Halloween 2011

Halloween wins the award for being the holiday that drags on the longest.  One thing is for sure, the kids get good use out of their costumes each year.

We kicked off Halloween at Sam's preschool for the annual parade and concert.

Sam and Mrs. Katie (Snow White and Snow White)

As you can see, Thatcher LOVED his Alligator costume...

Sam and her teacher, Mrs. Cindy

The next day we went to a Halloween party at a friend's house and Thatcher started to get the hang of wearing his costume, sort of...

Reese made the most perfect "Jessie" from Toy Story.

And then the next day we went to the PEP Halloween concert at the park

Sarah sang the National Anthem.  Just kidding.  She gave the opening speech.

Thatcher and Jack danced and snacked the whole time. Actually, Thatcher didn't really dance.  He was more mesmerized by Jack's sweet moves.

Clearly, Jack and Thatcher had way more fun this year than last year ;)

After the concert we came home and carved pumpkins.

FINALLY, we ended Halloween with trick-or-treating and a fun party at the Paskin's house.

Sugar highs, ya think?!

We ended up with A LOT of candy.  Last year we had a TON of trick-or-treaters so we stocked up on candy only to have a handful of people come to our door this year. I had heard about the Halloween Buy Back program which is where you take your candy to a participating dentist and they "buy" your candy and send it overseas to the troops.  Sounded like a good plan to me, didn't sound so great to Sam.  I told her she could keep 15 pieces.  She spent over an hour carefully sorting out all the candy and was not crazy about the idea of giving any of it up.  She kept saying things like, "well, those people might not like this kind of candy," and "we better not give them any of the real chewy things because it will get stuck in their teeth."

Here we are the next day at the dentist's office. This is a fake smile. She was VERY nervous about having to give away her candy. 

This is a REAL smile because they weighed her candy and in return they gave her 5 dollars! She was thrilled to have actual paper money (she is used to coins for her piggy bank) and thought she was hot stuff for having "money like Mommies have".

Farewell Halloween! Snow White and The Alligator have been retired. 

 Until next year.....