A Happy Halloween~ {2015}

Halloween this year was super fun because we spent it with BC!

We hung out for the afternoon, ate pizza~

 and dressed in costumes for pictures I mean trick-or-treating~

 Are they adorable or WHAT?~

 And here is my cute crew~

 Again with BC~

We loved having Rosie home for the weekend and sure missed Mill~

 Superman and Super Papa~

 Cowboy PC, Kitty HM, and Vet EK~

 Dino WP, Fern Farmgirl EC, and Pilot SJ~

 BC was amazing the whole evening walking everywhere the littles went~

 He carried his own pumpkin too~

  It was so fun being in Savannah and Josh's neighborhood

and even got candy from the police officer~

 We are guessing the night air may have sparked an asthma flareup with WP~

But have no fear, he was in excellent hands!!!

A Happy Halloween for sure!

Trick-or-Treating~

After a big day of Pumpkin fun, we took the kids to town for Monster Mash.

It was great we went right at 4~

 The kids loved trick-or-treating at all the merchants in town

but it was soon crowded and a little too scary so we headed back home for dinner.

So fun hanging out with Amy and Jason again~

 Loaded down with a ton of candy~

 My little Trick-or-Treating bunch~

We finished the evening off with a little trick-or-treating in the neighborhood

and called it a night.

A fun Halloween night!!!

Happy Halloween~

Our day started with these precious photos of Nana and BC~

 Could they be any cuter?

I don't think so!!! BC's first Halloween!!!

Our day has been full of pumpkin activities~

Read all about @ Growing Whole Hearts!

Our afternoon and evening is sure to be tons of fun with

Monster Mash in town, Dinner with our family, and Trick or Treating!

Happy Halloween everyone!!!

Costume Portraits~ {Halloween}

Last evening after dinner I asked Scott to help me get everyone dressed in their costumes

and head out to the front yard for a Costume Portrait session.

I had a Stylizing assignment for my photog class so this was the perfect shoot...

Real Life goes Make Believe.

I asked them to head up the driveway and I began shooting.

I didn't have a lot of time since it was almost dark

but after about 100 shots, these were the best~

 From the back they took my breath away so I knew it was going to be good~

As they neared the top, I had them turn around and just line up.

I couldn't believe my eyes when I came in and saw this photo on my computer~

{I hardly ever see this in my camera}

Do you see the personalities bursting through?

HM~ What are we doing?

EC~ What are the big kids doing?

WP~ I am saving the world!

EK~ I love my costume.

SJ~ Strike a pose!

PC~ Let me get ready...

{This will always be one of my favorite photos ever!}

The next idea was to shoot singles and twins.

The Big Girls~ {Cowgirl and Alligator}

The Boys~ {Ironman and Captain America}

The Bitty Babies~ {Tinker Bell and a Princess}

I'll be the first to say Halloween is NOT my favorite holiday but these littles~

sure make me love picking up my camera to freeze the moment forever!!!

With this done, I am free to enjoy Friday when we go trick-or-treating.

Happy Halloween!!!

The Witch with a Twitch~

I had all sorts of books when I taught school way back in the day

and my children now LOVE reading them all this time of year.

We're not all that big on scary things related to Halloween 

but this book was a perfect one to help turn scary over to God...

The Witch with a Twitch with a black cat named Kitch ~

{love the rhyme theme!}

 We read the book together and stopped along the way to discuss real and make-believe

plus make predictions of what might happen next.

The witch in the story was a scaredy cat and I asked them what the Bible said about being scared.

They all talked about our Steve Green song...

'When I am afraid' and we sang together then decided~

We are NOT scaredy cats in Jesus and found the scripture in the Bible to write on our door!

We all traced/decorated scaredy cats and copied our verse Psalm 56:3~

 They turned out adorable and are tucked away in our journals 

so we can remember this important truth~

Psalm 56:3

When I am afraid, I will trust in God!

Candy Day {Fun Friday}~

First thing that popped out of Evie's mouth this morning was "My Candy?"

and this would be her lucky day since I had planned a very FEW candy activities for Fun Friday.

What would Candy Day be without a quick game of Candy Land?

We dumped all our candy and sorted into kinds placing them on sheets of construction paper~

 This might sound like a silly activity but for lots of kids {especially kids from hard places} it is often difficult to let their candy go into 'the big pile' but everyone did well.

EK labeled all the groups and SJ counted writing the number then we all talked about most, least, and equal.

Next we chose our fav and glued the wrapper in our journals writing while we enjoyed our candy... ONE piece. :)

Halloween has come to an end... time for the REAL fun to begin!!!

 

Trick or Treating~

Payne and Evie definitely thought their first experience with ToT was SO fun.

We always go to my mom and dad's first and this year was just SO sweet.

They were greeted by my mom and she just covered them in love... like she always does right? big girls?~

 She had big goody bags waiting for them and they loved it.

We met Jason, Amy, and the kids there since we always ToT with them {our tradition!}~

 Look at those adorable boy cousins!!!

And thanks to Amy we got this awesome big group photo... just missing the 6 big grandchildren and 1 greatgrand!!!~

 My 5 LOVE their 3 cousins!!!~

 After my parents' house we made our way to Aunt Susan's neighborhood for ToT~

 Along the way we met up with Evie's BFF from China~ Lily Hope {Sweet!}.

Such a great night of fun and home in bed by 8:30!

Now the REAL fun can begin!!!

Dress Up Day {Halloween}~

Halloween is such an exciting day for kids so why fight it?

Decided to use the excitement in my favor 
and have everyone dress in their costume first thing this morning... 
Why?~

 To get photo shoot done of course and they did not disappoint!!!

Real camera shots on Everything Beautiful!

We were so excited to have Addie and Slate over today~

 After he went down for nap, we dressed, went out for photos, and then back in for a little cooking: 
Thumpkin Pumpkin Pies.

See the vote below~

Most were not a fan of the pumpkin pie filling! Ha!

Clearly Payne and Evie didn't go with the majority. :)

I printed everyone's costume photo and we added them to our journals~

A great memory recorded!

And last but not least we found books that went with all the costumes and read every single one~

EK: Wizard of Oz {Dorothy} ~watching movie for rest

SJ: {Unicorn}~ Goldilicious

PC: {Knight}~ The Knight and the Dragon

WP: {Pirate)~ How I Became a Pirate

EC: {Ladybug}~ Shaoey and Dot.... tears while reading. :)

And this is just the beginning... 

have a feeling I will crash come bedtime.

Dress Up Day... Halloween~ A GREAT Day!!!

Halloween Portraits~

Last night Rosie and her friends dressed up like Biker Girls and headed to Fuse @ NewSpring for worship~

As I shot photos of the littles this morning, I began to think back to all the Halloweens with the Bigs.

Couldn't stand it so went up and grabbed their albums to have a little TBT fun~

 What precious memories!!!

Remember all these fun times Big Girls???

I decided I would incorporate our Halloween Portraits into our day instead of fight the excitement.

A group was my first shots~

 When EK spotted an adorable basket with little dog inside at Target, her mind was made up to be Dorothy~

 SJ is in love with all things Unicorns and Alicorns thus her adorable costume~

 Payne really likes the show Mike the Knight so I ordered his costume 

and book {The Knight and the Dragon} from Amazon~

 WP is crazy about Jake and the Neverland Pirates and I think he makes a pretty cute Jake~

 I'm pretty sure all the girls have been a Ladybug at one time or another and isn't this the cutest one ever?~

I'm thankful to have these photos done so we can concentrate on trick or treating tonight~

 Oh... and the candy!!!

Happy Halloween!!!