Monster Hunting

I love fall. Everything about it really. I love the cooler weather, the lack of mosquitoes, the leaves changing color, the excitement of soooo many holidays around the corner (including my birthday!). I love my change in wardrobe (when I'm not pregnant that is...). I love pulling out my beautiful boots. I love not getting an air conditioning bill. The list could go on, really, but I'll get to my point.

Which is this. Halloween. And Jace. I never knew it was possible to love a holiday so much at such a young age. I should have known before Halloween even got here. I had inklings of my 2 year olds passion before it became a full blown obsession. I just ignored it. The love bordering on unhealthy obsession of Scooby Doo. (Scooby Doo was one of his first words by the way but it sounded more like ooby dooby dooo.) The fact that if Jace was around and the TV was on it could only be Scooby.

The first time I took him down the Halloween aisle I tried to shield his eyes from the scary masks. He threw my hands aside and wanted to try the masks on. I was shocked. You should have seen the look of delight on his face when I showed up dressed like a witch -wig and all. He loves it. The spookier the better.

Which brings me to my next point. Pa (my dad) also likes Halloween. Or, I should say, likes to pretend to be a monster even if it's not Halloween and enjoys scaring my children and then sending them back home so mom (me) can deal with the aftereffects. Let's put it this way - Jace is convinced that a monster lives in my parents overly large window well.

Why?

Because one day while Jace was checking it out, Pa ran back inside, downstairs, opened the window and let out creepy monster growls.

Then he ran back upstairs and asked Jace if the monster that lived in the window well was awake.

Yes, Pa. The monster is awake. And now so will my son be. All night. Because he's having monster nightmares.

How do I know he's having nightmares? Because he wakes up crying and the only comprehensive thing he gets out is "Monster (sob) scaaawy." Luckily, he just needs his mommy and he's able to go right back to sleep.

The thing about it is Jace can't get it out of his mind (hence the nightmares). He has a weird kind of infatuation with it. When we go to Pa's house that's all he can talk about. Finding the monster. He goes looking for it. He thinks it's fun. He laughs and giggles about it. It's like a hobby of sorts.

Unfortunately it's beginning to take over his life. He now has a monster "living" in his bedroom. He can't go in there by himself anymore - during the day and especially not at night. At least once a day he pretends he's hunting for monsters. I can't distract him. It's enjoyable for him. For the last 2 weeks before Halloween we had to drive out of our way to see the "spookies" at two different houses in our neighborhoood twice a day just so Jace could ooooh and ahhhh over it. He could point out the route from his car seat....."turn mom, turn." Like I said - obsessed.

It's been a week now and Jace still asks to go see the spookies. I tell him Halloween is over and the spookies are gone.

He's still talking about monsters too- I let him know Pa is just pretending to be the monster. He says " I know mom. I know." And then he goes to find Pa so they can go find the monster together. All I can say is at least he slept all night without nightmares!