Wednesday, November 17, 2010

second painting



With Julie's help, I finally figured out how to change my blog so it will show bigger pictures--yea!!  So it's appropriate for the first picture I post is Ben's second painting, which he just finished a couple weeks ago.  This kid has got some crazy painting skills!!  Once again, not from me. :)


This is the picture he painted it from--
my sister's grandfather-in-law makes these cute birdhouses, 
and this is one in his yard.

Sunday, November 7, 2010

this is halloween


One thing I love about Will is that he is a kid that knows what he wants. This year for Halloween he was going to be Indiana Jones, but then came along Ghostbusters, the movie. Once he saw that a couple months ago, he knew that this year he had to be one of the Ghostbuster dudes. We ordered his costume weeks ago, so he probably put it on at least 15 times before Halloween got here. He was very excited to wear it to school and show all his friends in his class. Here he is in the Halloween parade with his teacher.

ready for any kind of slimer at his class party!
Isn't Mrs. Payne the cutest witch ever?! She is the greatest!
Later the same day...Will's other obsession with the Ghostbusters movie is the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. He replays that part of the movie over and over. After his Halloween party at school, Will insisted on making a S.P.M.M. costume. We used our noggins and this is what we came up with. He even slept in it that night, jeans and all.

A couple weeks ago we tried going to this pumpkin patch with the whole fam, but just as we pulled up it was getting dark and it started snowing. On Saturday--yes, the day we celebrate Halloween here in Utah when it falls on a Sunday (it took me a while to explain that one to my Vietnamese neighbor!)--Jake and I went back to the patch, and most of the pumpkins looked like this. We found a couple pumpkins to take home, but it took us a while to find them!

Which leads me to Halloween decorations...my brother, Darren, is even more into Halloween than we are. He did a great post about their latest and greatest decorations, which they are, so I thought I'd include some of our great finds this year. I'd much rather spend money on Halloween than even Christmas decorations. I'm totally picky about our decorations too, cuz I don't like cheesey ones, so I'm always on the lookout for something great.
Every year I buy a tombstone at Target--this year I got a gargoyle too!
Our meager showing of pumpkins from our patch this year.
Daren found this skull at Costco and it was a huge hit!
The eyes light up and it talks.
Spiders everywhere!
I couldn't resist the Mona Lisa, especially since Jake and I just finished the
Magic Tree House book about Leonardo DaVinci.

the mantle
mini-tombstones...I love 'em!

I love this tin haunted house that I found at World Market!!
I only buy candy to give out that I like to eat myself...in case there are extras. :) It was drizzling when the boys were first heading out, so there weren't many kids in the beginning, but after 8:30pm they were almost non-stop. I had to hold Will back from giving out all the candy to one little girl! Sadly, we ran out of candy just after 9pm, so out our light went. *sigh* It's just as well--not like I really need it anyway!
The best part of Will's evening was when we went trick-or-treating to Mrs. Payne's house.
The boys didn't stay out long in our neighborhood. Like every other food, they are also picky about their candy and were happy with the few Tootsie Rolls and Hershey's they got. They talked me into letting them sleep upstairs, so here they are crashed out.
I got these pancake molds from Williams Sonoma for breakfast on Sunday morning, October 31.

The boys were excited to put on their costumes again to go up to Grandma and Grandpa Train's house on Sunday afternoon. Not only did they get full-size Hershey's, but dinner too. Ben was Ben Franklin, Jake was a grim reaper, and then there was mr. buster himself. These guys are the cutest things ever--we'll keep 'em!!