Halloween 2012

This year for Halloween we dressed up as 

1. Izzy, from Jake and the Neverland Pirates

2. Alice in Wonderland

3. A Tulip Pixie Fairy

We trick or treated with our friends around the neighborhood and met up with next door neighbors for chili and hot dogs before hand. After ward we went to Sallie's house for s'mores. 

Allie, is just now understanding that her name is Allison too. But what I think is hilarious, is that she picked her costume, because she thinks the character shares her same name. She thinks it's "Allison Wonderland." If you say it fast enough, "Alice in Wonderland" does sound exactly like that. She had a shirt that I got her and Ava to wear in Disney with Alice on it and ever since then she's become quite partial to that movie. 

Audrey's favorite show of the week is Jake and the Neverland Pirates. She was pretty excited to see Jake when we were in Disney and decided weeks and weeks ago she wanted to be Izzy, the girl pirate from the show. Our little addition to the outfit? We added her Flynn Rider satchel from last years Rapunzel party to carry her gold de bloom. 

Ava, well, she wore the outfit that the other three wore their first Halloween. I did look for other outfits and without spending a fortune couldn't find much that I liked. Besides, this way, I have a comparison photo. Except when I went to get Ava's photo by herself her sisters photo bombed the picture.

they were just not cooperating today. they were already in a sugar coma.

Her father gave her a laffy taffy right as I said let's go outside for pictures. 

tuckered out little tulip fairy

Audrey and her friend Sallie

The Mommas in the Hood. Val dressed up like an 80's girl. The rest of us, did not. Me, JoAnn, Val, Kristine & Jessica

Lily and Audrey at the end of the night

Sarah

Trick or Treat Cupcakes

The girls and I made trick or treat cupcakes this afternoon for Halloween. They happened to be gluten free and dairy free, so we shared them with one of the girls' friends who just found out she has a dairy allergy. I'm trying to perfect GF DF cupcakes for Audrey's birthday party that's coming up. Today for the frosting I substituted Earth Balance butter for the butter in a standard buttercream frosting. It tasted good, but the cupcakes had to stay in the refrigerator or they got a little runny. Time for plan B. The cake was just a mix. The idea of these cupcakes is to add candy to the top. We used sprinkles, skittles and suckers.

baker 1

baker 2

trying to spread on the frosting proved to be too difficult

she liked piping it on much better!

Baker number 3, still too young to stand on a stool and help was wandering the island from the ground level, waiting for someone to drop something that she could scoop up and eat. She was particularly interested in the step stool we had out that day.

Audrey's cupcake. Since she would soon be 5, she felt the need to add 5 suckers to her cupcake. 

Sarah

Halloween Kindermusik

Since today is our Kindermusik day and it's also Halloween, the kids could come in costumes if they wanted.

listening to the Milk and Cookies story

getting her stamp at the end of class

Sarah

A very quick photo shoot

After the baby shower, since we were all free we took the picture we give to my parents every year for Christmas. A picture of their kids and grandkids. I also snagged a few pictures of Hannah and Ben when we were done.

Autumn and Drew

Sarah

hannah's baby shower

Today I was thrilled to co-host a baby shower for my sister-in-law Hannah, with my other sister-in-law, Autumn. I was thrilled because partly I love planning parties, but really, I'm so happy that Hannah is pregnant! Now my kids will have someone to play with at family gatherings! We decided on pink and pumpkins as the theme and a baby shower brunch! We invited friends and family and served a few breakfast casseroles, gluten free dairy free pumpkin bars, potato soup, blueberry muffins, veggies and hummus, hot apple cider, coffee, ho-ho cake and made chocolate suckers for guests to take home. I did not get a good picture of the ho-ho cake because although it tasted wonderful, the decor I had in mind for the outside looked better in my head. :)

I normally hate games at showers but we found one online that used pregnancy words and matched them up with candy or candy bars in a memory game. It was so much fun! I made the board using the foam board I'd covered from Audrey's birthday and just used simple scrapbook paper for the rest. So each person would pick two numbers and then we'd uncover the word. If they got a match, they got the corresponding candy bar. For instance, if the word was 'triplets' the candy bar was '3 musketeers,' or 'epidural' was 'lifesavers.' The guests liked this game a lot.

We also asked the guests to fill out a wishes card for the baby. They answered ten questions on a piece of paper. We will then put these cards in an album for our little niece and give it to her when she's older.

It was so much fun! Now, for this little bundle to arrive.....

Autumn made those beautiful tissue balls. 

I got this cute printable collection here

We dressed up the coffee and apple cider cups with burlap and pretty pink ribbon.

Chocolate suckers that say, "It's a Girl!"

these blueberry muffins were literally falling apart on me. next time I will bake them in paper liners. 

our game board

these are the cards people filled out for the baby. We got them here

Autumn showing off the game board while I explained how the game worked

Autumn. My Mom. Hannah. Me.

Sarah