Punkies!

A few days before Halloween, we decided it was high time we go out and get us some pumpkins! So we headed out to a pumpkin patch in Orem to scout some out! 

 

^^Most of my photos didn't turn out. Partly because it was starting to get dark, and partly because trying to take a photo of Deagan is equivalent to attempting to take a photo of The Flash.^^

As soon as we arrived, the kids went NUTS! I don't know what it is, but both my kids are fascinated by pumpkins. They both just took off and ran their little hearts out! Deagan was adorable, shouting "Pumpkins! Pumpkins! Punkiiiissss!" It was like he had discovered gold! 

There was a teepee made out of corn stalks, which lead into a tunnel. Savannah went through probably a dozen times, but Deagan crawled in and camped out in the middle of the tunnel, which was far too small for Bryant or I to climb in after him. We basically had to ask the other kids to go in and shove him out for us. 

^^This was the best photo I could get of both of them together, and it still came out blurry!^^

It's always fun to do little things, like go pick out pumpkins, with the kids, because it's a really big thing to them!

It's the Great Pumpkin Savannah Jane!

Halloween was a hit this year!

Of course, if you remember Savannah from last year, then you know that Halloween is one of her favorite holidays. She talked all month long about Halloween and ghosts and witches. She would come running into whatever room I was in and dramatically stammering "Mom! Th-th-theres a g-g-g-GHOST!" Like shaggy from Scooby Doo, and then just laugh hysterically. And she enjoyed taking the fake spiders her aunt gave her and scaring everyone with them.

 ^Bryant has this thing where hollowing out pumpkins grosses him out. That must be a trait that's passed on because Savannah, despite loving pumpkins more than probably any person likes any kind of vegetable, thought the insides were disgusting and refused to touch it.^

 ^Yeah, she's kissing the pumpkins. I'll never understand 2 year old logic.^

 ^Those of you who know how cold it was, don't worry, Savannah actually had about 3 layers on underneath her costume, and I kept asking her if she wanted her coat but she refused.^

This year, we decided that Savannah would be Tinkerbell, Deagan would be Peter Pan, and I would be Captain Hook. Bryant found a captain America sweatshirt at Wal Mart at the last minute and threw on his captain America swim shorts and called it good.

 ^He also threw on some football gloves. Those sticky kind that are made for catching the ball better? Yeah, I'm not sure why...^

We started the night off by attending my parent's wards trunk-or-treat. Say what you will about trunk-or-treats, but I'm a believer. They are so nice for those tiny tots whose legs are too small to trudge up big hills in the dark. Savannah had more fun handing out candy than going around and getting it. Kids would come up and take a piece, and then Savannah would grab another piece and chase the kid down and put it in their bag for them. She was loving every minute of it.

 ^Her wings are upside down because she kept complaining that they were bugging her ears^

 ^My parent's are hilarious! My dad is the Ylvis "what does the fox say" guys, and my mom is one of the Duck Dynasty guys. The best part, was that my parent's ward is a much, much older ward and so when people asked who my dad was supposed to be, they looked at him like they wanted to ask "What's a youtube?" And some people thought my mom was being my dad for Halloween. But when they came over to our house, every person who came by knew exactly who my parents were supposed to be.^


Once it began to get dark, we headed home, where Bryant stayed home to hand out candy with Deagan and I took Savannah up and down our street trick-or-treating. She was so excited, but it took a couple of houses to understand proper trick-or-treating protocol for her. The first house we went to was our next door neighbors, and once they answered the door, Savannah let herself in, grabbed a giant handful of candy, and then proceeded to walk into their living room and play with the toys that were there.

 ^Sage was Peter Pan too!^

But after a couple more houses, she got the hang of it.

 She had a blast seeing all of the kids dressed up. One little boy was dressed like Jake from Jake and the Neverland Pirates (her favorite) and he was walking past us, and Savannah yelled "Hey! Hey kid! Follow me, Pirates! Follow me to Neverland!" She was a little bummed when they just kept walking.

She liked running up to all the houses and knocking on the doors herself. She kept telling me to  wait at the bottom of people's porches, but I followed her (a few steps behind) because most of the time, she wasn't knocking hard enough for people to hear. But one house freaked her out pretty badly. They had a motion sensor fog machine, and it made a loud spitting noise and she panicked and jumped into my arms. I've never actually SEEN a person jump into someone's arms because they were sacared except in cartoons, but Savannah ran off the porch and leaped into my arms saying "No! I don't like the smoke! I don't like it!" After that, she was too scared to go knock on doors, and would wait at the bottom of porches saying "You go mom, you go knock and get candy ok?" So we only hit a few more houses after that.

At one point, we were coming back down the street and were heading to the house across from mine, when I looked over and saw someone dressed in all black with a black hoodie pulled over their head hiding under the window, and looking into my house. I was really creeped out and was ready to call Bryant and tell him someone was creepin' out the window.  But then he turned around and yelled "It's the Knicks and the Bulls!" And a guy behind me yelled back "What's the score?"


Aha, I got it then. He was just a guy trying to see what game was playing on my TV... Which is still creepy.

My parents and my brother and his wife, my sister and my grandparents all came over to visit that night and we ordered pizza and watched Beetlejuice. It was really great to have everyone there!

 

^The next morning, she marched into my room, crawled in bed next to me, and we ate candy for breakfast. Are you jealous?^

 ^I think I have a good start on Movember^

I hope you all had a fun and safe Halloween!

Past Halloween posts:

2012  When Savannah was the cutest Pumpkin Ever

2011 When Savy was a princess and Bryant was an old man

2010 Halloween pre-children

2009 Our first Halloween as a married couple. And when I was waaaaayyy skinnier. And, I was also Peter Pan that year.

Rainy California

So when you think of California, most people think LA, San Francisco or San Diego, Blue skies, beaches and warm weather. Northern California, however is very different. It is still VERY beautiful. I grew up camping and hiking in the mountains of Utah so I love places like this. Unfortunately, it has been pouring rain for over 24 hours Non-Stop! Bryant was determined to take me out and show me the town. The first time we came here was last November and it was super cold and we spent a lot of time with his family. The second time we were out here, it was for our wedding reception so we were very busy with that and didn't see much of the town, so this time, Bryant was going to take me out and about. So we layered up and headed out!

We first drove up to lake Syskiyou (I hope I spelled that right). It was gorgeous! It was a beautiful lake and we drove up fpllowing the river that fed into it. But there were rocks sliding into the road from all the rain so we headed back before we could make it very far.

Next we drove around the main part of town and showed me all the shops. We didn't go out and explore because of all the rain and it was really cold. We then decided to go to a pizza place called Say Cheese where they have these cool little pizza sticks. You basically choose what you want on a pizza, then they put in on some dough and roll it up and back it. Really yummy!

Next, I wasn't feeling very good so I made Bryant take me to the grocery store where he used to work in High School and buy me some crackers. They had some pumpkins outside so I thought it would be fun to take some home and carve them!

Bryant hard at work!
This is my pumpkin. I like this picture because it looks like a candle is in it. There isn't one but the light from the window made it look really cool.Bryant's pumpkin lost a fang, but still looks really scary! :)

I'm hoping the weather lets up because I really want to go to Oregon tomorrow. I've never been and we are so close to it so I figured, why not? Plus, I have heard there is an amazing pizza place there and i'm willing to drive to a different state for good food.