Happy Halloween!

It was a whirlwind weekend of celebrating. Once again, we managed to stretch a one-day holiday over multiple days. We've been talking about Halloween and listening to Halloween music and watching Halloween movies for almost two weeks so I'm actually not sad the holiday is over. I'm kind of ready to move on, although we did have fun celebrating.

Saturday night we went to a party at a friend's house with our fellow Cat friends. It's always fun to see everyone's costumes. Wyatt was the Green Lantern, for about 10 minutes. Then his costume was too itchy and uncomfortable he said so he took it off. He had his Captain America pajamas on underneath so everyone just thought he'd had a costume change. Hadley was Strawberry Shortcake. Actually, it was just a strawberry, but she didn't seem to notice, or else she was using her imagination.  I decided to maximize the bump and went as Humpty Dumpy. Dayven had gone through many costume choices and finally settled on a giant chicken. He occasionally threw on his Cutler jersey to tease his friend who is a Bears fan, saying I wouldn't get it since I don't watch football. Whatever. Still, we had a great time and had fun chatting it up with everyone. Those of us with little kids chipped in to pay one of the teenage daughters and her friend to keep an eye on the kids - reading them books, supervising the craft and keeping things from getting too wild - so we could enjoy chatting with minimal interruptions. It worked out great. They were both dressed up and it was the highlight of Hadley's nap. She was still talking about "The Princesses" the next day!

Only one kid would cooperate (slightly) for the photo.

Fine, we'll just do one on our own.

Dayven "Tebowing"....   in a Cutler jersey?

Not happy about something.

Happy now that she has a cupcake!

The pregnant bellies...

Dayven Tebowing again, during the guys' group shot.

The girls...

 We carved our pumpkins on Sunday afternoon. How it works at our house is, the kids just request their design and Dayven and I carve them. No sense in having a two-year-old wielding a knife, right? Even Wyatt doesn't have much patience for it. He watched me clean it out while we talked about our design, then stuck his hand in to feel the "guts", then he got bored and went off to play (coming back about 3 minutes later to ask if it was done yet). Dayven carved his into a devilish bull monster/creature. I first worked on Wyatt's - he wanted a haunted house (easy enough since I'd done one last year), then I carved mine into Frankenstein. By the time I was done, I didn't have the energy or creativity left for Hadley's request - Strawberry Shortcake (you can see where her mind is this year) so I opted for a simple strawberry. She seemed pretty pleased with it. They looked extra cool when lit at night.

I made Cake Pops for Wyatt's school party. They turned out to be a little more work than I thought, but maybe that's just because it was my first time and I'm still learning the tricks. I'm much faster and more efficient with cupcakes. Anyway, they turned out really cute. Hadley spotted them on the kitchen counter instantly when she came down for breakfast the next morning. She pointed at them and asked "Mommy, can I have that snack for a little while?" I'm not sure where this "little while" came from, but she often adds it to the end of sentences. She was upset when I told her we had to drop them off at Wyatt's school, but I saved one aside for her to eat later so that made her happy. We drove like we were bringing our first born child home from the hospital, avoiding sudden stops and bumps in the road and making slow, wide turns to get them to school in one piece. I'm sure the cars behind us loved it! They survived the ride just fine and the kids excited squeals when they saw them made all the work worth it! When Wyatt got home from school, I asked him how the party was and what treats he ate. He said "Oh mommy! I ate my favorite thing - TOMATOES!!" Apparently someone's one had brought a veggie tray. He is definitely his father's son with his taste for healthy foods. I had to chuckle thinking of the teacher offering him a cake pop and him choosing tomatoes instead.

Halloween night we got ready to head out trick or treating (or "Halloweening" as they say here) after dinner. Wyatt was a little timid when it came time to put on our costumes and go out. He said he would just wait at home - he says this every year - but with some coaxing we were able to get him suited up and out the door. After the first house, he was sold and he took off running to the next ones before we could stop him. We met up with our friends from across the street and hit a bunch of houses together. Hadley was really into it too this year, going right up to the door and yelling "trick or treat". We had to stop Wyatt a few times when he continued on with the "smell my feet..." song. We did most of our crescent and a few houses along the main drag before the kids announced they were done. Then we headed home to check out our loot and answer the door for trick or treaters. We got quite a few this year. They seemed to come all in a mad rush. Everyone was dressed up, even the teenagers and the kids got a kick out of coming to the door with me to see all the costumes. Wyatt said he liked that better than even trick or treating! We got a lot of compliments on our pumpkins too. It's now 8:50pm and we're still getting a few stragglers. I just answered the door again (to one lonely witch) and gave her three heaping handfuls to help dwindle the candy supply. I think I'm going to shut off the lights shortly and call it a night...

Happy Halloween!