Care and Feeding

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Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here .

Dear Care and Feeding,

We’ve already bought a Halloween costume for my 8-year-old son, “Jaden”—he is going as a monster. But since he got his costume earlier this month, he’s been wearing it and jumping out and scaring his 3-year-old sister, “Mallory.” He did it again this morning, and now my wife, “Britney,” has decided he can’t be a monster anymore and has to go as something else. Jaden is extremely upset and says it’s not fair, and I agree. I think the proper thing to do is to take away the costume for now so he can’t use it to scare Mallory, and then give it back to him on Halloween just before I take the kids trick-or-treating. But my wife won’t hear it.…