Halloween Miracle? Story & Photos by Ashlie Hazen / Ponca City Monthly Contributing Writer
I’m not sure if it’s my habit for procrastinating or my Adam for a Halloween party in his classroom. need for things to be perfect that always has me working I had been down in the basement working on my youngest son’s Halloween costume until the last for two hours when I heard the voice of second. But I never dreamed it would be the very thing that my husband asking if I needed anything. would save the lives of my three children, and possibly my Realizing that I had forgotten to grab a sock husband and myself. before I headed downstairs, I asked him to It started when my youngest son was five. I ordered grab one before he joined me. his costume online, like I had been doing for him and my When he returned without the other two boys for the last 15 years. But when it arrived, the sock and a worried look on face, I pants were way too long and required hemming before was slightly annoyed. “The lights he could wear them. I had procrastinated on ordering the won’t work, and I think I smell costume, so there was no time to hire someone to fix it. something funny, maybe,” he said. I thought to myself, “How hard could it be?” Turns out it Rolling my eyes and thinking was harder to hem bell bottoms than I had expected, and to myself that he’d gone crazy, I I was literally making the last stitch as stopped sewing he was running out the door with the and started up excitement that every five-year-old has basement When I reached the the on Halloween night. stairs. I got to the I remember telling my husband of the staircase fifth step, something hit bottom Travis that night, as we pilfered that leads up to all four through the kids’ candy (don’t judge, bedrooms and flicked the we all do it), how much fun I had fixing my foot, so I looked up light switch, but nothing and even adding my own ideas to the It was a little at the exact moment happened. pants. I decided right then that I was alarming, considering going to make next year’s costume that the light is a the chandelier was chandelier with four from scratch. With only one child left in the trick-or-treat age group, I was bulbs, and what are dropping out of the the odds that they optimistic that I could create an entire costume. would all burn out ceiling. I instantly Over the next year, I bought a at the exact same cheap sewing machine, and taught time? myself the basics. First, I made Edward When I smelled smoke and Scissorhands, followed by Jack Frost reached the fifth (“The Nightmare Before Christmas”), saw flames from the step, something then Saul Hudson (better known as hit my foot, so Slash from Guns N’ Roses), followed I looked up at new hole in the by Beetlejuice, and finally the Mad the exact moment Hatter from “Alice in Wonderland.” the chandelier was ceiling. FIRE!!! Does anyone notice a theme? All of dropping out of the these characters (except for Slash) are ceiling. I instantly from Tim Burton movies. My son has smelled smoke and adopted his father’s love for ‘80s hair bands, and begged saw flames from the new hole in the ceiling. to be Slash. So what’s a mom to do but let the kid be Slash? FIRE!!! Now, you are probably wondering how a costume Travis and I opened the bedroom doors yelling, procrastination saved our lives. On Halloween morning “FIRE! Get up and get outside!” I grabbed anything that 2019, I woke up very early (I am NOT a morning person) was a picture on the way out the door as the three of us to put the finishing touches on the Mad Hatter costume, in were calling 911. I couldn’t believe three of us even had the hopes that I could send it to school that morning with the sense to call 911.
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