Halloween Party Animals

It started Friday evening.

Dylan dressed up as a soccer player.  He was so good! 

I tried out a new borrowed lens with a crazy good zoom.  

 Isaac watched, then he turned around to see the game behind us. 

 Dylan scored a hat trick - 3 goals! 

Then we drove home to change into the Halloween costumes for

Day 1, Party #1 - church fall festival

Don is Andre the Giant with the ugly good black eye.

 He was good at playing his part:)  The kids loved it, as they usually do.  He's fun "like an uncle."

 Um mom, pretty funny the way you're wearing that bunched up sweater as a fundamentalist "mormon" wife/mother:)

 Can you read this?  The new couple (and my new YW counselor) decked out their trunk for the "trunk-or-treating" after the party.  The bishop gives out candy to the kids after church when they tell him what they learned.  They had head stones for his counselors too. 

 My puppy doggie was looking in his candy bag to see his goodies on our way home (and back to the church b/c I had left my small camera.) 

 Here are our pumpkins, the kids told me what they wanted carved. 

Day 2, Party #1 - Amelia's 5th Birthday Hawaiian Party

When we rounded the corner and saw the decorations, Dylan asked "Is this Hawaii now?!"  Malia and Noah are going in December, so Dylan wants to go too.  So do I Dylan, so do I.

This was close though.  The pool wasn't heated, but I went in and it wasn't cold. 

I mean it, it was so awesome to be able to swim again.

 The birthday girl is in the middle.

They had a lady there who did hula dancing with the kids. 

First, Amalia placed a lei on each of her guests. 

 Dylan was having fun, but said that "pictures are boring." 

 He was a good sport.  He participated in wearing the lei for the dancing, ate the yummy food, and did the limbo. 

 Isaac walked right under it - lots of times.

 Amelia's mom made the cake, complete with a smoking volcano! 

Isaac and Dylan hit the pinata.

 and got the trinkets inside. 

On our way to Day 2, Party #2

(I forgot my purse at the first party so we had to drive all the way back, and I had to go back in costume - embarassing! yet fitting punnishment for me.  I'm always forgetting stuff. )

 Day 2, Party #2 - Cousins!!

 The cousins, missing baby Edison

 The hosts.  Such a thoughtful party!  Too bad we had to leave early when Isaac pinched his finger really bad in that little swing, then when I was trying to comfort him, he had an accident on my lap.  Check please!

Day 2, Party #3 - Dylan and Isaac's baby sitter's party

Their house was seriously like a haunted museum.  Every single part of it had Halloween scary stuff on and in it.  They go all out, but only every other year. 

 There was a skull in here. 

Day 2, Party #4 - Steven's office party (his previous job)

see Steven's teardrop tattoo?  He has had clients with many tear drops.  And it's filled in.  Do you know what that means?  It means that I caught him:)

 my fav couple - no clue who they are, but they acted the part and it was so funny. 

check out their french baguette:)

Day 3, church.

It's not fun that Halloween falls on a Sunday.  If you think about it, Christians shouldn't "celebrate" Halloween.  But since it's so fun to dress up and get together with friends and family, we do.  We sorta talked about it, and we're kinda playing ignorant.  The Fall Festival at the church was so that kids could still participate in something like their friends do, but so that the kids won't have to really go trick-or-treating or go to some scary place.  I'm sure a lot of families didn't go trick-or-treating, but we did.  We went to our neighbors that we know and a couple in between.  We were done in 20 minutes (walking at a slow puppy pace.)  Which brings me to

Day 3, final Halloween event (not a party) - trick-or-treating

 Dylan was skeptical.  He didn't want to go to any door that had a barking dog or that wasn't brightly lit.  Isaac walked right up while Dylan stayed back with us.  One house had a high doorbell, so Dylan finally went up to ring it, but ran back to us. 

 Isaac found another doggie!  When somebody would try to hand him candy, he would mumble as clearly as he could, "frick-or-freat, I uh doggie." 

 That was our last house.
Then we went home to do the fun part - passing out candy.  The boys each ate 1 or two pieces, but then they would tell me matter-of-factly, "when the frick-or-freaters knock on our door, I going to give them this candy."  And they would shove Steven out of the way to hand out their candy.  I tried keeping the good stuff, but they would want to give a couple of things at a time. 

 They liked candy, but they like the trinkets too!  They took turns scaring the kids with this set of vampire teeth.  Yes they shared.  Gross!

And I cleaned up today.  We had a busy fun weekend!

Oh, and I'm dropping out of the photo-a-day challenge Lacey.  I'll still try to post a photo-a-day, but on this blog, not on my fishy face photography one.  I did both for a week.  Steven pointed out that my business blog was becoming my family blog, and that's what I actually dislike about starting-out photogs.  When it looks like they can only take pics of their kids and don't have real clients.  Lacey is established and her daily photos are like art.  This is my first official year.  I wasn't even editing the photos, and I didn't even take the last one so I removed it.  If somebody stumbles upon my blog, I want it to be my work b/c we all know that not everybody reads the words, and even if they do, who knows if they read my initial post explaining it.  Steven didn't.  Or if he did, he didn't get it.  I want to still be able to take snap shots that aren't quality w/o the stress of worrying if i'm going to be judged on my work.  I love the challenge, but I'll be doing it here instead.  I have pleanty to post on there, and will include my family some.