Gimme Candy!

Michael and I did some calculations and figured out that we spent about $55 (without taxes) on Halloween this year.  $20 for Elliott's costume, $15 for Spencer's costume and $15 for a big Costco bag of candy.  We gave out all but a few little bars from our candy and when we dumped Spencer and Elliott's candy in the same bowl it equaled the same amount as what we had given away.  So really, we could just save $40, skip the costumes and trick-or-treating and just buy a $15 bag of candy to give them.

But that wouldn't be as fun, right?

The day began with a visit from Winston, of course.  He brought each kid a Snoopy chocolate bar.  

I had to work that day.  I made sure to dress in my Halloween best.

When I got home we ate a quick pizza dinner,

and then Mario and Luigi got dressed so we could hit the streets.

The mustaches didn't last long.

This was actually the second house.  The first house was too dark for a picture.

This is what happens when you carve you pumpkins too early in Arizona.

Oh, and this is what the yard of a jerk looks like.  These people had real, burning candles stuck all over the ground of their walkway.  Um, hello?  Burning candles, costumes, kids.  Not the best combination.  And then they didn't even answer their door.  

We did our street and the street to the north of us and then stopped in for some soup and cupcakes at our neighbor's house.

We did one more street to the south of us and then we were done.

The kids handed out candy for about 20 minutes before we turned out our light.  At one point there were about 15 older kids at the door.  They all seemed to know Spencer and were very excited to see him.  Apparently he rides the same bus as them.

I ate candy all weekend but went sugar free again on Monday morning.  I've only been tempted by the candy once this week.  Tonight, actually.  But I ate some protein and felt better immediately.

Carving

I am going to try really hard to not fall behind on my blogging during the next 2 months.  We have so many fun activities planned and I'd like to write the post about them right after they occur so I'm not talking about Thanksgiving in February.  Hopefully that means there will be lots of fun posts to read from now until the New Year.   Hooray!

Here is the 30 second recap of last week prior to our pumpkin carving.

After the huge wedding weekend we were all TIRED on Monday.  I had to work that day to make up for taking Friday off and after a day of working I was in no mood to cook.  Plus we had no food in the house.  Out to dinner we went.  

Then, the same thing happened on Tuesday.  I didn't work that day, but Spencer had an afternoon dermatology appointment at Phoenix Children's (he's doing so much better- he's almost back to what he was pre-study drug trial) so we stopped at IKEA for "kids eat free on Tuesday" dinner.

Last week was Spirit Week at Spencer's school.  Wednesday was Wacky Day.

Elliott and I went to Target that day.

Thursday was Nerd Day.  I think Spencer makes a very cute and very convincing nerd.

Thursday night was the night for carving our pumpkins.  If we had done it any sooner they would have rotted by Halloween.

As is our custom every year I cut the tops and cleaned the guts and Michael did the actual carving.  Except I did "carve" my baby pumpkin this year.  I just used a screwdriver to make a polka dot pattern.

My polka dot baby

Spencer's Mario pumpkin

Elliott's Minnie Mouse pumpkin.  She didn't photograph so well.

The jack-o-lanterns lasted for 3 days and then into the garbage they went.  It's always kind of sad that after so much build-up and effort that we just trash them.

Parking lot pumpkin patch

Almost every year since Spencer was two we have gone to a "big" pumpkin patch and farm in October.  This usually consists of dedicating at least half of the day to the event and spending a lot of money on activities that the kids enjoy but don't really HAVE to do.  This year we just had a really busy and full October and we ran out of time to go to a "big" pumpkin patch.  So we improvised and went to a perfectly lovely pumpkin patch that happens to be on an empty corner lot a few blocks from my parents house.

But first I had to love on Elliott who I had not seen in almost exactly 48 hours.  While loving on him I also rested because this was the morning after the wedding and I had slept for 4 hours.

Really, the whole point of going to a pumpkin patch is to take pictures with the pumpkins and this place actually had some lovely displays.

They even had a couple of goats, a turkey and some chickens.  That's all we really needed.

Spencer was DISGUSTED by this warty pumpkin.  I thought it was kind of cool.

We asked a fellow parking lot pumpkin patch goer to take a family picture.  I will take this opportunity to mention that Michael was as hung over as he has ever been in his life and had spent the morning alternating between vomiting and laying in bed wanting to die.  He hid it pretty well.  After we left the pumpkin patch he passed out at my parents house and the kids and I drove home without him (we had two cars and he came home later) and went to Monica and Rick's house for dinner.

The dinner was the last "official" wedding event.  After that we came home, unpacked, displayed our pumpkins and then passed out.  For the next 4 days.

The pumpkins stayed inside all week because it was in the mid-90's all week and they would have blown up if we left them outside.

More pumpkin and Halloween festivities to come!