HallowBirthdayWeen

When I was pregnant with Meili, I absolutely did not want her to be born on the Halloween. In the years since then, I have decided that it was actually a lot of fun, and don't mind it at all. However, this year I decided that we need to start doing things a little bit differently. It was just way too busy. I made her a birthday breakfast, then had to get her ready in her costume before school (which she was, of course, late to). Then I took Grant to story time at the library, dropped he and Cam off with a neighbor so I could help with the Halloween party in Meili's class. After school, we ate lunch, and had to get Grant down for a nap ASAP. We had less than an hour of downtime, before I had to get Grant up so Meili could go to gymnastics. Then after gymnastics we tried to have a spooky dinner of mummy hotdogs, bug juice, and black olives and cheddar cheese on skewers. Then trying to get three kids out the door in costumes, while trick or treaters are interrupting every couple minutes. We went trick or treating to a few houses, while, in the back of my mind, I kept thinking "We need to get back to our house so she can open her presents before bed."

 

Needless to say, it was a very fun, very exhausting day, and I bought everything to make her birthday cake, and didn't even end up making it because I didn't think we could squeeze one more ounce of sugar into our diets that day.

 Here is our cute Cam Man in his skeleton costume. He wore it for a total of about an hour and a half the day of, and during that time, he was either screaming or asleep. (The other drawback of our super hectic day is that Cam was totally off his schedule, and in the middle of trying to get everyone ready and make dinner before Josh got home from work, he pretty much just cried in his swing.)

 These pictures are from the day before when my parents came and gave Meili her presents.

 My parents kept asking if my kids like legos. Now we know, the answer is: Yes. They pretty much couldn't keep their hands off of it for the last two days. We now know what Grant needs for Christmas.

 

 And here is Meili in her Genie costume before school. She told me last year that she wanted to be a Genie named Shine that is on a tv show. I was so excited about it, and we went to the store to start looking at fabric. Right in the middle of our shopping trip, she changed her mind about what she wanted to be. This year, she told me a couple months ago that she wanted to be Shine, and that she wasn't going to change her mind. Her costumes went through a few modifications from my original vision, but it was still fun for me to make. However, I felt like after all the hours I put into it, the pictures don't do it justice.

 Grant said right from the beginning that he wanted to be a witch. We talked about being a Super Hero, or something from Cars or other shows he likes, but he just laughed. I think he believes that you have to be something scary for Halloween. So witch it is!

I tried to figure out a witch costume that wouldn't give him a complex later in life, and I think it turned out well. I did try to paint his face green and he wasn't having any of that!

 I wish so much that we had, but we never got a decent picture of him running around on his broom. He always had it backwards like this, and for some reason watching him, with his backwards broom, and cape flowing in the air-it was pretty much the cutest thing ever. But I really like this boy :)

 Again... I tried SO hard to get the perfect picture in their costumes...

 ...And this is what we ended up with. Oh well! I may like this even better!!!

 When the kids were sufficiently tired and frozen from trick or treating, we came back to open presents. I feel like every single person hit on the head with Meili this year. She got a box of cards, stamps, watercolors, and a notepad from Mary Elizabeth. I thought about getting her something similar because she is totally into writing notes and drawing pictures for people right now. When we were done opening presents, guess what Meili played with first? She wrote a thank you card to Grandma Anderson. Aaahhh......

 Grant and Cam gave her a Mermaid Barbie that she's been asking for for months.

 I gave her one of those extreme coloring books, because she and I have colored a few of them this year, and I love it.

 Josh gave her Perler Beads that she has now been obsessed with for the last week.

 See. Here she is writing her thank you card.

I. Love. Her.

And... this picture is a random add-in. I asked my sister for witch's stuff for Grant's costume, so of course, they both had to try everything on.

Carving Pumpkins

On Sunday, the 30th, my parents came up to visit Meili for her birthday. We still hadn't carved pumpkins, so they joined us for the fun.

 

I always buy enough pumpkins for every member in the family, knowing that Josh and I will each end up helping one of the kids, and we'll end up with (this year) 3 uncarved pumpkins. Eh. First world problems right?

 

Grant's involvement in the carving was picking which design he wanted, and then stabbing the pumpkin repeatedly. Meili picked a design that was pretty complicated, so Josh pretty much just carved hers and then she helped me with Grant's. However, Josh wouldn't let her off the hook from having to dig the guts out.

 I took several pictures, and in all of them, she had this same disgusted look on her face.

 Grant, however, was not going anywhere near the pumpkin "guts."

 Grant's showing me how strong he is carrying the pumpkin.

 And... Papa Randy kept Cam entertained.

Seriously, The. Best. Baby.

We barely even notice him sometimes, and then when I finally do, he just smiles at me (and then I feel guilty for neglecting him for so long.) 

 I was impressed with Meili's ability this year. I think in one or two more years, she'll pretty much be able to do it herself.

 Grandma Raylene brought a little individual ice cream cup for each of the kids. Grant thought it was hilarious to get huge spoonfuls.

Here are our finished masterpieces. My mom's is the spider that I mostly cut out of the picture :(

Outstanding Jr. Aggie

Josh mentioned to me a couple weeks ago that he entered Meili in a contest at a local store that sells Utah State apparel. He said, "I said things like: she's read over 100 books, she loves helping other people and is a good big sister, she was in the community play this summer..."  He said, "Everything I said  was true, I just made it sound really good."

 

I kind of forgot that he told me about it, but obiviously she won :), because she's amazing! (In all honesty, we don't know how many kids entered, but 42 kids won between kindergarten and 8th grade). Josh was SUPER excited, I was pretty excited, and Meili was somewhat excited. She won a $100 shopping spree to the store, 2 tickets to the Aggie football game, and got to go on the field during half time. It's funny because when I told her about it, she said, "I'm going to get a beanie baby!" So I had to explain that she would be getting clothes, and she said, "That's not fun!" So I had to reassure her that it would be fun.

 

Her shopping spree was the same night as the community Halloween carnival, so we had to leave early, and when she was sad, I told her it was going to be fun. Then, at the store, everything that was really cute and girly was 5T and smaller, so we had to convince her to get other clothes that she wasn't as excited about. Grant really wanted a lego man that was too much money for what he was getting, or a foam finger that we get for free at games sometimes, or a set of balls that we already have, and Cam was tired and hungry. Overall, the shopping spree was not as fun as I expected, but she got some cute things for herself and Grant, as well as a stuffed dog that made her happy.

 Then, the day of the game, it had been raining on and off. When we got there, it was a beautiful day with blue skies, and I thought, "We just have to make it to half time. How bad could it get by then?"

Famous last words. Starting in about the second quarter, it was a downpour, and I kept thinking that it would have to let up at some point. Nope. Not for 2 more quarters at least. So, again, I had to tell Meili how fun it was that she got to go on the field.

 She's the one in her purple winter coat and hat, turned completely sideways.

 She was definitely the smallest one on the field. And even if she didn't think it was all that great, Josh and I were proud, and my parents came to the game and suffered the elements just to see her big moment.

 They showed a picture of she and Big Blue on the jumbo tron as well as this video of her still waving the wrong direction ;)

 

Josh and I are pretty die-hard Aggies, but we finally had to say "Enough is enough". It didn't help that the Aggies were not playing well at all. Part way into the third quarter, we headed home for some baths and hot chocolate.

Pumpkin Walk

It's hard to pick my favorite October tradition, because there are so many. But the Pumpkin Walk is definitely up there.

 The kids could really skip the pumpkin scenes, and just move on to taking pictures of their faces. I kept trying to get Cam's face in one, but he didn't love that.