Spooky Foods

This past weekend was our annual spooky foods dinner.  I have to say that this year was my favorite spooky foods dinner so far.  I am realizing more and more that the most impromptu events can make for the most fun...it's all about what we do with the time we have together.  The last two years that I've had the spooky foods dinner, I've spent a full week preparing the menu, shopping, and trying to make sure the decorations were festive.  

This year, our schedule has been a little bit busier so while I knew we were going to do something with spooky foods, it wasn't until Friday night that Chris and I decided to have our dinner on Sunday and make the menu simpler.  We knew that the mummy dogs were Adelaide's favorite, mummy pizzas were Oliver's favorite, and Chris and I liked the snake calzone.  Those three items were plenty of food for us.  We decided that if we each had something we liked on the menu, then we couldn't go wrong.  I decided that bubbling brew would be worms, fruit juice, ginger ale and crushed fruit with silly straws.

Aunt Carolyn and Uncle Mike had given Oliver and Adelaide some fun mustaches and that made for the perfect Spooky Foods dinner accessory!  With a some spiderwebs, eyeball lights, a web with a spider, and an orange tablecloth that Nonna sent, we were ready to turn our dinner into a memorable night.

When Chris brought over the snake, the kids were excited.  True to our planning, Oliver ate two mummy pizzas and Adelaide ate two mummy dogs.  The best part of the party was when we turned out the lights, ate dinner by candlelight and told spooky stories.  Chris was the best storyteller.  He made up some story about the phone ringing and whenever he answered it, the voice on the other line would count down the minutes.  Adelaide was a wee bit scared.  She kept on looking at him and saying, "But, that's not real right?"

 Finally, when it was time for Adelaide to tell a story she created one about a scary straw that came out of the scary drink to go eat the mustard who ran away screaming.  Very entertaining!

Chris and I both agreed that this was our favorite spooky foods dinner because of the time we spent together.  I love my family very much.

Cupcake Princess

Trying to get a great picture of Adelaide wearing her cupcake princess costume to dance class was, well, challenging.  She is at the stage where she refuses to just look at the camera and smile.  It seems like that would be so much easier for her if she just smiled and was done with the whole thing.  Instead, it often takes many photos to grab a good one. 

 This one was when she was determined to get the cupcake to fall from her head with as little movement as possible.  She is doing this while I'm saying, "Adelaide, please smile for the camera."

Don't know what this one is...perhaps she is practicing a creepy ballet pose?

Getting a picture of her may have been a bit difficult, but it was fun to see all of the silly pictures that she had.  I took her to get her hair cut the other day.  I think that she will have her hair shoulder length, in a bob, for a long time.  I had this idea of her having luscious, long hair but given the type of her hair, the shoulder length seems to suit her and be manageable.

Pasta Tradition

This past weekend, Chris and Michelle came over for our annual tradition of making pasta.  Michelle brought over her pasta making machine and the dough and the kids got to work.  After they had rolled out all the noodles to make lasagna, we made a delicious lasagna and enjoyed a relaxing Sunday meal together.  Michelle was very patient with Oliver and Adelaide and I didn't get many pictures because I was busy trying to keep the kids from spreading the flour everywhere!  Who knew that playing with flour would be just as much fun as making the pasta.  :)!

Catching Up

The past month has been busy for us.  Oliver and Adelaide have been wonderful about coming back to school with me after I pick them up so that I can get some more work done.  We have still been embracing this wonderful fall.  I use my camera for both school and home so I accidentally left the camera at school when we went to the corn maze.  The kids had a great time and I captured a few pictures on my phone.  Hopefully I will get around to uploading them soon.  We also made some "delicious" cupcakes last week.  I gave Oliver and Adelaide the freedom to decorate them however they wanted and they came out, well, very orange and black to say the least.  Oliver and Adelaide were happy which is really all that matters.

We also discovered our love of really, really long straws.  

Saw these glasses at Target and had to pick them up.  They really made us all laugh!

Dzia Dzia joined us on Sunday at the Topsfield Fair.  Chris had to work so Dzia Dzia decided to come along.  Oliver and Adelaide enjoyed looking at the animals, being silly, and going on a few rides.

 They were allowed to choose one special treat.  I was hoping they might choose fried dough but they had to go for the cotton candy!

 We went during a special animal brushing time.

 Adelaide refused to look at the camera that day!

We all got some apple cider.  I never knew until this year how much I love hot apple cider.  Love it.  The kiddos are loving it too so we often have it as a special treat at night when we get home from school.

 We took a little break and decided to watch a show.  The show was for kids and the performer asked all the kids to join him on the stage.  Oliver and Adelaide went up to be helpers.

 Oliver lost interest in staying on stage but Adelaide was really into it.

Oliver came home from school the other day with this certificate from his teacher.  He was so proud of it so I felt as though I needed to document it on the blog.