Halloween...check!

One of the highlights of September is waiting for the back to school stuff at Target to move out and the Halloween stuff to arrive. The boys get so excited for the day that the costume section is finally filled up. Me, not so much! I mean really, since when did paying upwards of $50 for a KIDS costume become acceptable? Then when you take into consideration the last time Connor actually wore the mask that his costume came with or the last time Ty went trick or treating carrying all the guns, swords, etc. that his costume "requires" it really seems expensive. We got lucky with Connor this year and on our first trip he found the costume he wanted and thankfully it was in his size. Ty on the other hand found a costume he wanted but they didn't have it in his size and after checking back several times I became doubtful it would ever come in. This is when creative, strategic thinking on my part paid off. Knowing we had just spent over $40 on Connor's costume which will be worn for no more than 4 hours including all parties, I decided to try negotiating with Ty and offered him $20 to wear Connor's costume from last year. Last year Connor was an Air Force pilot. The costume was as a little big at the time so I was pretty certain it would fit Ty perfectly this year. After about 5 minutes of thinking about it and me reminding him of all the things he could buy that would far outlast a halloween costume he decided to shake hands on it. A definite win/win! Of course the next thing I heard was Connor requesting a "rental" fee for the use of his costume. I like that thinking! Sage wasn't happy with the collection of costumes that Target had in her size so thankfully she was happy to use a cute Tinker bell outfit that some friends had given us several months ago and boy did she look cute!



This year we didn't make it out to the pumpkin patch as a family but I did get to join Sage on her preschool trip. We went on a hay ride, ate smores around a campfire, and of course searched for the best pumpkin Sage could find...




The weekend festivities began on Friday with a party for the kids at Jack's office. It was a lot of fun. Each floor had games, a haunted house and of course lots of candy. As the kids went to each floor, they were given a sticker and if they visited all the floors they'd get a big gift bag full of fun stuff at the end. After all the candy they came home with from this party alone, I could have called Halloween done...

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After the Starbucks party we hurried off to football practice, came home and grabbed a bite to eat before Ty and I headed out to the Fall Festival at the school. (Connor had decided he wanted to get started on his pumpkin so they started that while we headed out). Then we spent the remainder of the evening doing the pumpkins. Can I tell you how proud I am of Ty. They always get so excited to pick their patterns that they want Jack to carve on their pumpkins but this year Ty wanted to do all the work. And he did!!! The only thing he didn't do was the initial cutting around the stem. As you can see his skull and bones turned out very good!!! Jack was sure happy to have one less to carve too...



This year Jack and I had a couple adults only Halloween parties to attend. We decided to break out a costume we had done back in NJ. I won't go into some of the comments we'd hear, dance moves Jack attempted, or facial reactions we'd receive but we can always count on it for a night of laughs...



And then it was the moment everyone had been waiting for....trick or treating! Thankfully, the stars were aligned and the rain decided to take a day off on Halloween (at least until 10:30 p.m.). We had a perfect fall day and evening and the trick or treaters were out in force. Like in past years, Sage wanted to always be the first one to ring the doorbell while Ty again mysteriously arrived home with more candy than the rest!




One of the highlights of the weekend was having Steve drive up to spend Halloween weekend with us. He brought along his girlfriend and we all had a nice time. It was a quick trip for them but we'll take what we can get...