Let the Festivities Begin!!

Halloween is the beginning of my favorite holiday season. Between it and Thanksgiving and Christmas I don't think you can get a better time of year. Throw in some nice cool fall weather and I'm sold. We began our Halloween festivities yesterday. We don't get big into decorating or the trick-or-treating, what we love about Halloween is the pumpkins!

First step, get the pumpkins. We usually like to go to a pick your own farm, but with all the rain we'd been getting, we decided we would just get them locally. We went to a church that had a bunch out front, but after seeing the prices we ended up getting one little one there. But we let the kids run around and have fun.

Alex kept trying to pick up pumpkins that were at least twice his size. He usually just managed to pull them over on himself. It was really cute. Ella picked out at least 10 pumpkins that were the perfect one for her. She finally narrowed it down to the small one we ended up getting.

She insisted on carrying it the whole time. On the way home we stopped by the grocery store to get pumpkins for the rest of us. Alex just got a little bitty one:

He likes holding it, and of course, chewing on it.

Last night was the great carving ceremony. This is a big deal to us. We don't do your normal everyday pumpkin faces. The harder the pattern the better. Though this year I decided to take it easy. Ella has never carved pumpkins before.

She was really excited to get started and carve a "happy face" as she kept declaring to everyone. She wasn't so sure about having to clean out her pumpkin. She kept saying, "My hand is dirty." I had to convince her that when it comes to pumpkins, messy is OK.

Now Alex is a whole 'nother story. He had no problem sticking his hands right down into the piles of pumpkin goo.

We actually ended up putting him in his highchair and plopping a big pile of pumpkin filling in front of him to play with. I think he ate quite a bit of it. Not surprising. Not to be outdone by his son, Anton had to get in on the action too.

Silly daddy.

We had to take a break from our elaborate pumpkin carving in order to put the kids to bed. And what better way to leave things than like this?

That was Anton's pumpkin. It looks like it's been murdered.

But after much cutting and sawing and scraping and more sawing, our pumpkins were finally done. Wanna see?

Ella was already in bed so we didn't get a picture with her and her pumpkin. Her's is the middle one. See how happy? She picked out exactly what shapes she wanted and where to put them and I carved it out for her. Now you want to see them looking really cool?

Mine is on the left and Anton's is on the right. I think they turned out pretty cool, if I do say so myself. Such fun.

The fun continued on this evening when we went to a Halloween party for church. Anton wasn't going to dress up but I insisted. So at the last minute we were brainstorming like crazy. I think we ended up doing pretty good.

Do you get it? I am the tower where the princess is being held captive by the dragon and Anton is the knight in shining armor coming to rescue her. Cardboard and aluminum foil are the homemade costume designers best friends. We ended up winning best family costume at the party. Alex and Ella were so cute in their costumes.

Alex was enjoying all the candy to be had.

And this girl has to be the pretties princess ever. What a doll!

Our friends Andre and Tonia had the funniest costume ever.

She's got the bun in the oven and he is the baker. How hilarious is that? They actually used parts of their stove to make it.

I also won the best pumpkin contest. Even though they tried giving the award to Amelia. Amelia, Amanda, I guess I can see where one would get confused. :o)

But the fun had to come to an end when it started getting too cold and Alex dumped ice water all over himself. But we'll get to do it again on Wednesday for the real thing!

On a non-Halloween related note, what is it with little boys and getting hurt? I don't think Elle ever managed to hurt herself as much as Alex does. Of course, Alex has Ella to help him too. But yesterday he went face first into the corner of the desk. And as the good mom I am I made sure to snap a picture.

Look at that welt on his forehead. Poor baby. But he bounced back quick and was his usual chipper self.

I hope you all have exciting things planned for Halloween! Have a good night!