The Halloween party didn’t happen.

I woke up feeling absolutely exhausted and decided that, for once, we could just not do something. A revolutionary concept in our house, particularly during half term when I seem to feel personally responsible for providing a full programme of entertainment.

River was delighted. No getting dressed, no leaving the house and absolutely no expectations. As far as he was concerned, this was the best Halloween party we’d ever attended.

I took Summer swimming and that was quite enough excitement for one day.

Thursday: Slime, slime and more slime

Thursday began with Summer’s friend arriving at 9.30am, ready for our trip to a local museum for a slime-making workshop.

It was the same museum we’d visited earlier in the week for our bug hunt, a fact that River noticed immediately.

“WE’VE DONE THIS!”

Apparently, returning to a venue is completely unacceptable, even when you’re going there for an entirely different activity. Fortunately, after voicing his objections, he agreed to let us enter.

We were taken upstairs to a room normally used by school groups, where rows of tables covered in plastic tablecloths confirmed that we were in the right place. Nothing says a fun children’s craft activity quite like a room that’s been prepared for a major chemical spill.

I’d deliberately not booked River a place. I suspected the workshop would involve a lot of instructions, sitting still and following a particular sequence of events. All things that River considers entirely optional.

Within minutes, I knew I’d made the right decision.

Fortunately, the lovely staff recognised us from Monday’s session and allowed us to use the room next door. I purchased a pot of slime from the gift shop, because apparently we didn’t already have enough slime in our lives, and River and I settled down to the very important task of removing a plastic beetle from it.

He was perfectly happy. I was perfectly happy. No instructions, no group activities and absolutely no expectations of producing something vaguely resembling the example.

Meanwhile, Summer and her friend had a fantastic time creating their masterpieces and distributing PVA glue across every available surface. I’m not entirely sure how much made it into their actual slime, but they were very pleased with themselves.

Afterwards, we headed to River’s favourite little park, the one with the trampolines, stopping for a ridiculously overpriced café lunch along the way.

To my surprise, River actually played in the park. Properly played, without immediately demanding that we return home. These little moments can feel like enormous victories, even when everyone else is just enjoying an ordinary afternoon at the playground.

We headed home, another friend joined Summer, and the house was quickly taken over by three girls screaming at the television while playing Nintendo Switch games.

River repeatedly complained about the noise, while contributing approximately 50% of it himself. He also refused to leave the room, so I can only assume that somewhere beneath all the protesting, he was enjoying himself.

I had a playdate of my own when Kiran popped round for a glass of wine in the garden.

A much more civilised activity, involving considerably less PVA glue.

Friday: Discovering East London

Friday was our big adventure. We were venturing all the way to East London to visit Discover Children’s Story Centre in Stratford.

For someone who lives in West London, crossing the city can feel rather like travelling abroad. Fortunately, the journey went surprisingly smoothly and Kate was there to meet us. This was particularly useful because my sense of direction becomes completely unreliable once I leave familiar territory.

Discover is a wonderful place, with two floors of interactive Story Worlds, an outdoor Story Garden and various workshops and exhibitions designed to encourage children to explore, play and use their imaginations.

Exactly the sort of place I thought would be perfect for River.

Obviously, he was most excited about a rainbow slinky he’d spotted in the gift shop.

Forget the carefully planned activities, the beautiful play spaces and the tickets I’d booked. There was a rainbow slinky, and that was clearly the main attraction.

I managed to persuade him to leave it behind temporarily as we headed upstairs for our first workshop, a Halloween Potion Lab.

Things didn’t get off to a particularly promising start.

River refused to join the group and positioned himself firmly at the back of the room, making it clear that he wanted absolutely nothing to do with the activity.

I began questioning my judgement. Again.

A witch appeared and began reading a spooky story, although unfortunately it wasn’t the most animated performance. I don’t think she was going to be winning any awards for dramatic storytelling, and River certainly wasn’t convinced.

I decided not to push him and just listened along, hoping something might eventually catch his attention.

Then the pots of PVA glue appeared.

Summer and I exchanged looks.

More slime.

Apparently, we’d travelled from one side of London to the other to do exactly the same activity we’d done the previous day. At this rate, I could probably have opened a small slime factory from home and saved myself the train fare.

However, something rather wonderful happened.

River became interested.

Once I wrote the name of his favourite television programme on his potion label, he was completely invested. Suddenly, he was happily mixing red food colouring into his glue, adding ghost tears (activator) and sprinkling in various spooky ingredients.

There was also an impressive quantity of magical pixie dust, otherwise known as glitter, which I’m sure will still be appearing in our belongings at Christmas.

He was concentrating, participating and genuinely enjoying himself.

It was lovely to watch.

Until, quite suddenly, he’d had enough.

No warning, no gradual loss of interest. Just finished.

And when River is finished, everyone else is expected to be finished too.

Luckily, Kate stayed with Summer to complete her potion while River and I made our escape.

Back to the gift shop.

Yes, I bought the slinky.

Obviously.

Story Worlds and a rather eventful bus journey

Next, we headed outside to explore the Story Garden. It’s a lovely space filled with things to climb, investigate and play on, and we managed a little play and a snack before Summer wanted to head inside.

River initially refused.

By this point, persuading him to move from one activity to another was becoming something of a full-time job, but eventually he agreed.

And then, as he entered the indoor Story World, something magical happened.

“OH WOW! IT’S AMAZING!”

He was genuinely amazed.

There were all sorts of imaginative spaces, machines, things to turn, climb through and investigate. It was the sort of place where children could create their own stories rather than being told exactly what to do.

For a little while, both children were happily exploring and I could almost relax.

Almost.

The novelty wore off relatively quickly, but never one to recognise when I should stop while I’m ahead, I’d booked us into a second activity: Luna Loves London.

I was slightly worried that Summer might feel too old for it, but she’s wonderfully playful and always happy to join in.

Which was fortunate because River was having absolutely none of it.

We were ushered into a small room designed to resemble a bus, where we met our very enthusiastic driver.

The plan was for everyone to sit together and listen to a story before the bus arrived at its destination.

River had other plans.

“NO! NO! I WANT TO LEAVE!”

The shouting began almost immediately.

In a desperate attempt to keep him occupied, I resorted to secretly feeding him Pom-Bears, one at a time, directly into his mouth.

A highly sophisticated parenting technique.

Unfortunately, River didn’t appreciate the portion control and demanded the entire packet.

We weren’t supposed to be eating in there at all, so now I had an increasingly distressed child, a packet of contraband crisps and a room full of people trying to enjoy a story.

Excellent.

We made a swift exit.

Outside, River was completely overwhelmed. I lay on the floor beside him, trying to soothe him while he screamed. It’s moments like these when I wonder why I keep putting us through it, particularly when the entire activity is supposed to be fun.

Eventually, he calmed down and found his own way of regulating himself.

He began walking around and around a table, gently stroking the walls as he passed. I picked up a few books and read to him while he continued his circuits.

It wasn’t the activity I’d planned, but he was calm again and that was what mattered.

A little while later, Kate appeared with some exciting news.

The bus had arrived in London and a secret door had opened into the main exhibition.

River was immediately interested.

Within seconds, he was through the door and exploring.

And actually, it was fantastic.

This wasn’t the London of Big Ben and Buckingham Palace, but a wonderfully imaginative little community where children could play in all sorts of familiar places.

There was a library, a community garden, an art gallery where you were actually encouraged to touch the exhibits, and a sports area.

And, of course, plenty of pigeons. It wouldn’t be London without them.

There was also a dance studio, complete with mirrors, a disco ball and a pole.

Summer took a particular liking to the pole and began enthusiastically performing what can only be described as a rather questionable dance routine.

Kate and I were in hysterics.

Summer, completely oblivious to why two adults were finding her dancing so entertaining, continued with great enthusiasm.

I decided not to explain.

It was a genuinely brilliant space, and River managed a good fifteen minutes of happy exploration before everything became too much again.

Back out we went.

Back to our quiet room.

Biscuits and his slinky was all he wanted.

Summer and Kate stayed for the remainder of the session, while River and I continued our own somewhat less conventional version of the experience.

And actually, I was pleased.

He’d enjoyed the potion making. He’d loved the Story Worlds, even if only briefly. He’d explored part of the exhibition and discovered things that interested him.

It wasn’t the seamless family outing I’d imagined, but we’d had some lovely moments.

We made our way back to West London for some very much needed lunch and a drink for Kate and me.

That evening, we enjoyed the Celebrity Traitors final, followed by an enthusiastic 80s singalong that continued well into the early hours for the adults.

Because apparently I hadn’t learned anything about the importance of rest.

Halloween: The grand finale

And just like that, it was Halloween.

The day we’d been counting down to for an entire month.

Summer had a packed schedule: jiu-jitsu, a Halloween workout at the gym, her annual pumpkin trail and then trick-or-treating with her friends.

River and I had a rather different day.

I was absolutely exhausted.

Not just from the late night, although that certainly hadn’t helped, but from the cumulative effect of the entire week.

Half term with River involves constantly being alert. Even when we’re doing something lovely, I’m always thinking about what might happen next, what he might struggle with, how to help him manage and when we might need to leave.

Add in the lack of any real time away from him and I had absolutely nothing left.

I spent most of the day lying on the sofa under a blanket, watching whatever happened to be on television.

Every fifteen minutes or so I was summoned to provide drinks, snacks, chargers, plugs or some other essential service.

Kike got home around 3pm and I managed a much-needed nap before it was time for the main event.

Trick-or-treating.

River had been looking forward to this for weeks. We’d talked about it, planned it and prepared for it.

Surely this was going to be a success?

Our first problem was that it wasn’t dark enough.

River refused to leave the house because Halloween trick-or-treating happens in the dark, and the sky hadn’t quite got the message.

Fair enough. We waited.

Finally, the sun disappeared and he was ready.

Off he skipped, pumpkin bag in hand, looking genuinely excited.

I explained the rules as we walked.

We only knock on houses with pumpkins outside.

Simple.

Or so I thought.

We spotted a house almost immediately with a lovely glowing pumpkin by the front door.

Perfect.

Except River refused to knock.

I approached the door for him.

“NOOOOO! THERE’S NO PUMPKIN!”

I pointed at the pumpkin.

There it was. Large, orange, illuminated. Quite difficult to miss, really.

“NOOOOO! THAT’S A JACK-O’-LANTERN, NOT A PUMPKIN!”

Ah.

Apparently, I’d made a serious error in pumpkin classification.

I tried to explain that a jack-o’-lantern was, in fact, a pumpkin that somebody had carved.

River was having absolutely none of it.

A pumpkin and a jack-o’-lantern were two entirely different things, and the rules clearly stated pumpkins.

We moved on.

At the next house, we encountered exactly the same problem.

This time, I decided to ring the doorbell anyway, hoping that once he received some sweets, we’d be able to move past the pumpkin technicalities.

Unfortunately, nobody answered.

Of course they didn’t.

Cue more screaming, more distress and the realisation that our carefully planned Halloween evening was rapidly falling apart.

Eventually, we made it to the house that goes all out every year with its decorations.

Thankfully, someone answered and River was delighted with his lolly.

Success!

One house down.

Only approximately another fifty to go.

We continued walking to meet Summer and her friends, but things deteriorated quickly.

There were children everywhere, costumes, noises, excited shouting and groups moving in different directions.

For River, who’d spent weeks celebrating Halloween in the safety and predictability of our home, the reality was suddenly very different.

He wouldn’t approach the doors. He didn’t want to knock. He didn’t even seem particularly interested in collecting sweets.

Instead, he jumped and spun his way around the streets, occasionally shouting out the names of Halloween characters he recognised.

We tried for about half an hour.

I stopped worrying about the trick-or-treating and just let him enjoy the parts that he could manage.

But he kept asking to go home.

And that was that.

Kike took him back while I continued with Summer and her friends for another two hours. She was having the time of her life.

By the time we got home, she’d collected two enormous buckets of sweets which to her credit she did share out with River.

When Halloween becomes too much

I’m not going to lie, I felt sad.

Really sad.

I was tired, emotionally drained and disappointed that something River had been so excited about hadn’t turned out the way I’d hoped.

I know he doesn’t have to enjoy everything that other children enjoy. I know his version of fun doesn’t need to look like anyone else’s.

But sometimes I just want things to work out for him.

I want him to be able to enjoy the things he loves without those same things becoming overwhelming.

And I sometimes wonder whether I’m getting the balance wrong.

The more I try to involve him in activities, the more he seems to protest. But what’s the alternative? Do I stop trying? Do we stay at home every day because that’s where he’s happiest?

I don’t want to overwhelm him, but I don’t want his world to become smaller either.

There must be a balance somewhere. I’m just not sure I’ve found it yet.

That evening, as I was putting River to bed, I asked him if he was OK.

He looked sad.

“I want things to go back to normal.”

It was such a simple sentence, but it stopped me.

After weeks of excitement, countdowns, decorations, activities and constant Halloween talk, he’d had enough.

“No more Halloween?” I asked.

“No more Halloween.”

And that was that.

Back to normal

On Sunday morning, we took down the decorations.

The pumpkins disappeared, the skeletons were packed away and our house slowly returned to normal.

Just as River wanted.

I couldn’t help feeling a little sad about it.

Halloween has been his special interest for more than two years. It’s shaped so much of our family life, from the films we watch to the activities we plan and the ridiculous amount of Halloween merchandise we now own.

And for most of that time, it’s brought him enormous happiness.

I’d assumed this year would be the biggest and best Halloween yet. Instead, by the end of it, all he wanted was for it to be over.

Perhaps the excitement had simply become too much. Perhaps all the changes to his usual routines had taken their toll. Or perhaps, after two years, his special interest really is beginning to fade.

I don’t know.

It might be back next week. He might move on to something completely different. Or maybe he just needs a break from Halloween for a while.

For now, I’m going to enjoy a little bit of normality myself.

No workshops to book, no costumes to organise, no elaborate activities to prepare.

Just home, school, familiar routines and hopefully a slightly less exhausted mother.

As for Halloween disappearing from our lives completely?

Not a chance.

Summer and I are far too invested now.

In fact, I’m beginning to suspect that somewhere along the way, Halloween stopped being River’s special interest and became ours.