the Halloween report

The kids had a BLAST!!! I honestly think it was our best Halloween ever! We wondered how trick-or-treating would be in the city... but it was great. For the first time we got to go out as a family with other families. In the 'burbs, usually the dads took the kids while the moms stayed home and passed out candy (at least that's how we did it in our old neighborhood). Plus we didn't go out until after 6:00 pm.

Here trick-or-treating started at around 3:00 pm. Jeff took off work early, so we were all out the door by around 3:15. First stop was the salon where Jeff and I get our hair cut. Then we went to a nursing home that was hosting trick-or-treating. It was so neat to see the joy on the residents' faces as they passed out candy to the kids in their costumes. The nursing home was a lot of fun. Not only could the kids get candy, but the rec room had tables of cookies and cupcakes plus a face painter (see Alex's skull and crossbones below). They also had a haunted house set up downstairs. They did a great job! It was spooky enough that Clara would only go through once, but Alex went through twice.Here the kids are checking out the costumes of the staff of the nursing home...
After the nursing home our parade of families headed out to the main street to trick-or-treat at the businesses. This was just incredible! I can't believe how many of the businesses had candy for the kids. The kids loved going into them and it felt safe for us parents (even though, I must admit, our kids did trick-or-treat at a pawn shop and a liquor store... LOL!).

Here are some of the pumpkins in front of one of the businesses....
The kids loved this knight....
After this we trick-or-treated our way towards dinner and home. The kids had a great time. At dinner they were playing Halloween themed songs (like Thriller and the Monster Mash) so the kids had a blast dancing around. Clara was a little shy at first but by the time we left she was busting out some of her moves from her hip hop class. It was too funny to watch our little Minnie Mouse doing hip hop moves! :-)

We finally got them home, but not without employees from random businesses popping out and giving the kids MORE candy. When we got home we turned on Ghost Hunters Live and the kids watched a bit with us before we finally put them to bed. Jeff and I got hooked on watching for a bit longer but there was no way we were going to make it to 2 am when it ended.

Whew! What a night! Thank goodness we have no where to go today... we can stay home and have a nice relaxing day of school! :-)