the dreaded Halloween costume decisions...

I thought this year would be easy as I was going to be the mom who planned ahead. You see, in May, Owen had dress like your favorite super hero day at school. Score one for Mom for buying a costume at amazon for $23 (before the mad rush of costumes), using a $20 gift card and only spending $3 out of pocket. woot woot!

So, Batman it was and Batman it would be for Halloween. We played and played in our batman costume throughout the spring and summer.

Well, one day in August, we were walking around Kohl's and Owen had to be Iron Man... (I don't even think he knew what Iron Man was). Ok, I thought. He can be Iron Man, maybe Quinlin can be Batman (ignoring the fact that Quinlin is almost 3 and the costume is sized 4-6). Ok, scratch that.

So I asked Quinlin what she wanted to be. And to my surprise, my non girly, though sometimes girly girl said Tinkerbell. And the excitement hit me as I was so excited she wanted to be in something so feminine. I rushed out and bought it for her!

Needless to say, Owen came home from school and had to be Optimus Prime. Um, again, he has never played with a transformer or seen transformers on tv, but knew exactly who Optimus Prime was due to the kids at school. So, call him spoiled, but we spent the $20 on Optimus Prime when we bought the Tinkerbell costume. And, he loved it and was very excited. I thought we were safe, as at this point, Halloween was less than 3 weeks away.

Yeah, I was wrong. We had a playdate last weekend and Owen discovered and raided the costume chest at Nora's house. Yep, he saw it... there was no hiding the Power Ranger outfit. He played in it (while mixing it up every once in a while with Spiderman) the entire time we were there. To the point that Nora's parent's said that there son outgrew it and Owen could totally borrow it. So yeah, now we have the potential of wearing the Power Ranger too.

I haven't figured out yet which costume he will actually wear when the time comes. We have a Halloween party to go to tomorrow at one of the kids friend's homes, so I am curious to see which costume Owen decides to wear. Quinlin will wear Tinkerbell to the party and to the party at school, but I think due to the cold weather in Ohio (potential for a rain/snow mix on Halloween) she will wear one of Owen's costumes for the actual trick or treating so I can layer her up underneath. Tinkerbell is a little skimpy, in my opinion.

And because poor Hunter gets left out on many things on the blog, this is what he wore last year... Homer Simpson. We thought he may stay home and hand out candy this year, being 15 and all, but his response was that he looked younger and he likes candy too, so he plans on trick or treating with his buddies.

And- to not leave out Sean.... his go to costume all the time:

"Hung Like a Horse"

Oh how I miss the days of picking out their costumes and them just being what I wanted...

Halloween 2008

they look so young...

Halloween 2009

Quinlin- 1st Halloween 2010, 10 1/2 months

Owen, age 2, 2010

Halloween 2011 (the last any of them will fit in the cute elephant costume)

So- moral of the story is... next year, wait until the week before Halloween before deciding on a costume. I'm curious to see how Halloween actually goes this year. Post to follow!!!



Group Night Out- Dante

As I mentioned before, I like to plan group night outs every month or so to get our group of friends out and doing different things. We've done Indians games, horse racing, casino, salsa dancing, etc. We all seem to have a blast and it gives us an excuse to get a sitter and do something fun. For October, we wanted to try a restaurant we hadn't been to before, so chose Dante in Tremont. Our reservation wasn't until 8:45, so I was worried that being the "old lady" that I am, that I would be tired as it was close to my bedtime. Luckily, I had a good second wind that night.

There were 12 of us in attendance (group nights usually range from 8 to about 18 people) and none of us had been there before. We all ordered different appetizers to try and different meals and had a blast. We were in a back private room, which was pretty full when we got there and when we left around midnight, we had the room to ourselves.

The love of my life

 Jimmy, Sean and Sean's cousin, Mike

 Ed and Mike

Cousin Mike's fiance Amy, me and Tanya, Jimmy's wife

 Tanya and Allison

 Pat and Jimmy

 Annmarie and Susan

 Not quite sure what Mike is doing...

Silliness 

Mike offered to take a picture of Sean and I... we were saying cheese and smiling, and then discovered he was taking a picture of himself. He's a funny one, that guy.

Awww- we are so cute!

Though Amy and I look pretty cute too. hahaha

These two are adorable. We are patiently waiting for Mike to put a ring on it.



Mapleside Farm Pumpkin Village

At the end of September we got together with Owen's buddies and headed to Mapleside Farms for the pumpkin patch. I had never been to Mapleside and always heard good things about it. It was a lot of fun and there were tons to do. I never figured it was as big as it was! We got there late so didn't get to do all the attractions, but it was a fun time.

Playing on tires and a slide

Potato sack slide

Bounce House

What happens when you have crazy toddlers in line for a hayride

 The excitement over the hayride

 Trying to get them to pose. Owen is hilarious because he's chilling on the bench

Quinlin and daddy walking through the trails

 Quinlin and her boyfriend Jake eating apples together.

I kid you not, as soon as we got there and Quinlin saw Jakob, she ran to him, hugged him and planted a big juicy one smack on his lips. Poor guy didn't know what was coming. She says she's going to marry him, and Troy (pronounced Froy).

I love that the kids have made friends at school and it's fun to plan outings to get them all together. I was social chair of my sorority, and I think I have carried that experience into my adult life as every month or so we plan group night outs...and now we started planning events with all the kids. Gives everyone something to look forward to.

Summer Goals- How we did

Before I start posting about our fall adventures, I thought it best to finally add a finished version of how we did this summer with our goals. Not too shabby if I do say so myself!

A few things we didn't get to do, and with our whole month of August being pretty much shot due to Sean's back injury and hernia surgery, I don't think we did too badly. Hopefully next summer, we'll be able to complete our goal list.