The skeleton and the princess

How is it possible these two are related? Born of the same womb, one wants to be as ghoulish as possible, while the other wants to be a diva princess.

At Boo at the Zoo last Saturday, the kids got to give their costumes a test run while getting a jump start on trick-or-treating.

Not only do they have drastically different taste in costumes. They also have drastically different attitudes toward wearing them. AJ was so excited to dress up that it wasn't not enough to wear one costume, he then had to modify it by adding a second costume. He couldn't settle for being a mere skeleton. He wanted to be a ghost pirate. So we cut up the now too-small pair of pirate pants from an old costume and added a pirate hat (which he rarely wore) and sword.

AJ was thrilled with the results, and even more excited when he found another pirate with whom he could battle.

For AJ, the highlight of the day, however, had nothing to do with his costume. He described his up close encounter with the alligator as: "it was kind of squishy and kind of heavy."

And where was Sydney all this time? First of all, in contrast to her brother, she wasn't particularly excited to dress up. The Daphne (from Scooby Doo) costume she'd gotten so exited about a week earlier? Not so exciting anymore. She was much happier wearing one of her princess costumes. She also was more than happy to trick-or-treat from the comfort of the stroller, and she wanted nothing to do with the alligator or any of the costumed volunteers.

The one time she was excited to climb out of her Daddy-powered chariot was when we came to the playground outside the zoo. She happily informed me, "Princesses like to swing."