Our Halloween started early this year – complete with preschool parties and fall festivals. And the requisite horrible cold. A nasty cold accompanied by a depressing sore throat took over our family the week before Halloween. But we didn’t let that stop us from having fun!
The weekend before Halloween we went to a fall festival hosted by a therapeutic boarding school in West Jordan. It brought back memories of our time working at Willow Creek School (a therapeutic boarding school in Provo) to put ourselves through college. I thought it was a really neat thing for the school to do – it was completely free, and there were a lot of things to do. We went for the last few h
ours on the last day, but the festival was open for three days that weekend. If we’re still around here next year we will definitely go earlier. We bought our pumpkins from their “pumpkin patch” and then went to dinner and a movie.
A week before Halloween, our co-op preschool had a Halloween party. We played a lot of really cute games – the kids enjoyed them. I think they enjoyed dressing up more than they enjoyed anything else.
They played a puzzle game (above right where Joseline and Colin are putting together skeletons), hot potato with a jack-o-lantern (whoever ended up with the pumpkin had to stand up and make a scary noise – with 2 and 3 year olds we got more silly noises than scary ones), Don’t Eat Pete (with ghosts), and a bean bag toss (sandwich baggies full of candy corns thrown into cauldrons).
Monday night before Halloween we had a special Halloween FHE complete with a jack-o-lantern pizza for dinner! Then we talked about sharing and serving our neighbors (part of the plan for FHE was to make a treat to share with our neighbors… more about that later…). After our brief lesson we carved pumpkins, decorated, and then started making the treat for our friends.
We made crunchy Halloween bones for a treat – click here for the instructions/recipe. We didn’t finish before it was time for bed, so we put the kiddoes to bed and Russ and I finished them while watching Edward Scissorhands. We made so many bones it was ridiculous. I we probably used about 5 lbs of white almond bark.
We had every intention of handing out three coffins full to our friends/neighbors… but remember how we were sick? And I’m pregnant? Yeah… somehow it just never happened. Failing to plan is planning to fail, and really that’s what happened. I usually plan these types of things out really well, but this time… well… let’s just say life got in the way and leave it at that.
Needless to say we just ended up eating all of the bones. Well, mostly the kids did. I can only eat so much almond bark before I feel like my mouth is coated in wax. We also took a bigger coffin full of them to work for Russ’ work Halloween party. Unfortunately they didn’t get as devoured as I had hoped (he had them hidden by his desk – and I think that was on purpose!)
I made a printable version of the coffin pattern I used (click here for the file), in case anyone is interested. I printed the pattern on cardstock and then just taped them up with scotch tape.
On actual Halloween day, Vincente had his very first costume parade at school! I really wanted to go and take Joseline, but she had been up all night before, hacking and coughing, and she slept until about 10am. (this is my little girl who is up at the crack of dawn saying “It’s good morning time!”) So I sent my little Vince off to his first Halloween at school all by himself. (to the right, Vince as a mummy with his friend in his class before school. Cuties.)
Later I dropped off some things for his class Halloween party (which I had also been planning on attending, but sick kids just need to stay home and cuddle, so we did).
Joseline seemed to be feeling a little better after sleeping all morning long, so I dressed her up to go to Russ’ work party. Vincente had a blast trick or treating around the offices, and see all the scary decorations, but Josline does not share her father and brother’s love of Halloween and all things spooky. She wanted to be held almost the whole time. Until we stayed put in Russ’ office and she just played and ate candy.
That night we went trick or treating with Dan and Michelle and Ethan. Well, Russ took the kids trick or treating, and I stayed home and watched shows on the iPad while I waited for trick or treaters to come calling. We had more than the last two years because our ward didn’t have a truck or treat, but we didn’t have nearly as many as I expected. I think most kids have been skipping our neighborhood for so long because of the trunk or treat that they are just in the habit of not coming. But that’s okay. Russ got the best candy (which I spent the next few weeks devouring – the baby made me!)
I’d say Halloween was mostly a success this year. The only flop was delivering goodie plates (which we do just about every year at Halloween!!). Everything else went off without a hitch, and we really enjoyed ourselves.
