I love holidays.  I love dressing up.  I love candy.  I love Halloween!

And I’m pretty excited about this one.

I won’t bore you with all the pictures from year-to-year, but we’ll go back a couple years for kicks.  On Kelsey’s first Halloween, she had just had her fourth brain surgery.  So I decided that a hat or wig would be perfect for Halloween…she was a Cabbage Patch Kid.  I was obsessed with these dolls for a good part of my childhood.  So it was perfect that I had my very own baby “doll” now.  Oh sure I had Ben, but the girl…I had to do it!

Ben was equally adorable that year dressed as an astronaut.

Last year Kelsey had just started wearing new glasses and her mood was rocky at best, so this is what most of the Halloween looked like…

As for this Halloween, Ben has been through a couple costumes but landed on an adorable, um, I mean terrifying ninja.  As a teacher in another life, all of my 3rd and 4th grade boys were always dressed from head-to-toe in black.  They called themselves Darth Vader, the guy from Scream, and ninjas but to me they all looked the same.  Well…we’ve arrived.  Ben is dressed all in black, but as sad as it may make him, he’s not the least bit scary.

Kelsey is dressing as Minnie Mouse.  Her current obsession is Elmo, as described in my last post.  It would make sense to dress her as Elmo but that would mean as much to her as dressing her as Minnie.  Absolutely nothing.  If Ben dressed as Elmo, that would be a different story, and Kelsey probably would have loved that, but I knew that would never happen.

Ben was Mickey Mouse when he was two, so we decided at two-and-a-half, Kelsey had to be Minnie.

I can’t stand the cuteness!!!

Now, the kids are as adorable as ever this year, but that’s not why I’m excited.  I’m excited because I’m hoping Kelsey may be able to actually trick-or-treat!  She has been speeding around the house using her gait-trainer and it is so exciting to see!!

When Ben dressed as Mickey, he too, was just learning to walk but he was able to trick-or-treat by just holding Daddy’s hand.  After about four houses, we were all done and that was perfect.  Now that we have Kelsey, I can’t help but compare the kids.  Ben has this MAJOR, horrible disease and he was walking before Kelsey.  He was talking before her too.  And that in itself is so scary.

On one hand, I often think that if he can do all he does, than anyone can!  His sister’s disease(s) is (are) much more common and not fatal.  Neither of their afflictions have cures but they do have treatments.  But by comparison, she’s behind (her brother and her peers) in so many ways.  Now.  She has a whole lotta reasons to be behind.  She was having seizures, that for a large chunk of 2015, were untreated.  She had four brain surgeries and an eye surgery.  She’s had a lot more traumas to overcome.  Ben had a lot riding against him from the start, but luckily no seizures, surgeries, or otherwise. But still…

Onto happy thoughts.  A month ago, I would not have believed this was a possibility!  But all-of-a-sudden…something clicked!  We still have a long way to go, but the fact that she WANTS to walk and is moving is so exciting!!  She is so proud of herself!  Walking makes her happy!

So stay tuned…I’ll let you know how it goes.

Have a Happy and Hopeful Halloween!!!

P.S. If you want to read about our scariest Halloween EVER, check out Ben’s Story.