Nice to meet you.

Meet Chu the Panda. He is the class pet for Mrs. LP's class this year. He gets to go home every night with one of the students who was a "bucket filler," meaning that they made good choices and were good helpers and good listeners that day at school.  Oct. 29th was Xochitl's second go-round with Chu. The first time we had him over a weekend and we got to do a lot of fun things. Xochitl was concerned about only having him for one night this time and took every effort to make the night unforgettable. Chu got to play at the park, play in the sandbox, watch a movie, and even have this very special dinner made for him by his hostess. Xochitl dutifully drew a detailed picture of all their adventures together. I hope we get him again this year! He's a very good house guest :)

Meet Halloween Deja-Vu. That costume looks familiar... isn't that?? Yes! It's the same costume Larry wore last year... only this year it actually fits him! It was an actual Disney Store purchase, on the pricier side, so I bought it bigish, and hey, I got two Hallween costumes for the (high) price of one! Or two Halloweens for the price of one? In any case, I'm glad it got more use.

 Meet Halloween Deja-Vu. Wait... Didn't we just do this? Yes... Xochitl wanted to be the sunshine again for the Lincoln school parade (my kids love to switch around costumes between events...) Later that night she was my star trick-or-treater dressed as a bride. This girl out trick-or-treated everyone else in the family! Her goal was to get the most candy, and boy did she ever meet that goal! Our neighborhood is pretty kid deprived, so the houses that do welcome trick-or-treated greet them with big smiles and handfuls of candy.

Meet the most famous and spoiled baby at Lincoln Elementary.  Between directing the Leopard Choir, doing music time in the kindergarten classrooms, and just picking up the kids every day, it seems like everybody at that school knows Jade and everybody tries to steal a hug, which she generally snubs... Anyway, her fame also gets her plenty of amazing hand-me-downs from devoted fans, which she loves to pieces! Give her a Belle dress, and she will no doubt give you a hug... So that's what she wore for all the Halloween festivities: "My Bella" as she calls it. 

 Meet the literal last minute DIY. Dawna has been asking for weeks to be Princess Leia for Halloween. We found a costume at Target back in September, but it just... looked cheap and cost a lot, so I passed, intending to make a costume for her. And then somehow, it was October 29th. Um... yeah.  My sweet Dawna never complained about my putting it off and then never having time for it. She was happy to use a costume for a nurse that Nana had given her for the Niles carnival.  And then the night of the 28th, she stayed up late deep cleaning my entire kitchen, hand-washing the piled up pots and pans, sweeping and wiping down the floor... so on the morning of the 29th, I had nothing to do... except make a princess Leia dress!

Having to work with only what I had at home, I looked up a few DIY ideas, ranging from cutting a hole in a sheet (literally...) to a super professional pattern. I went for something in between.

I used this old fabric that's been hanging around my attic since our wedding (it was used to cover up extension cords around the gym for the reception, haha...) Luckily Dawna had a cool looking silver loopy belt. It would have been nice to have some brown ear muffs to really complete the hair effect, but this didn't turn out too bad :)

And now, we are ready to meet November! 

Holy Halloween Countdown!

 What a year it has been for Halloween! We didn't want to miss any chance to party, so as a result, we were a part of 7 Halloween celebrations.  That might have been a bit overboard for one year... we are pretty "funned out" as they say.  But here's the countdown of activities we attended, spanning from October 24-31, in order of appearance...

7. Lincoln Spooktacular: The first chance for the kids to put their costumes on display! And here they are: It's Halloween 2014! Starring...

Dawna as Maid Marian from Robin Hood (This is a costume I wore as a kid... made by my mommy!)

Larry as Aren't-You-A-Little-Short-For-A-Storm-Trooper: You might THINK he's a storm trooper, but he's actually Luke Skywalker in disguise ;) You can tell because he likes to carry around a light saber...

Xochitl as Ariel (another costume I wore as a kid hand made by mom!)

Jade as a pony... or a bubble... or is it a bauble? It's a hard word to say, but she tries...

All the cuties together, ready to party hard!

6. Niles Carnival: We attended Henry's school carnival and had a great time with all the games and prizes! We had some last minute changes here...

Jade as a puppy... or a bubble... or a bauble... just as all friendly animals are called... She had a badly scabbed up nose that could almost pass for a puppy nose...

Xochitl declared the Ariel costume to be just too itchy... plus she kept stepping on the fin.  So she swapped it out for this blast from the past costume of mom's... an old Betty Gentry dance studio special I wore to tap dance to "Tiptoe through the Tulips." But if you ask Xochitl, she's going as the sunshine. Yeah... we have no shortage of girly things to dress up in around the hosue. 

The most creative part of the Niles carnival was this carnival game with three giant hula hoops on the ground and the kids had to throw poker chips into two to win the prize: their choice of donated stuffed animals! I am so recommending this one to our school for next year!  The kids thought it was awesome and the parents loved trading in 20 old stuffed animals for just one or two...

5. Family Halloween Evening: Nana and Papa put together a great family home evening party for us and the Pauleccas complete with favorite activities including...

...Donuts on a string...

Which is fun for all ages! From the mamas... 

... to the babies... 

...and everyone in between!

... Stirring and Stirring and Stirring the brew!!!! 

Other events not pictured from this night included a treasure hunt, candy corn drop, and Halloween themed dinner. Great times with cousins!

4. Google-ween: Always an enormous production!  This year was Alice in Wonderland themed event.  The kids enjoyed such things as...

...croquet in Disney A in W style with flamingo mallets, face card wickets and balls decorated like little hedgehogs!

... white rabbit petting zoo!

...giant chessboard!

... Giant Alice legs!  These were just outside a "rabbit hole" tunnel on the other side of a rose bush maze. Loads of fun, terrible traffic getting off the campus... note to future Google-ween visitors: just head south to get on 101. If you try to head north, you'll encounter nearly gridlocked traffic trying to get around buses and  illegally parked cars mixed with the regular traffic of the afternoon... not a pretty picture...

3. Lincoln parade and class parties: FINALLY got to the actual Halloween... Larry and Dawna had a parade first thing in the morning.  All the classes marched around the school to the cheers of the parents. Xochitl and Jade were my tag-alongs as we went to Larry's class to decorate pumpkins, make paper bag bats, and sing Halloween songs with the kids.  Then we went to Dawna's class and had sweets galore!  Dawna wanted to bring something to share with her class, but as we all know, Dawna is not a sweet-tooth kid. She asked me to make a veggie tray to take to her class.  I was impressed by the third graders.  They all wanted some vegetables and ranch and some kept coming back for more and more! Every last veggie was eaten up! One cute kid said to me while grabbing more carrots, "You make the best treats!" Thanks :) We were at the school for the entire day... When we got home, we had naps and recuperating time before our last events...

2. Bayside Trunk or Treat: Tradition... As always, a trunk or treat at the church building on Halloween evening.  We try to keep it short and sweet. Hot dog barbecue, walk around with candy, the end. The fun part was that Jon and I finally got to dress up :)

So here we are! I am being Tasha Yar and Jon is Capitan Jean-Luc Picard! He even let me shave his head for the occasion! He looked awesome! 

Sparring practice... use the force!

Wait... What movie are we from again???  We embrace all Sci-Fi. 

1. Trick or treat! And finally! What Halloween is actually for! Trick or Treating! After all that, the kids didn't last too long outside... basically we made it down our street and back... but the fun part was that we got to actually tag along with a neighbor girl who is in Larry's school class! The kids ran along from house to house and we old moms had to struggle to keep up with their enthusiasm for the candy... My kids took tips on which houses hand out full size candy bars... They scored a LOT of goodies... After the trick or treating, Brooke and Jon and Alex joined us to watch the Lego Movie and relax.  I love it when Halloween is on a Friday! No guilt for staying up late!

And to conclude the post, here's our little artist Dawna's rendition of Halloween!

Happy Halloween!!!

Happy Halloween Fun!

Happy Halloween!! Here's how we celebrated our scary week:

This girl  is growing so fast, it's scary! She had her first "solid" food on the 25th of October! (and as you moms know, "solid" is used in the loosest possible form... rice cereal soup is a more appropriate name). Dad is getting sentimental, mom is getting excited about longer nights asleep... or longer nights out :)

This boy is learning so quickly, it's scary! He's a great reader and loves to entertain Jade with colorful stories about sharks trying to eat cars... 

And tradition never dies... Nana and Papa came over for pumpkin soup dinner and "witch's brew" the day before Halloween... scary how garbage boiled in a plastic cauldron can taste like hot chocolate ;) 

This year's creative alternative to carving: finishing nails and strings woven into shapes and patterns. Larry HAD to incorporate his scary scorpion and tarantula.

 

Xochitl's heart pumpkin

All dressed up and ready to go: Dawna as Alice in Wonderland; Xochitl as Rapunzel; Jade as our tiger cub, and Larry as Spiderman!  

At the ward Trunk or Treat: Such Awesome costumes! Brooke and Jon Evans  go All Out--EVEN unto the shaping of facial hair --for their costumes... no wonder they look so good!  Jon and I had no such costuming.... so we earn no photo of our Halloween Humbug.

And as an afterthought, a scary skeletal science project: First you eat the Rotisserie chicken, then you pick the bones clean, then you reconstruct the chicken sans meat and skin and fat. We got to learn words like femur and tibia and ulna and phalanges, to name a few... 

Happy Halloween time! We had so much fun, it was scary.

Hot dog! It's Halloween!

In preparation for Halloween, we made these delicious hot dog mummies! I used a pretzel recipe from the Children's Friend magazine, rolled the dough out flat, and cut it into thin strips with a pizza cutter.  The eyes are two little dabs of mustard.

The kids loved wrapping up the dogs... They did not love eating them quite as much as I did, though...

Late Halloween pictures

For Halloween this year, Larry got to be a Bear-thanks to a friend from our ward. She made this costume for her son last year, and it is the softest, cuddliest, warmest costume ever!! Dawna still calls him "Lare-Bear."

Dawna insisted on being a ghost...so I was going to make her the classic white sheet type costume... but then I saw this "Fuzzy ghost" costume at Food Maxx (of all places...after looking at JoAnns, Costco, and Target for a basic ghost costume) for ten bucks and I couldn't resist the prospect of NOT making a costume :)

Halloween Saturday was filled with festivities... we carved our pumpkin in the morning...

...and in the evening enjoyed Glenmoor's Trunk-or-Treat!--which of course included many of our favorite games. In honor of Adele: "Daaaawna wants another DOUGH-nut."

Halloween!

Thankfully, the Trunk or Treat earlier in the month justified a very laid-back Halloween for us. Early in the day, my mom took Dawna and Adele around the yard to make “witch’s brew.” They collected sticks and leaves, rocks and dirt, and put it all in a large plastic cauldron. Then, it was placed on the stove. They sang a song about stirring and stirring the brew, and then let it “simmer” while they read stories. When they came back to the kitchen, amazingly, amongst all the leaves and dirt appeared six mugs of steaming brew!—also known as hot chocolate.


In the evening, we did minimal trick or treating. It was a little wet out and we were all cold. We just went to the six houses around our court and called it good. Somehow, we still managed to get enough candy to fill up our bag. Dawna loved dressing up again, and this time she got to add a flashing wand to the ensemble. What a girlie girl she is… I love it!

Trunk or Treat: Oct. 18, 2008

Our ward has a fine tradition of fun activities, and this was no exception. Simple delicious fun. Chili dogs and hamburgers for dinner, and then out to the parking lot to “trunk or treat” around the backs of cars with their trunks open and decorated. Dawna got all “princessed” up with dress, wings, and glass slippers. This is the first year she’s old enough to really care about what she wore, and everything was as pink as it can get! She was quick to catch on—“If I say trick or treat, I get candy!” We ended up going around the whole parking lot three or four times. My parents love to have donuts on a string and bobbing for apples by their trunks. Dawna particularly loves eating the donuts on a string and topped off the night with SIX donuts. Her BSL (Blood Sugar Level) was above the allowable .16% by the end of the event, so she wasn’t allowed to drive home.

Aaron, Emily, Adele, and Samuel moved back in the same day! They’ll be here for the next ten weeks and then they’re off to Oregon again for their last rotation! Emily and I are both very excited for our husbands to be done with school!