Kids
Happy? Halloween!
It was a beautiful fall Saturday on Maple Street—perfect for bike riding—but no one in Katie’s family was out for a spin. Instead, Katie was finishing her math homework, and her moms were catching up on their projects and some housework. At noon, they all made their own lunch and ate quietly at the table.
“Before I forget,” MomLee said, “I’m going to be out of town part of next week. I’ve got to make a note of that.” She looked at the big wall calendar. “Let’s see … where are we? End of the month …” MomLee put down her sandwich suddenly. “Holy smokes! Today’s Halloween!”
“What?” MomAnna looked up. “It can’t be!”
“It is!” MomLee told her. She whirled around to face Katie. “What are you going to be this year? You told us, didn’t you?”
Katie looked down at her plate. “Um … Mulan, I guess.”
“You were Mulan last year!” said MomAnna. “Oh, Katie, you should have told us what you wanted to be for Halloween weeks ago!”
“I’m sorry,” Katie said, “but you’ve both been so busy …”
“We always have time for you, Katie,” said MomLee. “We’re sorry we didn’t ask about a costume before. But we’re asking now. What do you want to be this year?”
Katie had dreaded this question. Both moms were looking at her now, waiting for her answer. She pressed her lips together and took a deep breath.
“It’s a silly idea. So Mulan is fine, okay?”
“Not okay,” said MomAnna, shaking her head. “Tell us your idea.”
This was going to be hard, Katie thought.
“Well,” she began, her eyes down, “I had this idea that I could be a … princess.” She gulped and continued. “A make-believe princess with a big, pink, puffy dress out-to-here.”
There. She’d said it. She looked up.
Both moms were looking at her very seriously. Then MomAnna stood up.
“Katie, do you mean out to here?” She stretched her arms out a little way from her sides.
“Oh, no,” said MomLee. “That’s no good.”
Katie’s heart sank. Well, Mulan wasn’t really bad.
MomLee stood up. “A make-believe princess dress should be out to here!” She stretched her arms out as far as they could go.
The moms laughed and clapped. Katie was astonished, but then she couldn’t help laughing too.
“A big, pink, puffy, out-to-here, make-believe princess dress,” said MomAnna. “This is going to take every single minute we’ve got—not to mention all the chores we have left to do today. But we’ll do it. What time do you go out for trick or treating?”
“Seven o’clock,” Katie said.
“Yikes. Let’s get started then.”
MomLee gasped. “You’re going to make that dress this afternoon?”
“Not just me,” MomAnna said. “This job is going to take all of us. Katie, clear the table and load the dishwasher. Lee, go to the fabric store at the mall and get all the pink tulle you can find. I’m going to get out the sewing machine.” MomAnna rushed up the stairs.
MomLee put on her coat. “I’m off to the mall!”
“Get some candy, too,” MomAnna called to her from upstairs. “And a hula hoop!”
Katie and MomLee looked at one another. A hula hoop?
While MomLee was at the mall, Katie could hear MomAnna upstairs, opening and shutting closet doors. She loaded the dishwasher and listened for a clue to what MomAnna was planning for her dress.
“Sheesh,” she heard. “It’s somewhere, I know it.” And then, “Aha! Got it!”
“Katie!” MomAnna called. “When you’re done with the dishes, come on up.”
“I’m just finishing, MomAnna.” Katie closed the door to the loaded dishwasher and headed up the stairs to the moms’ room. What had MomAnna found? And how was she going to make whatever it was into a princess dress?
MomAnna had her sewing machine ready to go. She was unwrapping silky white material from a big thick cardboard frame.
“This was going to be made into drapes. But it’ll be perfect for the base skirt.”
“The what?”
“Just come here.”
MomAnna wrapped the material around Katie’s waist and measured it. Then she spread the silk down to the floor and far out on all sides.
“If it’s that long,” Katie said, “I’ll trip on it.”
“Don’t worry, you won’t,” MomAnna told her as she folded the fabric. “Go get the pink leotard you wore at your dance recital last spring.”
Katie found the pink leotard in her drawer and brought it back. MomAnna was hemming the material on the sewing machine.
“Okay,” she said. “Leave it here now, and run the vacuum in the living room and the study. As soon as MomLee comes back, tell her to bring the pink tulle up here right away.”
MomAnna’s eyes were on the machine as she quickly fed the fabric through. There was a whirring as the pile of hemmed silk on the far side grew steadily. But just how was that stuff going to turn into the dress she imagined?
Katie carefully vacuumed under the piano bench and around the small table with the vase of autumn flowers from MomAnna’s garden. If it doesn’t work out, she was thinking, I can go as Mulan. And it’ll be okay. But it really would be cool if she could wear that pink, puffy, out-to-here, make-believe princess dress!
“I’m home! Katie, come help!”
It was MomLee at the door, loaded down with her shopping.
“Pink tulle,” she pointed, “in those huge bags. Candy in these. And—for what reason I don’t know—a hula hoop!” She held it up for Katie to see. “How’s the dress going?”
Katie shook her head. “I don’t actually know. But MomAnna says you should bring her the pink tulle right away.”
“Okay, then. Pink tulle to the rescue.” MomLee balanced the big bags and headed up the stairs two at a time.
Katie put the candy away and slipped the hula hoop behind the table. She was on her way up the stairs when she ran into MomLee coming down.
“Hey, Princess Katiekid. Let’s have a look at your hair. We’ll fancy it up a bit.”
MomLee sat Katie down in the kitchen and gathered brushes, combs, bobby pins, gel, and rubber bands.
“Hmmm,” said MomLee. “A make-believe princess needs some serious curls—and tiny braids, maybe, too.”
“Make it like a—” Katie’s hands flew up “a—what is it called? A tiara!”
“Exactly!” MomLee agreed. And she began brushing Katie’s hair with long, careful strokes.
And so the time went by. MomAnna sewing the princess dress upstairs and MomLee brushing and combing and curling and braiding Katie’s hair downstairs. MomLee had just decided she was ready to bring Katie to the big mirror in the living room to see her princess-y hairdo when the front doorbell rang.
“Can it be trick-or-treaters already?” asked MomLee. She grabbed a few candy bars on the way to the door.
No trick-or-treaters, but a pizza delivery! MomAnna had decided they needed a dinner break, and she’d called for a pizza with mushrooms and olives and extra cheese, just the way they liked it best.
MomLee brought the pizza to the table while Katie got the plates and napkins.
“Did I hear the doorbell?” MomAnna asked with a smile. Then her eyes got big. “Oh, Katie, your hair is beautiful!”
Katie ran to the big mirror and what she saw made her eyes get big too! Her hair was sleek and shiny, with big curls on top and braids around, just like a tiara. She wanted to keep looking at her princess hairdo, but the tempting smell of the pizza drew her back into the kitchen.
The pizza was hot, gooey, and delicious. When they’d eaten it all, MomAnna told everybody to wash their hands.
“Then,” she said, “you can come up and see how the dress is coming along. And bring the hula hoop.”
They washed and dried their hands very carefully. “I’m still wondering how that hula hoop comes in,” MomLee whispered to Katie as they headed to the moms’ room.
MomAnna stood in the doorway. “Now remember,” she said, “it’s not entirely finished yet.”
When MomAnna stepped out of the way, Katie saw a cloud of pink tulle on the armchair, and next to it her pink leotard, with beautifully layered tulle to make puffy sleeves.
“Oh, MomAnna! Can I try it on now?”
“Not just yet,” said MomAnna, as she took the hula hoop from MomLee. “But soon. Now scoot, both of you.”
Downstairs, MomLee and Katie started in on the trick-or-treat preparations. MomLee fastened a paper pumpkin to the window, the Maple Street signal for trick-or-treaters. Katie put her treat bag on the table near the door. Then she opened the bags of candy and raisin boxes and poured them into bowls. (Of course, Katie and MomLee had to taste some of the treats—just to make sure they were good enough to give out that evening.)
MomLee popped a raisin in her mouth. “By the way, Katie, what time are your friends going to be here, again?”
“Seven,” replied Katie, polishing off a chocolate nut bar.
“Hmmm,” MomLee looked at her watch. “Sixty fifty-five. I think we’re cutting it a bit close here.”
“Come on up!” called MomAnna.
Katie dashed up the stairs.
“First, put on the leotard,” MomAnna said.
Katie quickly changed out of her clothes and into the pink leotard, complete with puffy tulle sleeves. Now for the other half of her princess dress.
“Here we go,” said MomAnna, and she carefully lowered the mass of pink tulle over Katie’s head. Katie felt the elastic band catch at her waist and saw the rest of the gown billow beautifully to the floor, “out-to-here” in a huge circle!
“So that’s why you needed the hula hoop,” said MomLee, smiling in the doorway.
Katie gazed at herself in the long closet mirror, amazed. She really looked like a make-believe princess, with her hair curled and plaited high, and her big, pink, puffy gown. She twirled happily just to see the dress sway back and forth.
“Well?” MomAnna asked.
“It’s beautiful, MomAnna! It’s just the way I imagined it!” Katie hugged MomAnna tight.
“Oh, wait!” said MomLee. “The fabric store folks gave me something for you. I told them what kind of dress you wanted and they said you just had to have this. It must still be in the bag.” MomLee dug in the plastic bag near the sewing machine and pulled out a long, wide, pink satin ribbon. “Any idea what to do with this?”
“Oh, yes!” said MomAnna. She quickly tied the pink ribbon around Katie’s waist and made a big bow in the back, with the ends flowing down the tulle.
Katie turned round. “It’s perfect! Oh, thank you!” She gave MomLee a big hug.
“Is that the doorbell?” MomAnna asked. “Katie, I think your friends are here.”
Katie sailed down the stairs, careful not to trip on the hoop in her skirt. MomLee opened the door, and Katie’s friends, all in their costumes, said: “Trick or treat!”
After they’d chosen their treats, MomLee invited them in. When they saw Katie in her costume their mouths dropped open.
“Katie!” said Nisha the Cat, “You look like a princess!”
“Didn’t you say just yesterday that you hadn’t decided what you’d be?” asked David, as Harry Potter.
“It must be magic!” said Thea, dressed as Hermione.
“I know what kind of magic it is,” Jasmine the Artist smiled. “Moms-Magic!”
Katie laughed and picked up her treat bag. With a good-bye wave to her moms, she headed out into the evening, the perfect make-believe princess for Halloween.
