Pumpkins

I let the girls pick their pumpkins out at Cornbelly's this year. Alyssa wanted the biggest one she could find and Ashley wanted the smallest one she could find. I don't know why. Since I knew they were going to want to paint them when we got home, I let Ashley pick out two.

Alyssa named her pumpkin "Facey Pasey" since she drew like 4 different faces on it.  

 I hadn't planned on carving them, but Danny suggested it to the girls when he saw them and then the girls were set on carving them. We carved them on the Saturday before Halloween and cooked the pumpkin seeds for them to try. Alyssa kept saying "this is gross" when I had her scoop out her pumpkin. Once I loosened all of the insides from the sides of the pumpkin, she was pretty good about scooping it out. Ashley didn't want any part of that. Alyssa wanted to carve it herself but after her first attempt with the knife, I decided that was a really bad idea. I took the knife away from her and handed her a smaller carving tool instead. Alyssa didn't like the seeds and Ashley loved them because they were a means of getting large amounts of salt into her(she loves salt). I didn't take a picture while we were carving the pumpkins because I had pumpkin guts covering my arms up to my elbow and Danny wasn't around to take the picture while we were working on them. I did snap this picture of the girls as we were getting ready to leave to go Trick or treating that night. The smaller pumpkin came from the Lehi Rec Center Party. Alyssa designed the faces almost exactly the same.

Trick or treating was a big hit with these girls. We started it off in downtown Provo around 3:30 and then headed home for a quick dinner before going out into our neighborhood. They spent a good amount of time running up and down driveways. We came home pretty worn out and with a large amount of loot. Now to get rid of it without eating it myself and letting them chew too much with their cavity prone teeth.

Costume Activities

During the week leading up to Halloween, the girls had many opportunities to wear their costumes. The first opportunity was to Ashley's preschool on the Wednesday before Halloween. Here is Ashley with her preschool class on that morning.

That same evening, our Ward had a Halloween Party. Both girls got to dress up. The party consisted of dinner, a costume parade, and then a treasure hunt. They had fun, but Ashley and both parents were pretty worn out by the time we got home.

Two nights later, I took them to a Halloween Party at the Lehi Rec Center. They went all out in decorating the place for the night. Three of the pictures below were taken before we even went through the doors.  

 The 4th was taken after we had gotten their faces painted and their balloon creations made. Alyssa chose a purple swan and Ashley chose a yellow and green flower.

They also got to play a few games(the ones that had short lines that I was willing to let them wait in), listen to a story, go trick or treating, pick out a few free pumpkins to take home, and grab a helium balloon to take home as we were leaving. They also offered a spook alley and dinner with a movie playing(one of the Shrek movies). We decided to skip out on those two things as the girls were too scared to go in the spook alley and we had already eaten before we got there. I thought it was a good event for them and super cheap for all of the things they got to do. I was very glad that we got there right at opening though because within an hour of opening, everything had lines that were too long to wait in and I wouldn't have been as willing to let them do all that they got to do.

Witches, Witches, and More Witches

Another thing that we ventured out to do this Halloween season was Witchfest at Gardner Village in West Jordan. It is an outdoor, cutesy shopping area and they put all kinds of witch displays out during the month of October. Shannon talked us into going with her and the girls had more fun than I expected them to have. Alyssa loved trying on the different witch hats.

 They both had fun posing in front of the different witch displays. That hula hooping witch was kind of fun. You can't tell from the picture but she moved to make it look like she was hula hooping.

 There were a couple of non-witch displays too, like this creepy looking one.

 These two witches were playing baseball with a third witch that didn't fit in the picture. The girls loved this one.

 We went during the day, so it wasn't crowded at all. In the evening they have a lot more activities going on so I'm sure it gets a lot more crowded then. It is a fun little shopping area with a lot of unique stores. The girls especially loved the candy store where I let them each pick out a candy. It was a fun afternoon.