Happy Halloween!

Halloween is one of my favorite holidays. I love the orange and black colors, dressing-up and trick-or-treating, pumpkins and jack-o-lanterns, and candy and more candy. I love it!! This year was no exception and we had so much fun the week of Halloween. We water colored pumpkins that I later hid for Cole to collect and put from largest to smallest, made a Dracula box that we put a few treats in, made pumpkin sugar cookies, decorated them and took them to Russ at school, made a seven layer dip that looked like a spider web (for book club) complete with a tootsie roll spider, sang Halloween songs, carved pumpkins, went to the ward's trunk-or-treat (Wednesday night) and trick-or-treating. I think I enjoyed myself more than Cole and Garrett did.

Trick-or-treating was so much fun. We went to an older part of town that had the most beautiful old houses that have been restored and taken care of. Russ' program director, a professor, and classmate live in the area so we were able to visit all of them and show off our little guys. Cole was so darling and polite. He said "thank you" and "Happy Halloween" at almost every house, without having to be prompted by his parents. Garrett was mesmerized by the lights, sounds, and costumes. He just observed everything and didn't make a peep the entire night.

As for the costumes -- it was a drama this year! I was trying to be so frugal, so I waited and waited to find costumes. We found Garrett's cow costume at a second hand store for $5 -- what a deal! Cole was going to be a spider that a girl in our ward was going to loan us. I even had Cole learn a Halloween song called "The Very Scary Spider" to go with the outfit. Well, when I got the outfit it was black crushed velvet with purple satin and black lace on it. Not quite what I pictured my little guy wearing. My cute friend, Traci, saved the day and sent us the fire fighter costume. It arrived the day before the trunk-or-treat. Thanks, Traci! I would hate to have to explain to Cole in years to come why he was draped in a crushed velvet costume!! After all the drama and stress, they sure looked cute!! I think next year I will start a little earlier and be a little more prepared...

Darling kids! Aren't their costumes so cute?!


Decorating sugar cookies (and eating them too!)



Carving pumpkins -- what a great jack-o-lantern