For the past several years we have been ‘Booed’ by someone. I am pretty sure it is the same person every year but we can’t figure out who it is. Being ‘Booed’ is when someone leaves a treat or goody bag on your porch without you knowing it. When you get Booed you are supposed to hang the little sign on the front door that says “We’ve been booed!” and then you Boo two other people. Kind of a more fun version of a chain letter. The kids love it. Emilee likes to just leave it on the porch for them to find sometime, but Alli and Matthew like to ring the doorbell and run to test their speed and sneaky skills.
Some years I am more into Halloween than others. Either way I am ready for it to be over by the 31st. This year is kind of on the down side for being gung-ho for Halloween. Fall came really late so the hot weather made it hard to get in the mood. The kids like to help me put the decorations up. I am into more cute and silly Halloween decorations. Allison and Emilee (totally just being an Allison follower) keep begging to get more creepy scary Halloween stuff. I am not into that part of Halloween at all. Matthew and Ryan aren’t either so luckily the girls are out numbered.
Allison gets her creepy gross Halloween fix when she picks out her costume though. Last year she was a dead bride, this year she spent over an hour at the Halloween store looking for the perfect ‘disgustingly creepy’ costume. I walked a fine line between not raining on her parade and swaying her away from ones I really didn’t want. She was wanting a scary clown with blood all over it. Unfortunately (or was is?) her choices for that costume were eliminated by not being available in the right size. She settled for a jester costume that had no blood on it but has gloves with long creepy fingers and a mask that is definitely scary clown material. It didn’t take her long to test her scariness and she was not disappointed. She hid in Matthew’s bathroom and scared him to death when he came in. I told her she couldn’t do that again but he walked around paranoid waiting for her to jump out anytime he couldn’t see her for two days because he didn’t trust her. He finally decided to hide her costume until Halloween so he didn’t have to worry about it. I was glad he thought of because I didn’t trust her either. It worked for about a week, then she found it. There is now a battle of hide-n-seek with Allison’s costume going on. If you hear the sound of bells (her jester hat has bells on it) you know you are going to get scared.
Emilee walked around the store pointing out all the creepy stuff but settled on a cute little bat outfit. She told me it is the bat ‘Mavis’ the vampire turns into from Hotel Transylvania.
Matthew wasn’t with us when we got the girls costume so he is going to reuse his costume from last year-the grim reaper- but call it a dementor from Harry Potter instead.
The girls and I went to a pumpkin patch together. There are many options around here. Emilee has been really wanting to go to the Deanna Rose Farmstead. It is a fun place with lots of different farm activities and animals to pet or feed or ride. They also have a hayride out to a pumpkin patch in October so we decided to go there and do both. It was pretty fun. We have gone to the farm many many times over the years. I have to say it is a little more relaxing now that they are older to take them places. There were lots of mom’s with babies crying, toddlers rolling in the mud, or running off. I’m not complaining about them. I have been there, I get it. I help redirect a kid, and lend a hand when I can. I am just enjoying the less hands on approach I can have now. This is the first time we tried the pumpkin patch part though. It wasn’t ridiculously overpriced and the patch was pretty compact and had enough activities to keep them busy for a while. We all got to pick a pumpkin as part of admission too. Usually we go to the pumpkin patch but we will buy our pumpkins later at the store because I’m a stick in the mud and won’t spend $10-$20 PER pumpkin at the patch. Call me crazy. I call them crazy for charging that much for a pumpkin. We ended our time there by stopping at the General Store and getting a few pieces of salt water taffy. I don’t eat it very often but I like salt water taffy. They have yummy flavors too. Some of our favorites are caramel apple, root beer, cinnamon, and strawberry banana.
There is always the school trunk or treat and the church Chili-cook off (which I won last year-see my post ‘Why I Avoid Cooking’ for more details) followed by the trunk or treat, class parties and more. There is no shortage of candy by the time Halloween is over.
We usually carve our pumpkins a day or so before Halloween. This is a picture from carving pumpkins last year. I think it captures everyone’s thoughts quite well. Matthew is trying to touch it as little as possible and repeatedly saying how gross it is. Allison is completely fascinated and loves everything about it from the smell to how slimy it is. You can’t see but Emilee has a spoon and is pointing and directing every cut Ryan is making but will not touch the pumpkin herself. Ryan took one for the team and is carving the pumpkin for Emilee. I am gagging over the smell while I take the picture. Every year I try and hype up the ‘lets paint our pumpkins instead’ option, but it is fun to put a candle in them and see the carving when your done so they have powered through carving them so far. 
I actually got a carving kit this year. It was worth every penny. I had the top cut off and the entire pumpkin gutted in under two minutes. Cutting out little spiders and other things was a piece of cake too.
For the last six or seven years on Halloween dad makes home made root beer with dry ice and we have pizza for dinner. We call the root beer ‘Witches Brew’. Then we get in our costumes and go trick or treating. Most of the time the McDonald’s come over and eat and go trick or treating with us. We usually split up into a slow group and a fast group after the first few houses. I don’t know how many more years we have before the kids want to start doing their own thing instead, maybe we will keep doing it together even when the kids don’t but just stay home and play a game instead. Matthew did end up going trick or treating with a few of his buddies. He had a ridiculous amount of candy when he got home.
