Halloween Night

After the long day of partying, we were all so tired that we didn't carve our pumpkins until about 5 pm! 

Livvy was excited to color her face and was very upset when I cut into her beautiful faces!

After we finished carving, we got ready for Lincoln to come home so we could Trick or Treat!

Jude the Hunter, with his hunting spoils

Livvy the Princess (she had a bigger more obvious princess dress, but due to an earlier accent we found a back up dress that fit her princess needs)

We went to a few houses close by (where we encountered a man who gave Livvy a pound to buy some sweets). We learned fast that only people who put pumpkins out are participating in the American-imported holiday of Halloween.  After a block, Jude was done, so I headed home.  Livvy, however, was determined to find more suckers. So thanks to an amazing Dad (who still hadn't eaten dinner yet), they walked all over our neighborhood and looked for houses with pumpkins. 

Overall, Halloween was a success. I had heard it would be so lame and I was so dreading it here. But I have to say, it felt very much like a good, candy filled Halloween in the States!

P.S. Sorry for the lame quality of my pictures. I really want to invest in a good camera someday! Until then...automatic flashes and blurry photos will have to satisfy the grandparents! =)

Halloween Party 2012

My wonderful American friend of mine, Rebecca, and I were moaning about the lack of Halloween in England when we decided to fix it by throwing a party. At first the party started out just being a few of our kids friends but soon it grew to a ward party, including 40ish kids.

Yikes.

It was so much work, but it all paid off and it was a blast. We started the party with crafting monster plates, Oreo spider cookies, amazing gingerbread Halloween cookies, and Halloween cut outs. Friends showed up with cookies to decorate and cupcakes to frost. It was incredible to have so much unexpected help!

After all the crafting (and eating) we split the kids up into teams and started rotating between four different games, including: Pin the Tail on the Cat, Mummy Wrap, Marshmallow Ghosts on a string, and a Ghost Hunt.

 While I was helping with the games, Jude's biggest fan at church, Hugo, swooped in a took him for me. I am so thankful that we had so many helping hands. We had to do the party on Halloween (Wednesday) so we didn't have many hubbies around to help with the kids.I later found this cute photo of apparent evidence of what the Jude Dude was up to!

The last game (which I was so excited about!) was the Witch Relay. The kids had to ride on a broom and run around a witches hat and then tag the next team mate. It was such a blast!

Because Trick or Treating is a bit shoddy here we decided to have parents go into rooms around the church and let the kids Trick or Treat. They loved it and many "mums" told me that their kids had never had the chance to do that before and they were so excited to be able to finally experience it!

We ended the party with an amazing pot luck lunch (again thanks to so many people that helped so selflessly) and a little movie time featuring Charlie Brown's Great Pumpkin.

The whole point of this extravaganza was for that little miss to get some good ol' Halloween fun with her friends. Even though I felt like I'd been hit by a truck at the end of the day, it was all worth it to see this little miss (and every kid there!) so excited to spend time together having fun!