Sub-zero Trick-or-Treating & Other Such Fun

 Happy Halloween!  It was decidedly cold and snowy here this year.  We've been really spoiled with the fantastic weather the last few years, so it was about due for a cold and snowy Halloween.  As our usual, we headed over to the Sorgens' for pizza and let the girls go wild.  We wrestled them into snowsuits, painted their faces and put costumes on over top.  There was much mind-changing, costume swapping and face paint fixing.  Cailin was supposed to be a skeleton (skelegon as she calls it), but changed her mind to be a fairy.  Olivia tossed her pretty pegasus costume and pink painted face to wear the skeleton suit and get her face painted white and black (and scary!).  It took some doing, but we got the girls dressed warmly with newly chosen costumes on.

At a fantastic and balmy -15'C we bundled up and headed out for some trick-or-treat action.  As a real treat, we had Kelli with us this year.  Cailin and Carter go absolutely nuts over her (so do I) and we had a great night.  Since it was so cold, we only made it around part of the cul-de-sac, but that was more than enough to get an almost full bag of candy each.  To make sure our own house stayed relatively trick-free while we were gone, I put out a large bowl of Tootsie Roll mix.  Surprisingly, when we came home, the bowl was empty.  I'm actually surprised the bowl didn't go too.

Kelli as Frankie Stein

Sub-zero Tinkerbell (with white scary face paint)

Halloween Parade at preschool

Carter didn't dress up this year, but sported a snazzy orange jack o'lantern shirt instead for both the preschool parade and Halloween.  He didn't say much when I put him in his snowsuit and wheeled him around in the jogging stroller either.  He will enjoy trick-or-treating next year though.  I can't wait to see him running around after his sister and her friends.

The day before Halloween, I made Oreo bat cupcakes for Cailin's preschool Halloween party.  I was under the impression that there would be time to dole out treats and to eat them during the party, but it was more of a 'put the treats in the bags over there, take pictures and then take your kid home' kind of a deal.  Next year I won't spend a lot of time on making an intricate treat since my (time-consuming-slaved-over) cupcakes were tossed unceremoniously into sandwich bags and smushed into the students' brown paper treat bags on a table in the lobby.  The whole ordeal was confused and crowded with parents and siblings that had no idea what was going on.  Cailin refused to dress up, but then changed her mind and participated in the parade when I walked with her.  I got some cute pictures and she got some delicious treats.  Win win!

When we got home from that hairy and stressful Halloween charade, it was time to start our own Halloween fun.  Ryan had picked up pumpkins for the kids and it was time to carve them.  I cut the tops off and put the pumpkins down on the floor for the kids to look at.  Cailin took one look at the pumpkin "guts" and recoiled back - "That's scary!" she exclaimed.  Carter crawled right up to his pumpkin, tossed the top off and dug right in with his spoon.  He also tried a lick of the innards here and there.  So did Bailey.

Cailin took about 30 seconds to be completely grossed out, then grabbed her spoon and joined in.  They had a lot of fun.  Carter took a bite of the rind and decided that it wasn't so edible.  Bailey did too.  She liked it much more than he did.

Cailin took the bowl of innards and made a salad out of it.  Once Carter and Bailey had politely tried her pumpkin salad, I carved faces into their pumpkins and lit them up.  Cailin loved them, but Carter was less than impressed with the finished product.  He much preferred to scoop.  Then it was bath time.  

Quiet winter day cookie building

Kelli was supposed to go back to Nana's the next day, but there was no way we were giving her back.  We had a quiet and relaxing day at home.  No more Halloween stuff, no preschool parties/parades, no more costumes, no more rushing or needing to be anywhere, no more candy.  Oh, wait, yes candy (let's not get carried away now!).  I packed away all the Halloween decor while Cailin wasn't looking.  Kelli did her school work and I made the girls sugar cookie dough to decorate.

Making a mutant snowman cookie

There was much giggling and enjoyment had while making cookies.  We had fun watching them bake too since the marshmallows puff up to impossible sizes when they get hot enough.  The kids have so much fun playing together.  Kelli is wonderful with them, and they love her to pieces.

Teaching Carter to scoot around on his back

We watched Halloween flavored (er, themed) movies, and laughed ourselves silly at "Night of the Living Carrots" - a short with the Aliens vs. Monsters crew and starring zombie carrots (it's much funnier than it sounds).  I let Cailin skip her Thursday class of preschool to recover from all the excitement of the week.  Honestly, I was so tired that the thought of driving her there and having to unclamp her arms from their death grip around my leg sounded like far too much exertion.  I might have to simply enroll her in the gym part for next semester, but we'll cross that bridge when we get there.

I've noticed recently that I haven't had the 'big' camera out in quite a while and have been taking all my pictures with my phone.  While it boasts a decent enough lens, I wanted to switch it up a bit.  I've been taking pics right, left and center for the last week or so with the Nikon.  It feels great to be back behind the lens and I got some fabulous pictures of the kids for upcoming Christmas-themed stuff.  They had a good time too, crawling around and making faces for me to capture.

While I was crawling around after them, I started to get a pain in my side.  This weird pain went from 'slightly annoying' to 'I may possibly be dying' in about three minutes.  It lasted for about ten minutes and then was suddenly gone, leaving only a slight ache in its wake.  It was the weirdest thing.  I stopped by the doctor on the following Monday and they told me I described passing a kidney stone.

Yep.  Kidney stone.  And after checking my urine (ew, too much information I know!) it was discovered I had a kidney infection.  So I got to go on antibiotics too, just days after the kids finished their respective rounds.  We've been sick in one way or another since September.  If that's not a good enough reason to pull your reluctant kid out of preschool....  Germs.  Ugh.

So that's my sob story of the week.  The actual infection didn't really cause me grief, but the pills to get me all better cause nasty headaches.

Frosted leaves with sunrise

 This morning I looked out the window to catch a glimpse of the sun peeking out from the clouds to shine on the frosted leaves of the tree in our backyard.  It was gorgeous, and I had to run out to get a picture of it.  The pictures I took simply don't do the scene justice.  Cailin and Kelli are at Nana's and Carter was sleeping so I stood in the yard and enjoyed the sunrise by myself.  Absolutely breathtaking.