Good family fun

'Tis the season and we love it.  It is so short, we have to squeeze in as many outings as possible.  I'm talking about the fall tradition of TP'ing (a/k/a toilet papering)!  Wahoo!!  I loved it when I was young and I love it now.  Is that pitiful?  As soon as our kids were old enough to go (to make us not look so bad, you know) we started in teaching them the trade.  Now they are hooked.  Every Wal-Mart list includes extra cheap toilet paper.  We must not be caught empty-handed on a perfect fall night...because we live so far from a store!

This past weekend, my friend "Beth" and I took our kiddos out for supper and then started our mission.  Our first stop was an epic failure.  As we approached the first victim, we tried lights off, too dark; lights on, too bright; parking lights only, not bad...so we creep past house.  I look to the right and see "Becky" standing in the window, I'm not sure if she notices a vehicle moving ever so slowly past her house with only parking lights on, but I say to my partner in crime, "There's Becky!"  And my partner's response was to flip the lights on and take off...Apparently she took my comment to mean that "Becky" was out in the yard and had busted us. 

We go down the road and turn around.  We sneak back up to the house from the opposite side and turn headlights off.  Open van door, interior lights blaze.  Shut lights off.  Ahh.  Kids are on the prowl.  Here comes "Becky" creeping around their shed to attack.  BUSTED.  So we pulled up in the drive.  It seems she did notice the SMV.  Ha.  Now onto victim number two.

We move onto the next house.  We park the bat-mobile nearby in an empty lot and the kids are released.  Kids come back for more paper.  Next, half of the children come back because the residents are vacating the premises.  Nothing happens, same half of the children return back for the finale.  Success.  We head out.

The next stop only the little fellas got out and watching them do their stuff was comical.  We still aren't sure exactly what they were doing, but this was our view:  Unload with weaponry, run up to house, drop, creep along front of house, run around back out of sight, come back out front, drop, run over to other side of house out of sight, reappear, drop, creep along front and stop at front step, leave a sliver of TP on step.  We didn't see them touch the only tree in the front yard or the bush.  We were told they actually did use some of their TP, but we're not exactly sure where.  They were thrilled though because "they got 'em good."  Okay, whatever, they had fun.  Moving on...

We stop along the street near our next victim and see a familiar car drive by...hhm, they are out TP'ing too which means they aren't at home.  Off we go to their house.  We drive by, they're obviously not home.  We let the kids work their magic.  We literally park right in front of their driveway off the side of the road.  Kids go do their thing, come back for more repeatedly.  The yard is looking pretty good.  I make a comment about the fact that no one has driven by yet.  Shame on me.  Here come headlights.  They are slowing down....they are facing us with their lights beaming...they are turning into their driveway.  RUN! 

Three kids hop into the car, two still remain.  Car pulls up to garage honking, dad comes out screaming and waving his hands.  We then hear our two little guys screaming like girls (mine especially) making a dash for the bat-mobile.  We speed off.  That was fun.  Our two slow-pokes thought we were honking that it was time to go...until they saw the dad.  Ha.  We go out to a house along the highway and run through the whole light disaster again.  Kids TP until a dog barks...we take off.

The night is not over...stay tuned tomorrow for Part II of Good Family Fun.