The Seidel Family: Halloween 2016!

Before I tell you all about our Halloween night last night, let me just say that our kids LOVE Halloween. Halloween is not a holiday I remember loving that much. I'm sure I loved it when I was little, but we didn't trick or treat in neighborhoods and I just don't remember much about it. But, since last year, both kids have gotten into the decorations, the skeletons/zombies/bats/witches/etc., the trick or treating, the costumes, everything! Last year, Vic helped the kids decorate their bedrooms with orange and purple lights, spiderwebs, and spiders. But, this year, they decorated the playroom instead with lights and banners. On that day, the kids even made cards to tape all over the room of eyeball stickers. As the month has passed, they got their Halloween costumes in and tried them out, or other costumes they had, multiple times. We've been to 3 Fall Festivals; one at OSLC and then I took Grace to Grace Bible Church and Atticus to Christ UMC for each of their fall festivals and trunk or treats. The last few days have been spent making decorations for our house. Mostly Atticus has cute and drawn and created lots of paper decorations. AND, they turned Grace's doll house into a Haunted house complete with stickers, spiderwebs, plastic fingers and spiders surrounding it and bats stuck to the fireplace. They have talked about Halloween and loved the candy and treats they've gotten. They even practiced trick or treating yesterday all around the house with GG giving out candy they'd already gotten at fall festivals. They have just been so excited this month! And, we haven't even carved jack-o-lanterns or decorated cookies because I just didn't get to it, yet they still had a great month of October. Here are some quick October pics.

Pumpkin Patch 2016

Skeletor joined our family this year. He has slept in beds, sat in chairs and hung from the fireplace all month.

This is our neighbors house. The kids have loved it!

Apple Bobbing at the Fall Festival

What you don't know about this picture is that when the kids took off those cute little owl headbands, they had pink rings around their heads from the dye on the foam. Atticus wore his longer than Grace and it took all week for that dye to wear off his head and hair!

Fall Festival at OSLC.

Fall Festival with just Grace one night. Her favorite part was just pointing out every single Disney Princess costume on every single little girl there.

You can see a few of the decorations on their haunted dollhouse. And notice their mummy pj's!

This was their practice trick or treating run with GG this weekend.

And here is another fall festival selfie with my Atticus.

So, this leads us to Halloween last night. They chose their Halloween costumes a few weeks ago and I just bought them. The past few years, I have borrowed costumes or pieced them together with minor craftwork or GG has made the costume. But, this year, it was easiest to go to Amazon and just buy them. Atticus was a storm trooper and Grace was Princess Belle. Everly's costume was Olivia's last year...a precious little strawberry! They have been very excited to wear their costumes!

It was funny because a couple of days ago, Grace was getting out of the bathtub when she started telling me and Vic what everyone was going to be for Halloween. She stated "I will be Princess Belle; Atticus will be a storm trooper; Everly will be a strawberry; GG will be a witch; Mommy will be a babysitter; Daddy will be the Beast and Atticus will shoot him. " What? I thought it was so funny that she wanted the Beast gone; she watched the movie for the first time this past week and she didn't think she really liked it and really didn't like the Beast. So, Daddy is the Beast and poor guy is going to get shot by the storm trooper. We just thought it was so funny that she had it all figured out. Oh, and I loved that she just decided I was going to be a babysitter!? Funny girl.

So, by Monday at 6, the kids were dressed and ready to trick or treat! We took pictures and took off. Grace really wanted Atticus to go with her each time to each house, although he was usually running ahead. I thought it was sweet she needed his help. But, eventually, she got into the swing of things and would run as fast as those legs could carry her from house to house. She ran out of gas towards the end, but honestly, we were all out of gas. Atticus wanted to go to every single house to get every possible amount of candy he could get. He was getting so tired towards the end, but really wanted that candy! He looked great as a storm trooper and at one point, when he saw Darth Vader, he said "that's my boss!" Grace, on the other hand, was the perfect princess. I couldn't get many pictures to do this justice, but she was so funny because she walked (or actually ran!) around holding her skirt out to the side all night. She thought she looked so beautiful and although her crown didn't make it out the door, she looked like the most beautiful princess. When Vic saw her dressed up, he said "Oh Grace; I'm going to have a hard time on your wedding day." Ha! He has no idea! And finally, our little Everly was such a good sport riding around in her stroller for two hours. She was the cutest little strawberry but she did not have any idea what was going on and we were just glad she didn't get upset. Next year, she will have more fun! And while Vic and I did not dress up as a babysitter or the Beast, GG outdid herself as a witch! She looked great and the kids have loved that hat all weekend!

One other quick thing before we get to the pictures; So, our neighbors diagonal to our house set up a fantastic Halloween yard with a witch that speaks, zombies, bats, ghosts, skeletons, the works. This is the 2nd year they have done this and the kids LOVE to go visit their house during the day and especially at night. So, GG had a great idea to make a batch of Monster Munch (white chocolate covered popcorn with m&m's, candy corns, and sprinkles) and take a bag of it to their house as a fun treat. Atticus also wrote a thank you note to go with the bag. Although we helped him think of what to say, he wrote it and spelled the words himself. In Kindergarten, they really want them to spell words how they sound and not worry about the actual spelling of everything just yet. So, this note was exactly that and it was so great! I will also post a picture of it below as well.

And onto the Halloween pictures!

Happy Faces!

Silly faces!

Do you see how Grace carries her skirt?

Our handsome storm trooper. I bet he would have been the storm trooper to leave Darth Vader and turn back to the good side!

Both Grace and Atticus are excited candy and treat receivers. They get so excited about whatever piece of candy they just got. Well, Grace squealed when someone gave her princess stickers! She ran towards me to show me while the homeowners had her come back for her candy as well. She was so excited!