Halloween Fun

We are in Provo for Olivia's baby blessing today. She is such a sweet little Pumpkin!

Yesterday we enjoyed Halloween with Abbi and Charley, too! In addition to trick-or-treating, we had the traditional family Halloween dinner with lots of friends. The evening was topped off with a "fishing game" (Grandpa Mark behind the curtain, attaching candy to the fishing line), guessing games for guess-the-pumpkin-weight and guess-how-many-candies-in-the-jar, and a doughnut eating game, with the doughnuts hanging from strings. Too bad - no photos of that - my camera ran out of batteries.

For those who don't know the menu, it goes something like this:
spiders (hot dogs cut so they have "legs" that curl up when they are boiled)
blood (ketchup)
Transylvanian trees with bat guts (broccoli with cheese)
tombstones (Ritz crackers)
invisible juice (water)

Kendra & Katie and their friends added some additional dishes:
severed arms (wrap sandwiches cut into slices - from Costco)
goblin guts (tuna casserole with green food coloring)
bloody eyeballs (meatballs)
eyeballs (grapes)
blood pie (cherry pie with "bullet holes" cut into the crust)
slugs (green taffy formed into blobs on the plate)

This all started one year when the kids were little and we were scrambling to fix a quick dinner before trick-or-treating. I had hotdogs on hand, and some broccoli, and I threw in a can of clam chowder (ghost soup). None of it goes together very well, but the kids thought it was great, and it became the traditional Halloween dinner menu from then on. Be careful what you get started!

Before we left home, we got to see Josh, Sara, Kat, and Maddy in their costumes.

The best part of all of this was being able to enjoy the children and their fun, without having to be in charge of anything: costumes, menu, trick-or-treat times, etc. It made Halloween so much more fun!