Pixies and Gnomes - the Halloween Novela

I love Halloween.  Ryan hates it.  (Okay, probably not hate since I saw him smile quite a few times at how darling his girls looked, but he hates that people think it is a reason to act stupid.  And I guess while we are on the subject, I hate that many teenage girls and women think it is a reason to dress undeniably immodest).  Moving on...

As you know, I have a little disease called, "I like people to compliment my children."  So every year come Halloween time, I am busy making and creating.  My children don't always have their hair done or are dressed in the cutest outfits the other 364 days of the year, so Halloween is my time to shine.

This year Lucy and Elsa had a hard time deciding costumes.  They finally decided that Elsa would be a queen like her cousin Mallory and Lucy would be a unicorn.  Well, a few weeks ago Karyn called, Mallory was buying a pixie fairy costume from K-Mart and Karyn wanted me to tell my girls, especially Elsa since she choose to be a queen based on Mallory.  I explained the situations and right away my girls knew they HAD to be pixie fairies like Mallory, same color, same everything.  Of course, my insides wanted to scream nooooo, I had never done a store bought costume for them, I never had store bought costumes when I was a kid either (I was always a punk-rocker or a princess fairy, until I got older and more creative...two headed monster, dead lady (I liked doing the gory make-up), Super Woman, alien, 1970's Carson cheerleader...).

I realized I just needed to let them be what they wanted to be.  If I forced them to be "individuals" all I was forcing was my idea of individualism.  They made the choice and store-bought, matching, is what we did.  And I'm glad.  They felt so darn cute and they loved matching with Mals.  (Of course, I did add my own touch - extra ribbon, custom tailoring, adding yellow glitter to the wings...I told you, it's a disease.)

Leta and Annie are still at the age that they are whatever my crazy little mind thinks of - this year:  Garden Gnomes.  Thank goodness I can just type in "Garden Gnome hat tutorial" in Google and wallah, instant tutorial from someone's blog so I don't have to do trial and error.  Such a time saver - made up for all the time I drool over Halloween inspiration on the internet.  And it was nice because several of the details on their costumes were things I already had on hand in my stash.  

On Saturday we had our annual Papa/Rowley party.  As always, a great time.  I love my cousins.  And, it is fun as you get older, the age difference you had with some of your cousins while growing up, seems to fade.

 It was no surprise that Lucy's costume was about 10 times dirtier and worn out.

 Leta looves dogs.  She even got to ride this one for a bit.

 And Leta loves cotton candy.  I was the cotton candy maker again and Leta loved that her mom kept her well supplied.  Ryan rolled his eyes every time she came back with a new puff.

Monday morning was Lucy and Elsa' first Halloween Parade at school.  Oh they felt awesome.  They told me about all the kids that gave them hi-5's, the baby they gave a hi-5 to, all the claps and cheers.  I love it when my girls feel special.  Afterwards I stayed and helped in their classroom for their school party.  First time for me being a mom helper.  It was cute watching them at school and meeting all the kids in their class.

It was a warm sunshiny parade.

I didn't know whether to be happy with myself that Leta and Annie were actually dressed and put together in time for the parade, or to be a little sad that once the outfits came together, they kind of looked like little brats.  It's like I turned my sweet girls into sassy ones with the added touch of a miniskirt and boots.

Monday night, Halloween.  I would like to say that since I love Halloween so much, I'm just a bucket of sunshine and cheer come time to get ready.  Nope.  I don't know what it is, but I loose my patience very easily while getting all 4 girls dressed, hair done and ready all by myself.  Ryan had to go help with the ward Halloween carnival, otherwise he would have been there.  After taking an hour and a half to get ready (yah, totally thought I could get it done in 45), some tears, spilt cereal, two year old fights and mom frustration, we took our quick pictures, I said my apologies and we were off to candy and to see Ryan.  The night got much better once we were actually out the door.  

The girls had fun at the carnival.  I finally let Lucy and Elsa wander to the games all by themselves (of course while watching them from afar).  And Leta and Annie took about 2 seconds to cover their cute faces in a pound of sugar.

At the ward carnival, they have a little "trunk or treat" minus the trunks.  However, I was in such a hurry to finally get our late 5 little bodies out the door that I forgot all of our candy at home.  Ryan was running a booth all night, so between feeding the girls dinner at the party (I was a sight with my plate of 6 hot dogs, chips and cornbread stuffed on the sides and my other hand full of as many cups of lemonade as I could carry - trying to lead a slow gnome back to pasture) and supervising the fun, there wasn't really any chance I had to leave the girls and run home and grab it.  I felt bad that we participated in the trunk or treat with the taking, but not the giving, but then I justified it by telling myself, "Ryan ran a booth all night long."  I may not have given candy, but I gave a husband for over 2 hours when it would have been nice to have his help.  Besides, since one of us wasn't sitting and giving out candy, it was nice that we each could take a two year around to the people in our ward to gather candy.

I always want to be the fun mom that dresses up, but I'm a little nervous to do anything big, not to mention big doesn't work with 2 two year olds.  I spent about an hour trying to figure out, "simple mom costume" "easy mom costume" "unique mom costume."  Google and Pinterest were giving me nothing (at least nothing that I had on hand.)  So then I went to my stash and found the orange hunting hats my dad had given us.  I added vinyl facial features, a felt leaf and a real pumpkin stem.  I'm pretty sure I might wear this every Halloween for the rest of my life.

You better believe the tips of my Papa ears are tucked nice and safe under this orange beauty.  

One nice thing was that Ryan's booth was passing out suckers.  Leta and Annie had a never ending supply.

After the ward party we headed to grandma and grandpa's and went to the famous Bro. Allen's (Lucy and Elsa were looking forward to his spooky porch) to trick-or-treat.  Leta didn't like it at all.  

Leta and Annie were so cute saying their meek trick-or-treat, thank yous and Happy Halloweens all night, and quickly caught onto the idea.  However, after awhile, they just wanted to sit and enjoy their bounty.

Elsa, Lucy and Clara trick-or-treating at Grandma and Grandpa Melzer's.  

Ryan told Lucy and Elsa a scary story before bed.  Lucy loves scary stories.  Maybe next year we will take them to a little haunted house.

My girls are cute, they had fun and after a cleaning fest today, my floor no longer crunches when I walk on it.

And I am sooo thankful no one was sick like last year.