Halloween 2011

Halloween this year started for us in January. At the beginning of the year Riann fell in LOVE with the new show "The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That" on PBS. We had watched it EVERY day for the first few weeks of the year when I got the idea to dress the kids up as "Thing 1 and Thing 2". I was SO excited because we were finally getting to do a family theme!! I've been waiting for a while to do something like this and we were finally getting to do something together. When February came around I figured that was a great time to get them little red outfits with Valentine's Day and I started looking. I was able to score some season sell-offs for $1 and $2 and knew it was meant to be when they were at such a great price. After that I held off with the rest of our costume searching until we were a little closer to Halloween. Unfortunately it was a really bad idea to wait so long because Paul ended up being out of town and the kids ended up getting the flu in the middle of the week before Halloween, when I had planned on doing all of my prep and the rest of my shopping. It all worked out okay but the days before Halloween consisted of SUPER late nights and lots of phone calls trying to get everything pinned down.

Getting everything ready. Testing out the hats and costumes to make sure everything is the right size.

I'm really happy with how everything turned out this year and grateful that the kids loved their costumes too. Originally Paul was supposed to be "The Cat" but when he got his schedule for going out of town I had to step in. We found a costume at one of the Halloween boutiques in Idaho Falls for me and the rest of the kids stuff at different craft stores and other locations. Originally I planned on sewing/gluing blue boas to hats and using those for the kids but after trying to put it all together I didn't have enough boas and finding more was impossible. I ended up knitting them hats and they turned out SOOO much better than I ever thought they would.

Playing with the preschool group at the Halloween party. Our friends Emily and Heather did a FANTASTIC job putting it all together. The kids had a GREAT time.

We ended up having a very busy Halloween day but it was still a great day. Colby and I started off the morning by attending the beautiful funeral of a neighbor while Riann went to a friend's house to play. Then we came home to get ready and headed out the door for a "class party" with the preschool group the kids participate in. Then we came home to rest for about an hour and we rushed right back out the door for our Trunk-or-Treat. The kids had a great time out playing with friends and getting candy. Riann LOVED introducing Colby to everyone and she made sure he got just as much candy as she did. She's a fantastic big sister. We had a great day and it was so fun being together.

At the Trunk-or-Treat and other activities of the night. Riann had a blast with Colby. After we played here we stopped up at one of the movie theaters and in a neighborhood in town for more trick-or-treating and fun.

We really with Paul could have been there with us but he had a great time while he was away on "vacation". I'm excited for next year. Hopefully I can talk Riann into doing something as a family again. I know we only have a few years let.