Look what we found!! and leftovers.

 I've got a lot of pictures to unload :)  all of my october leftovers~

While out taking our family pictures we stumbled upon the Mormon Migration Kirtland Camp sign.  The first group of Mormon Pioneers to head West camped here- on the river- less than a mile from our house!  We need to figure out if we had ancestors here.  It's a pretty high probability considering most of our ancestors were early members of the church.  And pretty amazing considering we now reside in almost the very spot our ancestors camped for a couple of months.

I was in charge of the Chili cookoff for our church Halloween party this year and it was a blast!  there was SOOOOOO much chili.  The missionaries were our judges!  we just got three new missionaries and now we have SEVEN serving in our ward (congregation).  They are fabulousl

Kent and I dressed up as Sheldon and Amy Farrah Fowler.  People either knew exactly who we were or had NO idea at all :)

 There were LOTS of activities for the kiddos.  Here's one of our favorite babystitters- and our friend Penny who came with us to the party!

 Zeb getting his face painted.

 The week of Halloween we also hosted a giant pumpkin carving family home evening with several families!  and the sister missionaries came :)

 Kent and Zeb worked on carving Zeb's little pumpkin!

 people were supposed to dress up but I think we were all costumed out and only Travis and Amber came as requested :)  They are such good sports!

 My pumpkin.  I'm a pretty non detailed carver.  These Days pumpkins are such works of art!  so detailed. so intricate. It makes me crazy!  So I just made a Jack-o-lantern.  no stencil or pre tracing even. I'm a professional when it comes to easy.

 I love this picture of Metta trying to steal some snacks.  She loves to eat.

 The Barlows were also pretty hardcore with their carving and brought a DRILL.  They won 'most detailed pumpkin'.

 The competitors.

 Ike had a preschool halloween party and LOVED it.  He was so goofy about costumes this year.  I had to bribe him to put them on for every event.  He is always so worried about what people are going to think about him!!  His best pal- Ava- was Sophia the First.  He was Jake the Pirate.

 Ike loves preschool so much it's crazy.  I am really glad that we signed him up this year.  It makes him so happy!!

 look how adorable he is.

 He comes home from preschool telling us all sorts of funny things :)  It's a Lutheran preschool and he sings the cutest little prayers and says 'ah-men' instead of 'a-men'.

 mouth full of crackers. so so cute!

 We also attended the great pumpkin lighting in downtown dayton.  I love to pack in as many parties and activities as humanly possible for every holiday and event.  I've been thinking a lot about how it may be hard for us to establish the same long lasting traditions for Holidays if we are always moving around- but we can still DEFINITELY establish the tradition of fun and finding great things to do in every place we live- even if they aren't exactly the same!!

This giant pumpkin hill lighting was AMAZING.  800 pumpkins lit up on a big hill.

I'm not going to lie- though. It was kind of a nightmare with metta!  picture a steep hill- covered with 800 lit candle places in round objects that can teeter forward with the slightest touch.  She was NUTSO. running and tripping and trying to grab pumpkins.  ahhhhhhhhh!  such a rambunctious age!!

the evening was well worth it- even with metta the terrible!  

the detail on some of these pumpkins was unreal.

Just LOOK at this one!  I bet it took 6-7 hours to carve.


and this one!!  you could spend hours looking at each and every pumpkin!

On Halloween we were pretty worried about a trick or treating disaster thanks to the impending crazy storm- so we headed over to the air force base for some day time indoor trick or treating!  we got WAAAAAAY too much candy there.  Metta pulled out her third costume of the year as a strawberry.  and it was ADORABLE on her. To die for cute.  look at her!!

Here she is signing and screaming 'please' to get some of her candy!

We actually did end up going out to trick or treat for an hour on halloween evening!  it was pretty windy and got CRAZY bad late that evening- but from 6-7 we were pretty safe.  I only got the one picture!

Until next year!  where ever that may be :)