Not the most spectacular Halloween

It has just been a day. Michael has been up for several hours a night since last week and trying to sleep with us which is not working at all - John sleeps with a lot of pillows and I'm at that lovely stage in pregnancy where I just can't get comfortable enough to get into the deep sleep I really need. Needless to say, sleep-deprived mama and child are not the best of mixes. If the disturbances in Michael's sleep are still happening by the weekend, we'll be going back to the air mattress in his room again.

We had Michael's "pyjama party" this morning at his preschool - I'm not sure if it's a school policy or a teacher policy that Halloween was not mentioned, but I'm going to find out. The party was a complete disaster from my point of view. The parents arrived at 10am and I figured we were going to go right into the food after the kids played and showed us stuff and what not. No, we did not sit down to eat until after noon - eighteen kids and close to two dozen parents in the classroom. I hit sensory (and heat) overload after just thirty minutes. Michael had a steady stream of small meltdowns and by the time we did get to eat, he wasn't the only crying kid there. We ended up leaving at one so we could catch the direct bus home - after he had downed several Hi-C drink boxes and received two goody bags from classmates (who in their right mind puts pixie sticks in a goody bag for a 3/4 year-old?).

I am definitely going to have a talk with someone about this. I can't speak for other parents, but my kid can't cope with that much sensory input - a class visit would have been nice, all of us crammed in there for two and a half hours before eating was way too much. The food was fine, but I would like to see beverages limited to 100% juice. I am not the most uptight person when it comes to nutrition and firmly believe in the "everything in moderation" rule, but over stimulated three year-old and free access to red-dyed sugar water drink boxes do not a good mix make - trust me when I say that taking them away or finding a way to restrict access to them would not have been pretty. It's going to take days for him to get this out of his system. My mom, who was a preschool/daycare teacher herself for a good 10 years, feels that this was a failing of the teacher, much firmer guidelines need to be in place. I guess my position as classroom representative may come in handy after all.

Since the remainder of the afternoon and evening has been spent in various stages of melt-down or hyperactivity, trick-or-treating is pretty much out of the question. We got his costume on him (flannel, overalls and an engineer's cap) and he wanted it off immediately. We asked him several times if he wanted to go out and each time were told no. It's really for the best - God knows the last thing he needs is more candy. John and I are a bit disappointed, but neither of us can cope with much more at this point. The thing that really sucks about today is I didn't have the energy to make John's pumpkin cake with cream-cheese frosting for his birthday. Ah well, something to look forward to on Friday since I'm sure tomorrow will be spent in recovery.

Sorry to my friends out there - I just don't have the energy to call and bitch about this in person right now. I'll try and talk to you all in the next few days when I'm not quite so exhausted and raw.

Happy Halloween All!