Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween from the Beards!! We had a very festive day full of parties, pumpkin carving, costumes, trick or treating with friends, pumpkin seeds and hot cider. Life has kept us busy with soccer, after school activities and play tryouts. I woke up Halloween morning in a slight panic. Pumpkins hadn't been carved, no Halloween decorations had been put up, etc. So we made the best of our time and got everything done before trick or treating. Callie had a costume "Harvest Party" at school and Emily had a special pizza and movie day at her school. They watched the Legend Of Sleepy Hollow. They were both excited about their day at school. When we all got home we assembled in the driveway with the pumpkins and pumpkin carving tools. It was a lovely day full of sun and temps were up to almost 60 degrees. This is our fifth Halloween here in New Hampshire and we have lucked out every year so far with really nice weather. We have heard horror stories of gusty rains and sometimes snow on Halloween night. I think they are telling stories. Anyway.....the girls carved their pumpkins while I hung up some decorations. This is the first year that the girls really did all the carving by themselves. I helped a bit at the beginning getting their tops cut out and they did the rest. The picture on the top of the blog are the pumpkins they carved. Emily did the smiling one and Callie did the scary one.

Such concentration!!



They finished up their pumpkins while I started dinner. I made some fun mummy hot dogs. Kind of like piggies in a blanket but I made the blankets look like the hot dogs were mummies. The girls loved it!

We then assembled the costumes! Callie was a bat this year. I said, "Yes! That will be easy!" NO, I was wrong. I couldn't find bat wings anywhere except in a toddler costume. So I went online and found directions to make your own out of a black umbrella. Well, that wasn't easy either. I passed it on to Todd and he took the directions and tweaked them a bit and made the bat wings. He even sewed them onto a shirt with our sewing machine. I was impressed!! I braided her hair with black pipe cleaners into bat ears. There you have it....Callie the bat!


She was so cute!!

Emily went as our cat, Roscoe. Again...I thought what an easy costume. Well, most Halloween cat costumes come in black and Roscoe is gray. Emily was way ahead and used some birthday money back in September to buy a gray outfit. I thought I was going to have to make the tail but lo and behold we found a gray tail and ears at Joann Fabrics. It was the last one in the 50% off rack on the floor tossed to the side. Emily even bought silver shoes to go with her outfit. She was what I call, Hollywood Roscoe!!



Finally, it was trick or treat time. Our friends, the Eelmans, came down and we proceeded onward. Todd stayed home and played spooky music out an upstairs window and passed out candy. It was a beautiful night with leaves all over the ground. There was no wind and it was mild. We still had gloves on but no heavy Winter coats. The girls didn't wear coats at all.

When we came home Todd had made some yummy pumpkin seeds and hot apple cider. It was a great Halloween.

For a Soccer update: Emily's team finished in 2ND place!! They played in two playoff games but lost the second one. If they would have won that game then they would have played in the championship game. They played awesome!!!! We are all very proud of them! Callie had her pizza soccer party this past week and got her trophy. One more pizza party for Em's team and then we will officially be done with Fall soccer. I will post pictures soon.