Halloween Fun

Trunk or Treat and ward party! We even made chili this year to contribute to the chili cookoff (and there was enough left over for dinner another night). I don't have indoor pictures to show from the ward party.

The kids' costumes: Jr. Jr. was a pirate. Lucky was a pumpkin. Jr. was a Ten Man from The Mysterious Benedict Society book series. Nichole was Kate Weatherall from The Mysterious Benedict Society book series.
How do you like my costume?

I fooled several people thinking I had a baby in there. Nope. It was candy to hand out.

Beautiful weather for being outside. Several of us wore short sleeves.
And the next morning? Snow on the ground.

Then it stayed pretty cold through Halloween (depending on the time of day. There was no more snow, though).
Halloween day, I went to watch Jr. Jr. and Lucky walk in the school's Halloween parade. Then I got to watch Lucky's kindergarten presentation, sharing what they've been learning. He was so happy to have me there and to give me a hug afterward. I love supporting my kids like that. And I'm so glad he loves school.

After school, we met up with friends to do trick or treating at the mall.

Then the kids and I went home to have some dinner and did some trick or treating in our neighborhood.

We stopped off at a neighbor's fire to warm up and roast some marshmallows. Then we collected Jeremy who by then was home from work and went to visit and trick or treat at my sister's.

On a side note, after the ward party, Lucky was proud to show me what he did to his face and hands (and armpits) with a stamp. I let him know (nicely) it was not the best choice since we had church the next morning (the Primary program). Thankfully it washed off.

Halloween 2012

We survived Halloween this year.  Phew.  It was kind of rough for a little bit.  There's still some recovery to do from this weekend.  Nichole did get to go to school today and Jr. Jr. and I went to the school parade to watch Nichole and Jr.
I had a late night and early morning last night and today, though, finishing up Jr.'s costume and trying to get Jr. Jr. to sleep.  He just would not.  Jr. did the Batman thing when we went to our friend's Halloween party, but wanted to be a wizard for school and Trunk or Treat.  Luckily, we did simple costumes this year. 

I didn't sew new outfits for the kids, we did thrift store shopping for Nichole's skirt and shirt and she wore my witch hat, and I used construction paper and felt for Jr.'s costume.  I used brown construction paper for the hat and cut out white stars and moon shapes to glue on.  Then I took the elastic from an old birthday cone hat and put it on his wizard's hat.  Then I used his Jedi robe from last year and safety pinned white felt stars and moon shapes to it.

Jeremy and I thought it would be fun to do theme costumes for Jr. Jr., Jeremy, and me.  Jeremy was going to be an old-timey villain, I was going to be the damsel in distress, and Jr. Jr. was going to be "my hero."  Also simple with things we had on hand (except for the rope, which we bought).  I was going to make railroad tracks out of cardboard and duct tape to tie me to, but as you know, things got kind of crazy and I ran out of time.  It still worked because we had the rope and Jeremy looked good as the villain.

Jr. Jr. fell asleep as it got closer to Trunk or Treat, and I was not going to wake him up to put his outfit on (especially since we ran out of time). 

I just grabbed one of our superhero capes and put that on him when we got to Trunk or Treat.  He's 2.  He doesn't care.  And he still got to be the hero.  He was just excited about the whole "Trick or Treat" thing.  It was amazing to him how many people were putting things in his bag.

I decided early on in the day that I wasn't going to stress out about Halloween, and I didn't.  There were times I felt rushed, but I knew it would turn out a good day, and it did.

By the way, it's also National Knock-Knock Jokes Day, so just like I did last year, I wrote knock-knock jokes on ziplock bags that held some of Nichole's lunch items.  She was pretty happy.

Trunk or Treat

My personal opinions: In the first set of pictures, Jeremy was trying the balloon pumpkin on Jr. and adjusted it later to fit better. But in that picture, I think if the balloons were blue, he would look like a blueberry from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Jeremy's and my schedules overlapped Thursday evening so we took the kids over to some friends' house. Nichole became very interested in the red coat, so they said she could use it for Halloween. Thus her little red riding hood costume.
Jeremy wore his safari outfit and built a skeleton for a Halloween party he was hired for.
And me? Well, I'm just cute. Not everyone can fit in their own trunk to pass out candy during the trunk or treat. We got two big bags of smarties to hand out and didn't even get through the first bag.
And in the last picture in the middle of the bottom, doesn't it look like Jr. is floating (click on the picture to see a bigger version of it)?

And for those of you who don't know what trunk or treat is: Church members bring their vehicles to the church parking lot, open their trunks and let the kids come around trick-or-treating to the vehicles. For us, with our little ones, I'm glad our ward does it because they go around getting their candy in one spot and we don't have to drive around to so many different neighborhoods to go trick-or-treating. And it limits the amount of candy they get.