Halloween Fun

Halloween is one of my favorite Holidays.  It's just SO fun.  There are no gifts that have to be bought or ridiculously huge stressful meals that need to be prepared. I just love the silly decorations, carving pumpkins, going to the parties and the costumes. The abundance of candy doesn't hurt either. The month of October was loaded with Halloween activities for us.  I think Ellie was in a different costume every day, although that's nothing new for Ellie. 

On our way to the Trunk or Treat

This is one game my kids excelled at.

And one game they didn't! HA Ha 

 All month long I wanted to take the kids to Cornbelly's. Its basically a giant Halloween carnival. The weather and other obligations kept getting in the way.  Finally, one beautiful day, the stars aligned and we found a few free hours to hop in the car as fast as we could and head down the canyon to try and catch this Halloween wonderland. I nearly ran out of gas on the way there, but we made it and had an awesome time.  Grandma Andrea was able to meet us there and join us for some fun. We had such a great time and stayed as long as well possible could.  That is until the sun had gone down and the kids forgot how to do anything but whine.

The first thing we did was head for this huge slide.  The progression on these photo's is all that is needed to explain how it went.

The kids loved riding on this cow barrel train.  Unfortunately I was little too wide to fit inside.
Ouch! The things we do for our kids ha ha.

Ellie found paradise. There was an entire section dedicated to being a princess.

Ellie couldn't pass up the stage they had set up for the princesses to dance.

Fortunately, they had an area set up for the kids who didn't want to be princesses.

In the back ground of this picture you can see a number of bounce houses.  This bounce house village was fenced off and so full of children it looked like an ant hill.  We let the kids play in there until Ellie managed to get hysterically trapped inside one of the things.  I then had to crawl inside the disease infested bounce house of terror and make my way through the swarming children and tight squeezes to rescue her. I'd never wanted a shower so bad in all my life. YUCK!

Not quite a princess, but still pretty cute!

We will definitely be going again next year!

 The day before Halloween Gram Andrea and Grandpa Gary came up to see the kids in their costumes and share some Chili and Donuts with us. The kids are always happy to have a reason to dress up, and they always love spending time with their grand parents.

The next night was Halloween.  We were treated when Gram Wendy and Grandpa John came up to join in the fun and bring us beef stew and caramel apples.  We love living back in Utah where we can see our family so much. The kids loved trick or treating.  Even Autumn got into the fun.  She clung onto her treat bag so tight no one could have stolen her candy if they had wanted to. It was fun to go around our neighborhood and see so many people we know.  The kids like handing out candy to the trick-or-treaters who knocked on our door even more then they liked getting candy for themselves.

Our WALKING lady bug.
Jake and I had a bet going about when Autumn would start walking.  He bet November, I bet October.
Autumn must like me best, because she pulled off October just in time. HA HA

A friend of ours told us a story about a Halloween witch who comes if your leave your candy out on the table during the night.  She takes your candy and leaves behind a prize. We were curious and thought we would give it a try.  Ellie was a little worried, but the next morning when she came out of her room and found the ponies and legos that had been left by the witch she was pretty excited. 

The kids have wanted to go camping so bad.  They keep begging us to take them.
I guess they have given up on us and come up with their own alternative.