BOO and I mean YOU!!

This month, that has been a re-occurring theme around our house.  My children will run around and inadvertently yell "BOO, and I mean YOU!" in their loudest voices possible.  Who started it? Why Maddie of course.  And whenever your eldest child comes up with a catchy phrase like that you know it will stick around for awhile.  Although it got pretty annoying, I have to admit it was pretty darn cute to hear Eli repeat it back.  He always misses a word or two in that sentence and most of the time will yell: Boo....Mean YOU.  Anyways......

We had a BUSY, fun, BUSY, beautiful, BUSY, sugar-high, BUSY October (notice a reoccurring theme around here?).  There were definitely several high stress moments in the past few weeks with Jesse super busy recruiting for IB, me working full time and then some, attempting to keep the house together between the two of us, and lots of activities to do.  Some of the things we did included:

*Pumpking picking at our favorite Riverview Farm complete with running through the beginning of the corn maze they had set up.  I will add pictures about this later.

*Decorating our house with a cute spiderweb after my cute neighbor Natalia prodded me on my way.  We also added some black windows with DO NOT ENTER tape and had pumpkins galore, and a spooky "Cocoon Mummy"

*Our annual Spooky Halloween Dinner, this time we invited some friends over to our house and we all chipped into to put this together.  I'm already planning on doing another of these next year and have found some more time consuming dishes on Pinterest I am dying to try out.

 Michelle and Catherine, my two AWESOME, PATIENT, KIND friends and babysitters

Michelle, Andrea and I; seriously love these girls

*Barbeque Dinner at one of the professors BEAUTIFUL Vermont estate on a cool Sunday evening compliments of the Christian Club (of some sort at Tuck).  I will also have to post these pictures another time.

*Pizza Dinner on Halloween at Sachem's clubhouse and then trick or treating with Daddy a few hours later

{it was quite the adjustment for my kids to bundle up with coats, mittens over the top and long sleeve shirts and pants underneath their costumes--I cannot wait for them to all look like the kids from The Christmas Story come December}

*Trunk or Treat party with our church in the middle of our first official snowstorm

FYI: Robby refused to hold still long enough for me take pictures of him, imagine that?!

J and I dressed up as Pharaoh and Egyptian Princess (Cleopatra sort of). No pictures recorded of the two of us, so don't be surprised if this costume gets pulled out next year as well

*The constant disaster scene at church as Mr R continues to struggle with Primary (he just cannot sit still and really struggles with this in Singing Time.  He also tends to upset and angry when he is reprimanded.  We are still struggling to come up with a solution for all of this, but really really want to find something so he can enjoy {I will even take tolerate} church)

*Cookie decorating with two of my favorite families in Sachem Village! (we sure missed you Maren and are already penciling you in for next year)  The kids were really good and played around us and/or watched a movie while we talked and frosted.  Robby did come and frost one cookie, which he immediately proceeded to eat.  I have a feeling if Miss M would have been there, she would have been right in the thick of things decorating away!

*And of course LOTS of time spent outside playing in the snow.  Maddie was so excited to come home on Monday and tell me that she built a snowman at recess with several of her friends.  Robby has been spending hours outside with his monster trucks making "tracks" for them to race on.  And Eli will basically run outside fully clothed in winter gear or almost naked without a thought in mind about the weather.  He will then proceed to stay outside until we make him come inside to gear up.

 Still proudly announcing ourselves as "Arizonans" despite the snow

All in all, we had a really good time this year and feel very blessed to be in New England experiencing everything on our own for the first time (although I have begun to really miss my family). 

Now without further ado, here is my cute breed all done up for Trick or Treating:

 Mr E as Leonardo the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle

*I think this has been my hands down favorite year to experience Halloween with E.  He was so excited and "in to it" for the first time and actively participated in everything.  He also 100% picked out his costume on his own.  As I began to plan costumes for the children, I turned to him and asked him what he wanted to be figuring he would have no idea.  Instead, he looked right back at me and immediately replied "Teenage Ninja Turtle".  When we got the costume in the mail, he was thrilled to find out it was Leonardo and immediately recognized this without me telling him.  What can I say?  That boy is obsessed with the Turtles right now!

 Robby as "Red" Iron Man

Mr R cracked me up this year.  He had been telling me he wanted to be Iron Man since he found out Halloween was coming (in September).  I figured this was because he remembered dressing up as him last year.  I tried to sort of steer him into being a Pro Bike Racer because he LOVES doing "tricks" on his bike and is always pretending to be in a race.  We bought the biker costume which he also liked, but then proceeded to announce he still wanted to be Iron Man.  Last year I bought him the black Iron Man but he was pretty determined to be Red Iron Man this year.  Finally I caved and bought him yet another Iron Man costume.  The end result = TOTALLY worth it.  He has loved his new costume and probably worn it almost every day for the past three weeks.  We have more than gotten our moneys worth for it and I am pleased to add it our new collection of Super Hero costumes.  The boys have had many play sessions in their costumes already, and I know we have many more to come :)

 Missy as a Kitty Cat--sassy one I might add

Maddie has been a princess of some sort on Halloween for as long as I can remember, so when she announced that she wanted to be a kitty I literally jumped with joy.  It's such a relief to move onto something else.  Since I don't really know how to sew and was far to busy to shop locally or come up with a creative version on my own, M and I hopped on the computer one evening after her brothers were in bed.  Together we searched Amazon for the perfect costume.  Let's just say I was shocked to find the vast majority of "children's cat costumes" to be totally inappropriate for anyone, let alone a child.  We finally found this number and she has loved it!  It is the perfect kitty costume that completely fits her personality.  The only bummer on Miss Maddie's end is that she has been under the weather for a good two weeks of October and so she didn't quite get the same experience as the boys this Fall.

My boys :)