"How're my royal girls doing? Are you almost ready to go collect your treasure?"
There was an infectious giggle as a round cheeked little girl dressed in full princess garb came running out of her room, down the hall and leapt into the arms of her daddy, who was dressed as a king. He gave her a big hug and kiss on the forehead as her mother, smiling, came walking down the hall to meet the two in the living room. She was dressed as a queen, completing the royal trio.
"You two look fantastic!" Kimzy stated, pulling out his phone to take some pictures.
"Are you ready to go collect some candy?"
"I'm weddy daddy, see. Twick o tweet. Now you give me candy." The little princess was smiling proudly.
This was the first year that she really has a good grasp of what they were doing. They had gone out trick or treating every year of her life, but she honestly had spent most of the evening either sleeping or distracted by the decorations. She didn't really understand what they were doing, but this year she did, and she was ready.
"I think you've got it, Sweetheart. Do you have your candy bag?"
"Candy purse," she corrected.
"I'm sorry. Do you have your candy purse?"
"Yep, wight here."
"Ok, let's go."
The happy family headed out to go collect some candy and have some Halloween fun. It was still bright outside, when you have little kids you don't go trick or treating after dark, but many of the houses on their street had fun inflatables, and there were several other families out as well.
The first house was a dud. No one was home, but the next several paid off fantastically. At each house, Kimzy and his wife would walk their daughter up to the door and then stand back a few feet, allowing her to do it on her own. She got the hang of it pretty quickly.
"Twick o tweet," danced off her lips at every home, and who could resist a cute little princess with a candy purse? Every house loaded her up, even the oddball house that was giving out apples, not candy. They gave her three, one for her mom and dad as well as her.
The collected from four streets in the neighborhood, and one of the last houses they came to just had a bowl of candy out front with a sign inviting people to go to something called a "HallowedName Community Carnival" taking place at a church just down the street.
"That sounds like fun," Kimzy said. "Want to go check it out?"
"Sure," his wife responded. "Let's go home and get the car."
By the time they got the car and drove to the church it was starting to get a little dark, but there was still enough light to see to play the games, and there were lots of games. They didn't have a lot of time, their daughter was three and needed to get to bed, but there were enough activities to stay busy for hours.
They got some cotton candy and popcorn. The little princess got a balloon tiara to add to her costume one, and she collected lots more candy.
Then, she saw the facepainting and decided she had to have a "buttafy" on her check. The two royal women, mother and daughter, got in line, while Kimzy went to go find a bathroom.
When they reached the front of the line, received the face painting and proceeded to the next activity, and Kimzy still wasn't back, his wife started to get both concerned and angry. About then her phone chirped.
"Hey Hon, I'm really sorry, but I just got a call. I have to go. I love you."
She tried to call him, but he didn't answer, and he didn't reply to her, understandably, confused texts.
Part 25: 7
Part 27: 5