Halloween 2016!

Ok. So things are about to get crazy here. Like, legitimately insane. Our November is looking as booked as humanly possible. So, I'm going to try and get blogs in where I can. I'll update you on all of that later. 

But first, I have to finish up October. I don't have a ton to report for you, because it's been a lot of cleaning and packing. But, hey, the garage is looking awesome, the box towers have grown taller than me, but I'm also going a little crazy with the house closing in on me. 

A couple of days before Halloween, I thought to myself 'crap. I have to make Hayden a costume.' He decided he wanted to be Link from the Zelda video games. At this point, I was like 'maybe I should just buy one.' But, they were all ridiculously expensive. I decided I would buy the hat for $6 on Amazon, and make the rest. A little Duct tape, a few pieces of yellow foam, an over sized shirt, and ta da! The belt is entirely duct tape, and then we lined the sleeves and the hem at the bottom with the tape. 

Then, I took the same couple of pieces of foam, some grey duct tape (and thanks to moving, I have tons of duct tape), and a heavy blue poster board, and I made him a shield. 

Peyton wavered on whether or not he wanted to go Trick or Treating. Last year, he didn't go, but he had all that candy from the Not So Scary Halloween Party. He decided last minute, that he did in fact want to go, which meant I had to come up with a second costume. I suggested a Pokemon trainer, and he said that he would do that, but wanted to be the original Pokemon trainer, Red. I thought it was a pretty good idea when I turned a trick or treat pumpkin into a Pokeball. I have some crafting skills. I also made his hat, and his little emblem thing, but apparently, in my big rush that has been the last week, I didn't take an up close picture of those. 

Calib, meanwhile, said he would just hand out the candy in his horse mask. 

Halloween morning, I made some pumpkin shaped pancakes for the boys to decorate. It's kind of my go-to  themed brunch for the holidays. We do turkey's on Thanksgiving, Santas on Christmas Eve, Bunnies on Easter, and Pumpkins on Halloween. 

On Halloween, we decided to open up the Candy Bar Election Voting, so we worked on that during the day (I'll get to that later too), and then realized we needed to make a quick Publix run. Asa and I had been there earlier in the day, and noticed the store was once again doing trick or treat, and our run just happened to coincide with that, so Hayden put on his costume to tag along. 

It's just a couple of stops throughout the store, but it's always a nice little quick trip. And his costume was a hit. 

Usually on Halloween, we have a whole day dedicated to Halloween events, but like I said, things have been a bit crazy here. The boys did say they wanted to do the donut game we always do, if we did nothing else. I basically just tie some donuts up across the palm trees, and we see who can eat it without using their hands, or dropping any. 

Peyton won, Hayden dropped half his donut, and in the couple of years we've been playing this, Calib has never improved. There's always next year. 

We always do a low country boil for Halloween dinner, but I realized last minute that our giant pot we hardly use (but need for the Low Country Boil), was already packed away. So, we settled for a quick dinner of frozen pizzas, salad, and fruit. 

For dessert, we had a cute Halloween minicake from the Publix deli. 

And then it was time for Trick or Treating. 

Calib stayed behind for handing out candy, but he told me to come back and help him, because he didn't want to do it alone. (Last year he had Peyton for company). 

We decided since it was Ellie's first Halloween, she should come along. Plus, it's cooling down, and she needs the exercise, what with her massive summer weight gain. It's a pretty good trick or treat neighborhood, and lots of people really decorate their houses. 

When Ellie was ready to go back, I left the boys and Asa and sat down with Calib to help hand out candy. Ellie stayed with us, and soaked in all the pets from the neighborhood kids. She is such a good dog, and several people just loved on her, and I made sure to tell everyone she was a shelter dog, and there are plenty of other ones just like Ellie still waiting for homes. She's a good ambassador. 

Peyton and Hayden came back when there was no more room in their buckets. They've also been pretty good about sharing with Calib, which is nice. 

 That does it for Halloween. 

The next night, Asa decided since we had all the stuff for a low country boil, he could make our small pot work. It nearly overflowed like 8 times, and took forever to cook everything. But, it did work. 

In other news, we had a taco bar for football Sunday. The Bucs lost, in overtime, in a very Bucs way. But, at least we had tacos and nachos to cheer us up. They play tonight, and I managed to snag two free tickets. So, Calib and I are going to go, since Asa has to work. I wonder if we'll make it past halftime. If it gets ugly, we're out of there. 

And my puppies can never pass up on a football Sunday. I think it's their favorite day of the week. 

The Halloween Pokemon Event was also very popular in this house, Peyton rode his bike a whole lot, and him and Asa even came across a few friends, including a tortoise and an alligator. 

The Candy Bar Election is also in full swing here, because I need a few more things to do. It's actually really great we're doing this project, because on the days I can't seem to fit in a whole lot of school work, we do have this to work on. Peyton is the Chewy Party Chairman, and really trying to drum up support for Sour Patch Kids. He had a script and everything. It's kind of amazing, and if you haven't gotten a campaign phone call, I highly recommend it. 

 Apparently, I never moved over my contacts into my new phone. (I don't really call people, or text, or really use my phone at all) At one point I told Peyton he could really call anyone in my contacts and he was like 'All six of them?' So, there's that. I did find it really funny when he placed a campaign call to Calib and Hayden though. 

We did another video on just how the election process works. And, we got a whole lot more footage for our Blooper reel. You can find that on my Facebook page, it's kind of amazing. I think Asa is going to put it on youtube too. It's 17 minutes of awesomeness. 

 

Voting for the Candy Bar Election is now underway. The voting booth at our house is proof I keep too many things for too long. I used this thing once, for a week, four years ago, and it was still in the garage. On the upside, I took a few minutes to update it, and ta da! 

 

 The boys have been recording the votes every night. Calib gets the official ballots for each state, Hayden marks them, and Peyton records the map. Calib is also the tally guy for electoral votes. It's a good system. Right now, Reese's is leading 24  to 19, but I noticed we had some more votes for Sour Patch in our election email this morning. We'll have to do our updates tonight before Calib and I head off to the game. 

Asa and I did make it to another political rally yesterday. But, I will save all of that for our Election Blog. I'm planning on writing a little each night, and then publishing once I string a few nights together. That's the plan for the next couple weeks, but we'll see how it goes. I leave you with a cute Ellie picture. She likes to pout after she gets her eardrops. She's almost done with them though! 

Next Up: Decision 2016 Mania!