Halloween - 2014

This year we had a Frozen Halloween at our house. I was a little hesitant to go with the massively popular movie as our theme. But, the girls love it! And I remember my mom making me a Jasmine costume because it was my favorite movie. I figure they won't remember that there were lots of other Elsa's and Anna's but they will remember that they were excited about their costumes and that's what really matters I think. I love the way that each girl identifies with the princess that looks like them. Mya with Anna, the redhead and Sadie with Elsa, the blonde.

I lucked out and found these darling costumes at a local boutique for a fantastic deal. Both girls wanted wigs this year so they could have hair like their chosen Disney Princess. We laughed because Mya's wig looks almost exactly like her hair except I don't think there is any possibility I could get her hair that straight.

Miss Sadie as Queen Elsa 

Miss Mya as Princess Anna

When did she get so grown up?

 Little Mister Hayze as Kristof and his reindeer Sven.

His little tunic and boots were my project this year and I was excited to see how it turned out. I was proud that I remembered my lesson on how to sew in a collar. 

 This little man was ready to run! I don't know what had got into him! It was like he could tell there was something different about the night. He was right in there with the big kids as they went around the cul-de-sac.

Oh the mischief in those eyes!

These are our darling neighbor boys, Preston and Cooper. They are the cutest and such good little friends to our girls. We had to laugh, when I initially asked them to stand by each other so we could take a picture they paired off into 'couples'. The boys' dad was there as well and we all got a good laugh. They have a little lady that's a little younger than Hayze so we are set, arranged marriages done and done. We really lucked out in the neighbor department.

Hayze only made it to the end of the street and he decided that he was done. He just wanted to stay with mom and play outside while I handed out candy. And when I say we played outside I mean it. It was probably the most beautiful and mild Halloween night we've had in a long time. It was fun to be home to hand out candy. It was interesting to see the realization on their faces as some of the kids looked at me and put together that I'm the 'singing lady' from church. Yep, I do exist outside of primary.  

We stopped by and visited Great Grandma and Grandpa Keetch and then ended our night at Grams house. After a quick picture the girls were ready to shed their wigs for a bit and have some pizza. 

We walked over to Trick-or-Treat Aunt Jolynne and Uncle Mark and got to see Hadlee, Bo and Maggie. Bo, who is usually the girls favorite to play with has fallen from their good graces as of late because he decided to scare them one day with his Halloween mask. Since then, they have been on high-alert whenever they hear he will be around. As a special favor to them, he took his mask off but you can see that Sadie is still giving him the wary eye. 

I kind of love this picture of their hair hanging there at the end of the night.

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 The Sunday night before Halloween was the Draper family Halloween extravaganza. I had to work so we weren't able to attend. I hear it was incredible as usual. I got pictures of everyone's costumes as they were getting ready to go. It definitely made my night at work a little better and I couldn't let them go undocumented.

A Duke and Duchess 

Woodsman Ty

Mya and Sadie insist that he was Paul Bunyan 

And McKay and Megan, the old married couple. 

Night O' Pumpkin Carving

Halloween means a night of pumpkin carving, soup and treats with the Keetch clan. Grams kitchen island turns into carving central. Daddy takes care of the gutting, since that's what he does. He will basically gut anything you put in front of him. Grandpa tried to get Hayze to dive in and grab a handful but he shook his head and said 'Uh, no.' Sadie also politely declined and chose to help Grams make salsa instead. Mya however, rolled up her sleeves and dived right into the slimy innards. She also helped Cody pick out a bunch of seeds for us to bake later.

Then comes the most important event of the evening, choosing what is going to be on the front of your pumpkin. Grams has stacks of patterns that we've collected over the years but you can also find a bunch on the internet.

 Tyson and McKay opted to throw back to their Zelda days and carved some symbols from the game. Megan's ghost kept her busy most of the night. It didn't look like such a big deal at the start. Hayze of course got 'Me-Mow' and we carved a Minnie to keep him company. Mya wanted a Halloween cat and Sadie, silly miss Sadie was instantly smitten with the Jack Skellington face.

Grams and Grandpa carved some pretty awesome faces to round out the group. It was a fun night with lots of laughter, yummy food, cramped up hands and no trips to the Instacare (sorry grandpa we may forget that year some day).

Pumpkin Patch Fun

Fall break brought lots of fun adventures for these little cuties! Our big event was having our Kansas Hansen's, Uncle Adam, Aunt Camarie and cousin Abigail come and stay with us for a few days! Daddy and Uncle Adam had been planning to go hike and chase deer on the rifle hunt. So thankfully they made it a family visit as well.

The few days they were here were busy. Cami had family and friends she wanted to visit with, and of course I had to work one night. But we found plenty of wonderful moments to just let the kids play, ride bikes in the cul-de sac, and we even conquered dinner out with all our kiddo's in tow, just us two ladies. Cami and I also spent some wonderful evenings chatting after the littles were in bed. Their last day here we decided to take advantage of another beautiful fall day and visit a local pumpkin patch called Jaker's. We had both heard about it from friends and the best part... it was free!

There was a fun petting zoo area with cute little 'Wilbur' pigs and then the most gigantic beast pig! I think he was as big as a couch! 

He just sat there munching on his food and digging in the muck.  

There were also cute calves, geese and of all things a kangaroo. 

We jumped on the wagon for a hay ride. 

 Then the kiddo's ran to their hearts content in the mini hay maze. Mya was so proud when she figured it out all by herself. 

Abby and Hayze wandered in too but just around a few corners and then they would turn around and come back. 

 These cuties! I love them!

 Then we played in this giant corn box. There was so much corn! 

 It was a hilarious good time! If you have never played in a giant pit of corn, I suggest you do so. It's quite an experience. Just know that any pants pocket, small child's diaper, shirts, hair it will all have places to hide these little golden kernels. And you will inevitably bring some home with you. 

This sweet lady! I love her, look at those eyes and that dark hair! She and I made some great progress while she was here. She has a big bubble and doesn't really like big people to get too close. I'm happy to say that by the end of the week she was 'talking' to me and I got some smiles and lovies!  

Aunt Cami kept Mya giggling and was sweet enough to keep burying her over and over. Then she let Mya bury her! Mya thought it was a great plan, Miss Abby however was a but concerned about what we were doing to her mommy and kept sweeping the corn off of her. 

 

Just us girls being silly in the corn.

After the corn the girls decided to try and scale the hay mountain. To my surprise, Mya shimmied up to the top without much hesitation at all. Sadie made it up a few levels and then caught wind of the band playing and broke out in some awesome dance moves. I guess when the music hits, you've just gotta dance. 

It warms my heart to watch them play together.

We headed home when the boys called and said they had returned, sadly empty handed, from their hunting adventures. Thanks for coming to visit us you guys! We hope you can come again soon, we love you!!

Wee Witches Adventures

For fall break Grams invited us to a girls afternoon at Gardner's Village. I hadn't been to Gardner's Village for a really long time and I had never been when they had it all decorated for Halloween. They had all these hilarious life size witches all over dressed up to the hilt. The girls were a little wary of them at first but once we saw a few of the silly ones they were more OK with them.

 We spent a little while wandering around the shops, we discovered quite a few headpieces that needed to be modeled. I still think Grams should have nabbed the furry tarantula headband. A must for any Halloween wardrobe!

Megan and I found some pretty amazing witches hats but felt like the $50 price tag was just a wee bit more than our pocket books would allow. But it was fun to try them on. We wandered around this shop for a while, they had some pretty fabulous basic pieces that you could combine to make all sorts of amazing costumes. All the pieces were custom made in London and shipped especially for this store, so I'm sure you can imagine they were a bit expensive as well. And the witch boots? They were fabulous! 

My darling little Wee Witches. They got to pick out some witch hats from Target, more my pocket books speed. This train car was set up like a witches house and had a snoring witch in the corner. This picture took quite a bit of reassuring and begging for a smile. Sadie managed it, Mya is close.

We spent the majority of our afternoon in the Wee Witches area. Playing on obstacle courses, the spider rope, corn pit and hay maze.  

This was our first adventure in a hay maze and they thought it was great. They had tunnels made with barrels that took you to other parts of the maze. Mya thought those were awesome but Sadie voted to stay with the big girls instead.

Celebrating our completion of the maze! Sadie is pretty proud of herself wouldn't you say? 

Then we waited in line to jump on this giant bouncing blob, air pillow thing. Originally I was just going to send the girls and sit with Mom and Megan. Well Sadie was feeling a bit nervous about going alone so I said I would go with her. I'm glad I did! It was a blast! It was so much more bouncy than I expected it to be. Little Miss Mya was a bouncing fool! She would catch a bounce from another kid and fly into the air. She loved it! 

 Sadie warmed up to it as well but liked the security of holding my hand. 

 It was a great afternoon! We had a great lunch, yummy treats and great company! Thanks Grams for a fun adventure!