Halloween Festivities

I love Halloween.

 

Dressing up, candy, fall.....there's not much I don't like. And I really like good, old-fashioned, trick-or-treating in a real neighborhood. Unfortunately, we've never lived in a neighborhood that's good for trick-or-treating so we've always had to drive to someone else's real neighborhood.  This year, we've been passing around a virus that's kind of overshadowed much of our Halloween preparation so it hasn't been quite the same, but we still managed to squeeze most of it in.

Zoo Boo

 

 We enjoyed trick-or-treating at the zoo and our last time to use our annual passes. There was candy, costumes, water play and hungry giraffes.

 Xury wasn't sure if she liked their tongues so close.

I came down with the bug a few days ago but, thanks to Tanner, we still had Halloween cookies.

And pumpkin carving was very last minute.

Aravis was the only one who wanted to carve one this year. 

Possibly, only because she loves pumpkin seeds.

Tanner also planned and prepared our creepy dinner.

 

And, of course, we still managed to squeeze in a little trick-or-treating even if some of our tired bodies didn't last too long this year.

 Dominick's costume was not all he had hoped for. Both he and I were sick this week and we just weren't able to put the time into it that it needed. It still needed some tweeking but it turned out pretty good.Tanner was planning to be a black and white movie star and make herself look entirely black and white but it just wasn't coming together the way she wanted so she changed a few things and went as an old lady instead.

Aravis's costume, on the other hand, turned out way better than I expected. She told me she wanted to be a peacock with a "really big tail" this year and I had no idea how I was going to pull that off.  While searching for ideas at Michaels, Tanner came across the peacock feathers. I put them together with duct tape and covered the back with blue craft feathers. Then, I bought some blue and green tulle and made a super poofy, peacocky skirt. She was very pleased with the results.

 

 And for Xury, I went the easy route with this last minute, half price, Old Navy owl costume. I didn't think she'd like wearing it but she loved it, hat and all! You could tell, she knew she was dressed up special, just like everybody else.

 For those of you who celebrate, hope you had a fun and happy Halloween!