Halloween used to be in my top three holidays (behind Christmas and my birthday). I loved dressing up! But sometime since college I’ve lost my excitement. I finally have an idea of why my mother always seemed less than enthusiastic. Between the energy expended to dress the kids, my expanded post-baby body self consciousness, and the lack of widely available, modest, flattering, affordable women’s costumes, I’m about ready to put on my mom uniform of jeans and a T-shirt and leave the fun to the kids for the fourth year in a row. For me, it’s a little depressing to see otherwise sane women using Halloween as an excuse to dress provocatively. But I haven’t seen much between that option and a huge ugly gorilla costume on the store shelves.

When I asked my out-of-the-box husband what I should be, he started out with “It would be funny if you were…” To which I blurted the reply “I don’t want to look funny, I want to be pretty!” He said “Great, be a princess!”

Isn’t there anything slightly more creative than a princess, with more coverage than the average party-store mini-skirted pirate costume, less dark and scary than a witch or gorilla, that doesn’t cost me my Christmas budget, and that I can look pretty in? I know it’s a challenging list of requirements, but I’d really love to re-discover my love of Halloween dress-up.