Happy Halloween!

This was my favorite Halloween in a long time. It is so much fun when you have kids that like it! Daphne has known for months that she wanted to be a bat. And I must say, she makes a pretty cute bat!





For Daphne's school Halloween party Sophie was a witch (which was pretty funny since it was her costume from LAST YEAR - size 0-6 months!)



But she ended up being a bat when we went trick-or-treating.





My sister and her kids came to our house to go trick-or-treating. Chloe was a bat (what a surprise for our family!) and Phoebe was a pumpkin (albeit a crazy pumpkin!).

Here are a few (okay, more than a few!) pre-candy pix:













This was the first house that Sophie ever trick-or-treated at... she was pretty much set from then on. She got in the wagon and ate her Skittles! Then she just ate whatever candy she could get from the other girls (she ate right through the wrappers!) and she actually visited about 5 houses total. Some of the people were so nice, they actually walked down to the road to bring candy to Sophie. She loved it. But she didn't say 'thank you' until we were about 10 feet away from people!



Here are a few pictures of the trick-or-treating. The older girls RAN from house to house without a break for the first hour. Then they totally wiped out and all 3 of them wanted to ride in the wagon (Thanks again to Grandma and Grandpa Merrill for the great wagon!). Poor Sophie had to give up her spot and walk home!







Overall, the girls had a blast. We came home to find that Josh had already given away ALL 700 PIECES of candy away in the first hour so we turned out the light, kicked off our shoes, and ate some candy!

Little Sneaks and Magic Candy

For the past 3 years our family has this silly little tradition... we sneak around the neighborhood at the beginning of October and "BOO" people. Daphne really gets into the sneaky part of it. We tiptoe up to someone's door and then we carefully place the treats down. Then we ring the doorbell and bolt for the getaway car. Seriously, she thinks being sneaky is one of the most fun things to do. Ever. We even sing the Laurie Berkner song "I'm a Little Sneak" because it helps pump us up.

This year was even cooler than the past 2 years though. Apparently we were giving away magic candy because we created new relationships with our neighbors by boo-ing them. I'm not kidding. Some of our neighbors have 3 kids and none of them have ever spoken to us. But they boo-ed us back the very next day and they were so cute at the bus stop. They could hardly stand still - they were looking at us all trying to be sly but they had the cutest, biggest smiles on their faces. It was adorable. And now every time we walk by their house, the kids wave and say 'hi.' (They were pretty clever when they spooked us too, they gave us some fake lottery tickets that tricked us into thinking we won $5000! I was pretty impressed and I might have to try those next year.) We spooked 3 other families too and I'm not kidding, it's crazy, but because we did this silly little trick and handed out the magic candy, we have all these new friends. I think it's great.

So if you need to reach out to your neighbors but you're not sure what to do, give them candy!!

Here's a link where you can find the poem and a BOO picture if you want to try this too:
BOO!!

Painting is the New Carving

Daphne loves to paint (something she inherited from both grandmas). And I'm kind of lazy. So when she wanted to paint her pumpkin, I thought it was a great idea. Instead of having to spend forever thinking of something to carve, then carving it, then having a big mess to clean up I simply pulled out some paints and watched the kids go!

Here's a picture of Daphne making her pumpkin. You can see the serious concentration it takes!



Here's Sophie painting hers. I was kind of surprised by how involved Sophie was with the painting. I guess I have two little artists!



Since our activity, the pumpkins have become close friends... Sophie hid hers in her room (which only happens to special things)and Daphne takes hers outside to play in the leaf pile.