta pause. I gotta go get my, I don't have a heated blanket, so I You don't, no, I don't. In

nicole: 1:18

Minnesota.

robin: 1:19

I know, I know. Because

nicole: 1:20

it gets very cold there. Right? It get,

robin: 1:21

it gets very cold here. Yes. Yes, it,

nicole: 1:24

the temperatures dropped here in Idaho. This week, and it's been much colder. And my mother-in-law was here visiting and she's very small and petite and you know, she's tiny and it's cold. And so I went and got a heated blanket. Okay. Can I tell you what I, what happened to my last heated blanket? You want, you wanna just really put all our dirty laundry out there?

robin: 1:43

Yeah, do it.

nicole: 1:44

Okay. The la. So Embarra, you're the one that wants to say it, you know? I know. Because this is just how I live. This is just how you know. It's all out there. Okay. So the last heated blanket we had was just like a throw, and one of my kids was sick and he got sick on the blanket.

robin: 2:02

Oh my gosh. Which

nicole: 2:03

I appreciated because I'd have to clean up the floor, but it wasn't in the middle of winter and it wasn't in the middle of the night. So I just put it outside because. It was in the middle of the night and I was like, I'll clean it up. And then we, we were like sick for a while and then I think we like all rotated being sick and it got moved and I forgot that the blanket with the vomit was outside and it was frozen because it was in the middle of winter. And so when I went to get it, it was like all frozen solid and like stuck together. And I was like, I'm not. I'm not dealing with, I just, I'm throwing Well, and it's electrical

robin: 2:33

like Yeah, it's very, it's, there's, there's nothing about that that, um, you know, I'm an environmentalist and try to salvage things whenever I can. And there are certain things you gotta, you know, align your energy. And that one, I'm glad you purchased. No, not worth it. I'm glad you purchased a new book and

nicole: 2:49

every time we would've gotten underneath it, we would've thought. This was frozen with frozen vomit. Yeah.

robin: 2:56

You know, since you're airing your laundry, I'm gonna make a confession here. The, um, the, one of the reasons truly that I don't have a heated blanket is because I had a problem as a teenager, um, into now my forties, um, with leaving curling irons on. Oh, and when I was a teenager, I actually, I had this like egg crate foam on my mattress and I left a curling iron on, on my bed, like did not burn the house down. Literally like. Praise everything and, but there's significant, uh, backlash of, you know, being concerned about electricity and like burning things. Yeah. Yeah. And now I'm in such a great spot because not only do I have a curling iron that automatically shuts off after 60 minutes, I also got one of those silicone holders sleeve for it. Yeah. So I have a system because you know how much I like systems. Yeah. Mm-hmm. I'm science, soul, and systems over here. Mm-hmm. And I. Unplug it immediately while it's still piping hot, put it in the sleeve and put it away. And it's, we've had to turn around from like driving away from the house because I've had such, such anxiety about leaving it on, oh, I did that. And so there's some of that with the heated blanket. That makes me a little weird too, so. Mm-hmm. Yeah, we'll just, we'll work on things slowly. I have, I have two cats, so they help when they wanna. Cuddle on the lap.

nicole: 4:23

That's true. Yeah, that's true. They keep you nice and warm.

robin: 4:26

Well, speaking of the coziness of the season and even the cats, right? Like they're, my cats are not black, by the way, but it is officially Halloween for this episode, um, coming up, and we wanted to really look at. The holidays. Mm-hmm. And so we're dropping in right now, gonna talk about Halloween, then we're gonna get into some other episodes, um, around some courageous conversations mm-hmm. On some very messy topics. And then back into the holidays when we're in the full swing of the, the mess and delight that is Thanksgiving and Christmas and, uh, new Year's. But right now with Halloween coming up, you know, both of us. Are neurodivergent and it have children that have neurodivergence. So I wanted to just shed some light on what, what it looks like as we've been navigating Halloween over the years, as well as, um. You know how magical things can be, but also overwhelming because every time that I have that conversation with people, they're like, oh, just almost like a sigh of relief because so much of our culture is making things seem like. Everything is picture perfect and we have these little, these beautiful costumes and little gift bags and we're doing all of the things and that's just 1% of what we're seeing. So,

nicole: 5:53

well, you know, a couple episodes ago I was talking about this pretty picture perfect white picket fence and how I have no white picket fence. It's been trampled, it's been run over, and it's just chaos. So. And it has a

robin: 6:05

frozen puke electric.

nicole: 6:07

Yes. No picture perked victory here. It's all a hot mess all the time. Oh my gosh. Um, I, I think the last time I did like match, like cute matching it, they was really cute when they were little. We all the, all four of the kids were Ghostbusters. Oh my gosh. It was super cute and that they were super, super little. Like, I think our oldest was probably 12. It was probably 10 years ago. Like they were super, super little.

robin: 6:34

Now did you and your husband also No. Do you dress up? Okay.

nicole: 6:39

No. Well, so Mark being in the cooking industry, most h most Halloweens, he was working when they were little. Mm-hmm. So it's only been in the more recent years that he's even been home for Halloween. And so, no, I, ne and I per, I just never really had a desire to dress up.

robin: 6:56

Okay, so let's even rewind more. How do you feel about Halloween? I'm, I don't, I Do you mean like from my religious perspective? I mean both and, um, you know, I. Had told you that as a teenager, one of the greatest ways that I connected with my parents was watching the television show, Buffy the Vampire Slayer,

nicole: 7:20

Uhhuh.

robin: 7:21

And recently I discovered as an Amazon Prime member that there's a whole TV

nicole: 7:26

mm-hmm.

robin: 7:26

Station, there's like multiple that you can watch just nonstop all these old shows and buffy's on there. And I do not feel that it holds up in the same way that it, and I'm watching and I'm like, I can't believe I watched some of these things. But you had shared with me that you were not allowed to watch that. Totally. Um, and ironically, I, um, just attended an online, uh, service this Sunday with someone who I follow that um, we did, it was a prayer service and, um, education around Mother Mary. Mm-hmm. And he was sharing how he grew up in a Presbyterian church and that when he was a teenager, his, I can't remember if it was a pastor or what. What, what they're called, but he literally said, you can either choose the church or Buffy the Vampire Slayer. And I laughed out loud when I heard that because I was not going through that same experience. I mean, I was at a Catholic high school, but I wasn't necessarily sharing all my media with, you know, my, like the nuns and everyone else. Um, and my parents were self-proclaimed atheists. So yeah, it was a very different scenario for, for my family. So. Yeah. What's, what is Halloween like for you personally, but I mean personally is interrelated with your faith and how you grew up. So can you talk about that a little bit?

nicole: 8:46

Yeah, so growing up, we did not do a traditional, um, Halloween. Um, yeah, there was, that was my parents' conviction. And so we did, like, we went to the churches, we did the trunk retreats, and we did things at the church, um, and that, and we did it sometimes like not on Halloween. But we always did. I remember giving out candy too. So we, we didn't like shut everything down.

robin: 9:09

Were you dressing up?

nicole: 9:11

We, when we did the trunk or treats. Yeah. Yeah.

robin: 9:13

Okay.

nicole: 9:13

But we couldn't do anything. There was like limits, like we couldn't, you couldn't do anything scary. You couldn't do anything pro provocative. Mm-hmm. Like, there were certain boundaries. Um, but yeah, we, I remember doing it at churches mostly, or I was homeschooled and so the homeschool groups would do. Bonfires or they would do funny things. So

robin: 9:33

when you were growing up and even where you live now, is Halloween on like trick or treating? Is it at nighttime on Halloween? Evening, yeah.

nicole: 9:43

Mm-hmm. What about you? Okay,

robin: 9:44

so this is gonna be mind blowing to you. So I live, it's gonna be better. I'm ready. No, it's not better. Um, not necessarily. It's just different. But I live in Minnesota and when I moved here I was like, why is everyone trick or treating at night and why is it on Halloween? Because I grew up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. And in Milwaukee where, where I grew up, this is not the case for the entire state of Wisconsin, and it's not even the case for like the neighboring suburbs, but I only knew what I knew where I was,

nicole: 10:17

right?

robin: 10:18

We trick or treated on the Sunday. It was, I believe, always before Halloween. Okay. In the afternoon in broad daylight. Oh,

nicole: 10:28

and when. Okay. That's kind of different.

robin: 10:30

Yeah. That's the response I get from everybody. I feel like,

nicole: 10:33

I feel like it should be like Friday nights, like the, the every week of Halloween be on Friday night. Should be like parent is raising four and saying yes, yes, yes to you. We all agree. And the poor teachers, they go to school the next day and it's outta control and outta control. So bad.

robin: 10:47

Yes. As a former public school

nicole: 10:49

teacher, yes,

robin: 10:50

I agree. I'm

nicole: 10:51

ringing hundred percent my kids in like, okay, we, you have to be home. Especially now that like I have teenagers. Their friends are throwing parties and things, and I want them to go, but also you have school the next day.

robin: 11:01

Mm-hmm. Well, this, this Halloween's on a Friday, so let's let it loose. It'll be

nicole: 11:06

party it up,

robin: 11:07

party it up. But un the unfortunate piece of why I grew up with that is, um, I don't know the exact. The exact stats or date on this, but at some point, so I was born in 1982, and so my memories are, you know, from the eighties and nineties and at some point in the late seventies, I believe that there was actually a child abduction. And during H at Halloween. So that completely changed the culture, shifted everything. Yeah. Yes. And that is, you know, valid. Um, yeah. But I really like, I, so it was a culture shock to me coming into other locations and being like, what do you mean everybody is out at nighttime? How do we do this at night? So, um.

nicole: 11:53

I think it's interesting. Well, I think, I don't know, maybe I'm just,'cause it is, we live in Idaho, it's very safe, but no place is immune. Like there's everywhere. But I don't let my kids go without me. Like last Halloween, our neighbors were like, oh, we'll just let the kids go and we'll stay here. And I was like, oh, sorry, I can't do that. I have far too much anxiety, I just stay on the street. So for I, so my, I was raised not going trick or treating, but we let our kids trick or treat. Mm-hmm. And they dress up and there's very little restrictions on what they can dress up as. Um, but so we, I just stayed on the street though and just let them, but, and they can go to the end of the street and come back, but I cannot let them go yet. Mm-hmm. And that, to be fair, our teenager didn't go with us or our high schooler. So it was just our 12 and 11-year-old. But I still felt like so little, like they're still so little.

robin: 12:41

Well, and for. My neighborhood. I live in a suburb, you know, a newer development and it's just joyous. The like, you know, feral child energy that's everywhere. Mm-hmm. And it's still is dangerous with traffic. I mean it's dark and so even if you put like the bright, the lights on them and all of that, I too enjoy walking around and just. Quelling my anxiety with knowing that I'm there and that she's Uhhuh going door to door. I'm not. Yeah. It's so, you know, we all need to do whatever it is that works. Right. That best serves you for us.

nicole: 13:16

Yeah. Our last neighborhood was the most amazing neighborhood, and they had. Like stations, like a taco station, you get nachos and Oh, when we lived in Texas, girl in Texas. Oh, it's Texas.

robin: 13:31

Yeah.

nicole: 13:32

It was the most insane experience I've ever experienced in my entire life. And this one house had like full on bar, like we just gave them my cup and he just like was pouring the liquor and he's like, tell me when to stop. Okay. Like, and then sent us on our way. It was wild. But, so it is fun walking around with'em because Yeah, you can, like, there'll be a hot cocoa station or there'll be apple cider, and we have our own drinks too, but it's just, it feels like community ish. Mm-hmm.

robin: 14:00

Yeah. Yeah. We, we have some elements of that as well, which is always an interesting thing for me as a recovering alcoholic because, um.

nicole: 14:09

We're all walking around with drinks in our cups.

robin: 14:12

Yeah, you are. And then even like during, especially we had, um, our neighborhood had really been developing right before the pandemic hit. Mm-hmm. And then, mm-hmm. You know, when everything shut down, we were a new neighborhood and that's how we got to know everyone. And we had this mm-hmm. One, um, house that coordinated. We had food trucks every single week. That's for that whole summer of 2020. And we were doing like ladies nights, you know, with a fire in the driveway and all that. So like, we Nice. Uh, we have like, you know, I think it's like 90 homes in our development, but, um, we know like a ton of'em. Yeah. And it's, and so yeah, it's just all those things are interesting and what's, for me, what is really, um, perhaps I, I read more into it, but there's always, um. I'm comfortable with the fact that I'm a recovering alcoholic. Like mm-hmm. I don't, I don't need anybody to worry about me, but people worry about that. Like there's a, there's kind of a resistance almost sometimes, like, ugh, I don't know, Robin's coming, you know, and it's like, listen, I'm a great time and uh, if you need to have a drink or two in order to match my energy, whether it be on the dance floor or a conversational top like you do, you boo I'm over here and I'm gonna have a great time. But it is, uh, it's always just. You know, we all have our own things and have to create our own boundaries. And so that leads to the next part for me. I really wanna talk about the challenge that I have with candy. Okay. Yeah. Talk about candy. You know, my daughter, when she was born, we quickly realized that she had, um, a genetic disorder and everything's all. All good now, but we went through a lot of medical trauma. Yeah. Um, first getting her diagnosed and so she has a condition called Hemi hyperplasia and her legs are both different sizes like skeletally from length mm-hmm. And also girth. And she wears a lift in one of her shoes to help balance them out. And in the next several years, we get monitored, um, with Gillette Children's Hospital. Um, she will have surgery to clip some, uh, growth plates so that her legs will eventually balance out. But the biggest concern, she's 10 years old right now, was that um, she has an increased risk for abdominal tumors up until age eight. And so we had to do all of these blood tests and ultrasounds, and the very first scan that we had, there was a mass. That was unidentifiable. And we ended up in several different specialists that nobody should ever have to go through. Vascular specialists, oncologists. Um, but because of that, I had already begun my, my journey around health. Prior to having her, after years of infertility, I was really digging into food and the food industry and then, um, you know, as a holistic weight loss and wellness teacher and coach. Now I had been battling my weight and my body and I had been learning about sugar. And so then I have this baby. I had been. Breastfeeding her and now we're about to start feeding her food. We have this mass, we don't know what it is. I'm like, what are all of the factors that I can try to control? And the number one, one that I could control was her food and mm-hmm. The sugar that I started introducing her to or not. Mm-hmm. And that has still continued because even though she is out of that like scary time and we, you know. She enjoys a Sprite and a root beer when we go out to eat or sometimes in the house. And you know, she has sugar and all like, but it's, I still try to limit it, especially because her behavior gets off the chain when she sugar. Well, have you noticed, noticed that

nicole: 17:59

she, when not even the sugars, but the dyes, have you noticed a difference with the dyes? I have not noticed the difference with the dyes, but um, we noticed a difference with the red dye. All three of one. All of them, no. So we, we have, of the three boys, the 16, 13, and 12 two have been diagnosed on the spectrum. Our oldest and our youngest, and only our youngest is affected by, when our oldest was younger. I feel like he was, but he's, he's not now. But our youngest definitely, like, we don't get, there's no red Gatorade, there's no red anything. And so he, after th after Thanksgiving, after Halloween, when we come home, they'll, he'll trade his brothers. Mm-hmm.

robin: 18:40

Oh, that's nice. Yeah. What we've been doing is, um. I don't even remember how I learned about this, but we do something called the Switch Witch.

nicole: 18:49

Switch Witch, yeah. My best friend does that. Mm-hmm. So

robin: 18:52

I get a, a gift usually from the fun aisle in Aldi and I hide it somewhere, and then we count up all the candy and do all of that. And then we give her some arbitrary amount that she gets to keep and the rest of it is donated. We've actually had like. The PTO at our school has done donations before. Mm-hmm. But we'll try to find places to take it and, um, I'll, you know, at night take that and then the switch witch, spoiler alert, I'm, I'm the switch witch, um, Uhhuh and the um, then she gets some form of a gift instead and it's usually I like to do a craft or one year, I think it was like bongos or something. I don't know what it was. That's cute.

nicole: 19:34

I think last year we ended up doing some, we just offered the boys money. Yeah. I'm like, you want some cash? Because they got so much candy, it was like gallon bags full and it was just ridiculous.

robin: 19:47

Yeah. And it's more of a problem, like I'm all of a sudden, you know, in a closed door of the pantry, like in the middle of eating the candies. Yeah.

nicole: 19:53

And then it's like my husband and I are looking at each other like, we just ate all of that candy. That's disgusting.

robin: 19:58

Well, and I, you don't feel good. Right. And it's, and that's even why, um, leading into the holiday season, you know, I'm working really closely with, uh, a couple clients, one-on-one, on what are the strategies to ditch the diet and hustle culture. So that means like we enjoy, one of the areas of hunger is social hunger, cultural, like we're not gonna not participate. Or not even not have that piece of candy that brings back nostalgia or just that you enjoy the taste of like Right. But what's a way to do it intentionally? That is right. Mindfully nourishing your entire body. Mm-hmm. Not just in the moment'cause it's those mindless pieces, but, right. So the Switch witch is something that I, we still do and I share with so many of my friends and they really value that, um, because it. It's just through our stories and the things that we do, that's how we learn about even different options that we can have.

nicole: 20:53

Well, and you say, and that makes me think of when we started the episode, you were talking about Neurodivergency. Yeah. So do you in your area. So for us, my best friend and I used to take our two little boys. They're close in age. The, there's a couple of churches that do a trunk or treat, but they do it like they have it staggered. So the earlier hour is for special needs kids only. So we've done that and that's every time we do it. And. I was always so impressed by like, because it's slower, it's less people. There's the kids don't feel the pressure to rush. Like they can just look at the thing because we could be standing there for quite a while picking out one piece, singular piece of candy, or they're not saying, they don't wanna say thank you. They're not saying trick or treat. They're not. Answering the questions that you've asked them, but that, so it takes like this pressure and then they feel accomplished and they're not overstimulated from going out at night past their bed. Because that's the other thing of with neuro divergencies is the routine.

robin: 21:50

Yep.

nicole: 21:51

Halloween totally throws every holiday, throws out everything, the routine, which then sends them spiraling, and then they're overstimulated, and then you add in the sugar and we're all a hot mess. And so I really value the churches that see, uh, for me it's, I've only even seen churches do it. I don't know if other organizations do, but I really value when they do that.

robin: 22:09

Yeah, I mean. That is, it's just so important that we have multiple options for people to be able to experience whatever it might be, whether it's a concert or, you know. Mm-hmm. I've been seeing a lot with like touring Broadway musicals where they have like a sensory. You know, experience for, um, people with Neurodivergence and that need, like, the quieter even, it's just like knowing that there's a safe space where other people that have the headphones on or whatever it might be, are there. Yeah. Um, we have not done that with our daughter. Uh, and we've paid the price. You know, because the, the nighttime and the craziness, I'm just anticipating that, um, you know, I'm grateful that Halloween is on a Friday this year, and I'm anticipating that the next day is going to just be. Trying to get back to being regulated. Um, there are some pieces that I've created, some routines. So for example, I, we have dinner before we go trick or shoot

nicole: 23:16

every time. And I always get pizza because I don't want it to be a fight. Yep. Like I want them to Same. I get the Papa Murphy's little pumpkin pizza thing.'cause I, I need you to eat, I need you to eat a lot. And because we're not mm-hmm. A hundred percent.

robin: 23:27

And you know, with that, even though it might be breaking the routine from like the normal school weekday routine, we're still creating routines within holidays. And so there's mm-hmm. You know what to expect. Right. And um, last year one of my daughter's friends came, um, and that was really, really wonderful. And so that's happening again this year. We've invited her to come. Nice. Because. We have this really wonderful neighborhood of incredible people, and yet the exact same age as my daughter. There are not any other girls, all boys that she's connected with. All boys. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, you know, my daughter is the, I don't wanna say something that's incorrect, but I really do think she's the only only child. In our like whole neighborhood. Mm-hmm. Um, and being an only child is very challenging. Yeah.'cause we don't have other, you know, you don't have another kid that it's, well, we can just go out as a family and then you have so, um. It's actually really dysregulating for me, that social aspect of, well, who should I call to make sure that we're like going trick or treating with them and is it gonna be, you know, and we've taken that factor out by knowing Okay, her, one of her besties is coming. Mm-hmm. Um, we are all, so I do, I do dress up. I like. I was love coordinating. I was gonna wrap this

nicole: 24:52

up without hearing about what you're,'cause you have a whole thing. First of all, I would like everyone to know that she was already talking about Halloween costumes, I feel like months ago.

robin: 25:01

Oh, Nicole, because you had to talk. You we're

nicole: 25:03

gonna do one and then you switched. It was her birthday. Her birthday. Here's what happened.

robin: 25:08

Wicked came out last year, right? And literally at Wicked First I had to go and see Wicked. And so this is an example of like how my daughter's Neurodivergence comes up and I support it. Okay. Let me just also say I love musical. Like I am a musical. That's what I am. Like that's what I hear in my head. That's how I've always been. That's how I've like navigated so much of my life and world. I love Broadway musicals and Disney and all of the things. And, um. My, my, my Spawn is very similar to me, and yet she also gets really over, uh, stimulated with media and not knowing how something's going to end or, and like love scenes and scary things and all of that. So I went and saw Wicked. My mind was blown and I knew that Rowan, um, would absolutely love seeing it. But she needed to know what happened. So I actually worked with chat GPT to get an outline of Wicked. And so I ran through that whole thing with her so that she understood what was gonna happen when the scary monkeys were gonna come and all of this. And then after we had watched it, I, she was just in love. We ended up seeing it three more times together in the theater and. I said, oh, do you wanna do her birthday's in July? I said, wouldn't it be awesome to do a wicked themed birthday party? And then we could be dressed like wicked for Halloween and then we'd have those costumes ready for Wicked too.'cause see, I'm not only planning for the future, right? I am a girl on a budget. Okay? Right. And I'm trying to reduce my mental load, but none of that has happened. Um, her, we ended up, you. Introduced us. Sorry, us to survivor. Yeah. Yeah. And so that was what her themed birthday was, which was so great. It was great. And, and thank you for that. We've really been enjoying, um, it's amazing continuing to Yeah. And connect over Survivor and then, you know, the K-pop demon hunters has come right,

nicole: 27:09

right. And

robin: 27:10

taken over.

nicole: 27:11

Yes.

robin: 27:11

Everything. So my, I'll say

nicole: 27:13

I, I finally saw a preview of that last night and I was like, oh, that does look kind of cute. The offense on Robin's face right now that I thought it was only kind of cute.

robin: 27:24

Kind of cute. Okay. You know your own Well, to be fair, I only saw a three second clip. And to be fair, I could not watch it when it first was on because I just am like, Ugh, what is this? This like anime blah, you know? And I get like that. It was because of hearing the music. It was because I was like the, there's all these reels and tiktoks out there of the dad that like walks by and has like a, you know, stinky facey on his face. Yeah. And then the next time he's like sitting there with popcorn watching it with his daughters. And then the third one, he's like in full costume. Yeah. That's me. Okay. And so, um, my daughter is not only an only child, she's an only grandchild. And my, uh, sister-in-law's only niece, and I love my sister-in-law. If you think I'm a good time, watch out when the two of us get together. We are so much fun. And so, yeah, we are the K-pop demon hunters. My daughter is Rumi, the main character. Okay. And then I am, I think my name is. Mira the like long redheaded one. And then my sister-in-law is Zoe. Um, my daughter's friend is the like derby cat. There's like a cat and then my husband is gonna be like the manager Bobby. And it's a whole thing. We're doing a whole thing. I love this. This is amazing. I found another like neighbor friend who has sons that um, go to my daughter's school. I think they're going as the saga boys because it's a Friday night. I told her like. If you do for real, do the saga boy like they, or whatever they're called. I think I got'em wrong. Sa sja. They always, the kids get very mad at me because I don't, I'm really into it, but I don't have any of the right words for any of these things. Well, just so you know, you're

nicole: 29:02

go, it's, you're on track with me'cause I've never seen it, so I You're, I've got you.

robin: 29:07

My whole point is we go, we go in, we go in. Yeah. And uh mm-hmm. It's a great time.

nicole: 29:14

That's awesome. I love it. It's a great

robin: 29:15

time. But everybody needs to do their own thing. And what I, I just really feel firm about is, you know, I don't care how old or big someone is, a hundred percent. Like a hundred percent, they're, they're here asking for candy instead of like smoking a joint or doing shots in a cemetery, which are things I did in high school. You know, like, come on, I'm just gonna take

nicole: 29:35

a big sign and everywhere I go, and if anybody says anything rude. I'm just gonna hold up the sign'cause I'm, I'm with you. I a hundred percent dress up all you want. I don't care. Like, let's go door to door. I, it's so frustrating to me. People who get, give teenagers a hard time.

robin: 29:51

Well, and I'm going to also like say this, I get very frustrated at Halloween because our like neighborhood Facebook group, all of a sudden a bunch of people are posting their like ring camera doorbells because they went out and left like a bucket of candy and they're like, who's this kid that came and got all of our candy? It's like, don't leave a

nicole: 30:12

bucket.

robin: 30:13

Don't

nicole: 30:13

the bucket or like

robin: 30:14

they're

nicole: 30:15

teenagers, like what do you expect? Yeah. They're supposed to be adjust your expectations and, and

robin: 30:21

they're sup Like they literally are supposed to be bucking the system. They're supposed to be challenging those things and they, there cannot be a safer way than coming on Halloween night and taking candy, like they're not taking candy from a baby like these other babies that are around. Trust me, they're getting plenty of candy. Like Right. It's, it's good. None of those teenagers take the Play-Doh that I leave on. I, so we do, we do do candy, but we, I'm, I'm really big into, um, multiple options, especially for allergies and there's the whole Yeah. You know, turquoise pumpkin thing and Oh, yeah. Yeah. Um, yeah. It's, it's just, it's a fun time and I want to always lean into joy. And releasing judgment. Mm-hmm. And I just wish that we all could do a little bit more of that in. Not just the holidays in our day to day, remembering that what we see on a Pinterest page or a social media feed is just a snapshot. We don't know what's behind the scenes. And if you see, that includes when you see someone, whether it's a big, huge teenager that's barely dressed up, or it's, you know, a mom with a kid who is not saying quote unquote, the right words of. Trick or treat, or thank you or whatever it is, like let's just let people have some grace and space. Especially right now, the world is happy enough, like let's just lighten up and enjoy the joy.

nicole: 32:02

Yes, I a hundred percent agree. And what a better time to do that than on Halloween when we're giving away candy.

robin: 32:09

Yes. And I or

nicole: 32:11

Play-Doh.

robin: 32:11

Or Play-Doh, and I have to say, these blow up costumes are like. The light in my world right now. Like we've, we had these giant alien teenagers walking down the street last year and I was crying, I was laughing so hard. Whoever came up with these blow up costumes, these T Rexes, they're great and everything else.

nicole: 32:32

The one that the alien like has a hold of, is it, oh, that's so got a hold of like a little boy. Yes. Yeah. It's so good. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

robin: 32:40

It's so good. Yeah. It's so good. All right, well, we're gonna survive. Whatever happens, especially'cause this year sigh of relief. The next day is Saturday. It's Saturday. Woohoo. And we don't have to worry about school and all the other stuff. The teachers are

nicole: 32:55

so happy.

robin: 32:56

Yes. All right. Well, we will be back next week with a little shift in our focus. Um, and

nicole: 33:08

thanks for hanging out with

robin: 33:09

us. Yeah.

nicole: 33:11

Yeah.

robin: 33:11

Happy, happy Halloween or not happy

nicole: 33:12

Halloween. Yeah. Yeah. Or. Movie night. Whatever you do, whatever you

robin: 33:16

do, turn

nicole: 33:17

off your lights, trunk or treat. Trick or treat, you do you going to bed early. All love.

robin: 33:23

All love. All right, bye Nicole. Bye.

Speaker 3: 33:26

Hey, before you go, this podcast is made possible by our soul led solopreneur businesses, nicole coates.com, where Nicole's helping moms navigate the pain of distance or estrangement. And robin's well nest where soul meets science meets systems to live, lead, and learn. Well support us there because it supports the conversations that we're having here. And if you love this episode, please subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a review because that also helps our village grow. Now we also have the vault for you. You download the vault, which is our growing library of resources, reflection tools, and extras in the show notes, as well as at motherhood in the messy middle.com. Until next time, remember, you're never alone in the messy middle.