Happy Halloween

Wow, this day is as busy as Christmas. First thing we do on Halloween morning is check to see what the Great Pumpkin put in our buckets. (preface: This tradition started when I was younger, my dad made up the 'Great Pumpkin' (In honor of the classic Charlie Brown cartoon) when that Halloween fell on a Sunday. The GP fills up the ToT buckets, sneaks into the bedroom and leaves them on the end of the bed! Dad continued to do this each year, even when we were too old to go ToT! I always loved it so I've continued the tradition. Although instead of all candy my kids got a book and a few small toys too.) These are suckers that the GP thought we be riot to see them suck...and it was! After exploring the buckets all five of us had to eat breakfast, get dressed in our costumes with make-up and be out the door by 9:30am. Josh was an Army Guy, Emily was Super girl (although everyone called her Wonder Woman, she didn't like that too much!) Wesley was a ghost (at least for a while), Rusty was a Crab (yup, the same costume every kid has worn at this age!) and I was a witch. Then we headed over to Josh's very crowded school parade. Where is Josh you ask? He's wearing so much camouflage he just blends right in! After the parade we volunteered in Joshie's class party. I say we, meaning: Mily, Wes and I. Believe it or not my 3 and 5 year old were huge helpers since out of the 6 moms who originally volunteered--only two of us showed up! I was in charge of the Pumpkin Bowling, we did 2 lanes and Wes & Mily were down at each end putting the bottles back up for the next bowler. We had about 90 kids come through in just over an hour! I would not have been able to pull it off without my helpers...I have the best kids! In the mean time, Rusty went over to my friend Pam's house...which she was an angel to do because that meant she was virtually taking care of twins! She's just amazing! After I picked up Rusty I took my hard working kids out for lunch and let them play around until it was time to go pick up Josh. Then we had to rush home and fix every ones make-up and costume. Wesley decided he didn't want to be a ghost anymore, but a ninja turtle instead. We climbed back into the car and drove 20 minutes down town to dad's work. The kids always love going to dad's work and his co-workers are awesome...plus on Halloween they always hand out candy. This year one of Shawn's co-workers pulled out her wallet and gave each kid 2 quarters to get a pop out of the machine in the lunch room. Looking back, I don't think my kids had ever bought pop that way...they were amazed. On with the story, so we got back in the car picked up Little Caesars Pizza, ate dinner then of course we fixed make-up and costumes. Once again Wesley decides that he wants to change costumes, he wants to be the ghost again. So after everyone is all dressed, Aunt Leannie shows up just in time to be our photographer.

We posed for a few shots and then went ToT around the block. It didn't take as long as I thought it would because most of the porch lights were off. This photo makes it look pretty early but actually it was almost 5:30. I made a deal with my kids...if they said Trick or Treat when the door opened and then thank you when they were done, they could keep the candy they got at that door but if they didn't, they had to give it to me! Luckily, I didn't earn very much candy. One time as they were walking away from a door I asked them if they had said thank you and the lady at the door over heard me and told me that they said it about 4 times each...they wanted to keep their candy!When we got home, we turned off our own light and jumped in the car to go visit the grandparents. First we went over to Great Grandpa Joe's. Grandpa's eye site isn't the greatest...It was quite funny, he thought Josh was dressed as a tiger. Mily even corrected him once but his hearing isn't that great either! Which is for the best because Grandpa (Colonel) always gives us a hard time when we support anyone besides the air force. (I remember once I wore an Old Navy t-shirt to his house....I'll never make that mistake again!) Then we drove down the street to grandma's where we all got ready to go back out and do more ToT. However this time was extra fun because Grandma and Aunt Jennie went with us. Funny story: My kids each have a small lantern that they carry when it gets dark but apparently it also gets heavy, or maybe not as important as the candy bucket, so can you guess who ended up with the lanterns? At some point grandma turned around and said..."I just feel silly!" We told her she looked pretty silly too but she wouldn't put them in the stroller, the kids thought it was great! Ironically we bumped into my cousins Ryan, Cassie and their clan. That was fun! Then as an added bonus Josh, Mily and Wes got to ToT with their cousins who showed up just before we were done!We finished off the Halloween night back at grandma's and enjoyed some yummy donuts ! We didn't get home until a quarter after 10pm! Craziness.

It was a fun but LONG day. Gosh I love Halloween. The count down begins...365 more days.