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.

All You Need is Fath, Trust, and Pixie Dust

I've been thinking a lot about Peter Pan lately. Peter, the Lost Boys, Captain Hook and his sidekick Mr. Smee consume a large part of our day to day life. 

We watch Peter Pan at LEAST a million times a week. We watch Jake and the Neverland Pirates, we watch Tinkerbell movies. And lets not forget one of my favorite movies, Hook, the one with Robin Williams. (Rufio! Rufio! Ru-fi-oooooo!)
 

 And we play. We pretend. Sometimes, Savannah is Peter and I'm that dastardly Hook. Other times, when she's feeling a little mischievous, she will be Hook and I'm Tigerlilly and she's trying to capture me. We chase our shadows, and one time, I even caught her scrubbing her feet furiously with a bar of soap, and when I asked what she was doing, she said "I'm trying to get my shadow back on!" She asks to wear her Tinkerbell costume everywhere. And she talks like a pirate constantly. I'll ask her to go grab Deagan and diaper, and she will salute me and sharply reply "Aye, aye sir!"

She will fill her backpack with snacks and toys, then march into whatever room I'm in and say "Hey Mom, I'm going to Neverland ok? I'll see you later!" and then runs off into another room.

And her grandpa Peacock bought her a Jake, Hook and crocodile figures, and her Grandma Stokes bought her the Jolly Roger ship. Oh boy, she's in heaven!

^Playing with Jake and Hook while waiting for our food, then carrying them in her pockets^

And these last couple of weeks when I tuck my little pirate in bed to dream of mermaids and Indians, I sit down to catch up on Once Upon a Time (I have to say, Hook is much more handsome than he is in the cartoon... Juuuuussssttt sayin'.)

So as you can see, we are kind of Peter Pan experts around here. 

Today, I was thinking about that saying "little girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice, and little boys are made of snips and snails and puppy dog tails." And as I watched Savannah wave her fake hook in Deagan's face and watched him giggle and try to grab for it, I thought "My children are made of faith, trust, and pixie dust."

The last several months have been a bit of a roller coaster for me. Between having a baby and adjusting to two babies (going from one to two is SO much harder than going from zero to one, just FYI) And then trying to keep up on housework, then school started and I'm battling the financial aid office to get my grant sorted out. Then the fact that I no longer have health insurance and I've got to get that all figured out. And trying to make friends in my ward and volunteering for events, and trying my best to be a good mom, and trying not to ask my parents for too much help, and being a supportive wife. And bills, and obligations, and stress and, and, and...

Well, some days I just feel like crawling under my blanket and never moving. It took all I had to get out of my sweats and into real pants to run to the bank today. I was not going to even think about washing my hair or put on makeup.

Some days I wish I really was in Neverland. Always being a child and never growing up, with no responsibility and no hardships and adventure at every turn. With fairies and pirates, and mermaids and Indians. Not testing center clerks who don't know what they are doing, or financial aid bureaucracy hoops to jump through, or how about door-to-door salesmen? I'd take a pirate over a salesman any day.

And then bedtime came and neither kid wanted to go to bed. My dad came over to grab something he had left here and ended up helping me put Savannah to bed, with no meltdowns from her, and I stuck Deagan in the jumper until he wore himself out.

But when I went to go check on the both of them later, I could see in their sleepy faces everything that I need to get me through the stressful times.

Faith, trust, and a little bit of pixie dust.

 

And it's because of them, that I don't every truly have to grow up. I can play and be a kid right there with them. And that's when I realized that my home is it's own special version of Neverland. Pirates and pixies and all.