Halloween Party

A week before Halloween, we hosted a Halloween party for the boys and their little friends. It gave us a good opportunity to try out the boys' costumes. Jaden was our little Indian (mostly because he refused to put on boots and because he greatly dislikes wearing jeans), and Cody was our Montana cowboy.

This next pic is a bit deceiving. Cody is not actually taller than Jaden-- the boots just give him a little boost!

The boys were NOT that happy about being in costume, so we distracted them with different picture locations and with leaves!

I was fairly proud of myself for taking out my sewing machine and putting together Jaden's costume all on my own. I kept it very simple... only 2 seams up the sides of the tunic, and a bit of stitching on the headband to make it fit and to attach the feathers. Mostly, I was relieved that the top actually went over Jaden's head without tearing or inducing any screaming! :) Here's one last pic of the little Indian, sitting (almost) Indian-style.

When the guests started to arrive, I had all the kids sit around the kitchen table to make pumpkin creatures out of play-dough. I tried to make the homemade play-dough a bit more festive by coloring it orange and spicing it with nutmeg for some seasonal aroma. I'm pretty sure none of the kids noticed. :) 

Jaden and Cody mainly enjoyed cutting up their play-dough.

The older kids, like Abbie and Noah below, enjoyed using all the play-dough tools and decorations that I had set out (cookie cutters, pipe cleaners, feathers, googly eyes, etc.).

It was pretty cute seeing all the kids sitting in costume while decorating their play-dough creations. Also, the activity was perfect for keeping the kids calmly entertained while waiting for the rest of the crew to arrive.

Samuel (our older brother helper) and Ella the lion

Ella was probably the kid who stuck with her play-dough creations for the longest length of time. Her creatures turned out pretty cute!

After all the kids arrived, we posed for a group picture. Unfortunately, Cody and Jaden were not in the happiest of moods, so they refused to stand in the picture unless I was with them.

Ryder the moose; Ella the lion; Batman Noah; Kody the hunter;
Abbie the princess; Landon the Hulk; Baby Hannah; Yoda Micah;
the pirate crew-- Kenzie, Grace, and Wes; Cody, Amy & Jaden 

Here's a close-up of Baby Wes (as Jaden and Cody affectionately call him). What a cute little costume!

After the group photo, it was snack time. The pumpkin oranges and banana ghosts were super popular on Pinterest this year-- probably because they look so cute and yet are so easy to make. We also had pumpkin muffins to accompany the fruit.

Kenzie and Grace

Ryder

      While the kids ate, two of the other moms read Halloween/pumpkin stories to the group.

 The kids were great listeners...

Kody, Noah, Micah

...Jaden and Cody, included!

We had to bring out our little picnic table in order to fit all 11 kids in the kitchen. It was a bit tight, but it worked!

Ella, Abbie, Landon

I had originally planned to do all of our games indoors, but the morning was beautiful, so we soaked up the sunshine and went out. (What a great change from our snowy and COLD party last year!)

The first game we played was a spider web hunt. Before the party started, I had drawn a chalk spider web on the driveway (way easier than the duct tape web I had been planning to do indoors!). Then, we spread out plastic spiders & bugs all over the web.

The kids looked super cute all lined up, listening to the directions. This probably would've been a cuter spot to take our group costume picture!

The kids took turns (3 or 4 at a time) racing to pick up all the plastic bugs. They could only step on the lines of the spider web, though, on their way to retrieve the bugs.

Many of the kids didn't really follow the "stay on the lines" direction. But the plastic bugs were sure a hit! :)

While the other kids were waiting their turn to play the Spider Web game, they could play a pumpkin ring toss game. The goal was to toss a canning jar ring around a pumpkin stem, or (since this was fairly difficult) to simply hit the pumpkin with the ring.

Following the game time, we had a mini trick-or-treat event. Each family group took a turn standing behind the door to hand out candy to all the kids. The boys and I went first.

Jaden and Cody were both excited to hold their own candy bucket... and to fill it up with candy, of course!

The process of switching family groups and handing out candy got a little confusing, especially since all the kids wanted to hang out right by the steps or near the door. I'm pretty sure some kids either got looked over or got double candy. No one complained, though, so it all turned out fine! The act of knocking on the door and saying "trick or treat" was fun for enough kids that the confusion was worth it. :)

Back inside, we moved into craft time. I gave each kid a black cut-out in the shape of a candy corn. The kids dabbed white, orange, and yellow paint onto their candy corns using a clothespin and a small pom-pom. This new painting method was pretty exciting for Cody and Jaden.

Ryder seemed to be a fan, too!

Kenzie experimented a bit with both ends of the clothespin. :)

Many of the older kids were a little distracted with sampling their candy while working on their craft.

The dotted-paint texture ended up looking pretty neat on the candy corns. As expected, only a handful of the kids actually got the colors in the right places, but everyone seemed to enjoy the process.

Once the crafts were done, we moved on to two more games. This downstairs game seemed to be the kids' favorite from last year, so I chose to bring it back. The "ghost prints" on the ground are Cody and Jaden's last-year footprints. Each print is decorated with a colored shape. Samuel (Ella's older brother) was a great helper during the whole party. Here, he demonstrated the game for the younger kids.

I turned on some music in the background while the kids walked around on the footprints.

When the music stopped, the kids had to listen for a direction: "Stand on a red. Find a star, etc." Once the music started, they could race around again. We didn't play for all that long, but the kids seemed to have a good time with it.

Finally, we went into the back yard for a few pumpkin relays. Each line of kids had a small pumpkin.

At our "go," the kids had to race to the opposite end of the yard, and then return the pumpkin to their teammate.

I had a couple more relays in mind for the kids to play (passing the pumpkins over their heads, passing the pumpkins through their legs, rolling the pumpkins along the ground...). All of the kids were pretty distracted by the play set, though, and seemed ready for some free time. So, that's what we did!

You may have noticed throughout these pictures that Jaden and Cody weren't very active at all in any of the games. Mostly, both boys just wanted to stand by me or have me hold them all morning. I'm not sure what accounted for their not-so-happy moods this day. You never quite know with 2-year-olds sometimes! Once the outdoor free play time came, however, Jaden and Cody were finally ready to leave Mommy's side. This was definitely the boys' favorite part of the morning (probably with snacktime being a very close second!).

So, even though Jaden and Cody may not have had the most fun in the world with these planned Halloween activities, it seemed to be worthwhile for all the other kiddos! If nothing else, I guess, we gave Cody and Jaden some costume-wearing practice, and the boys came away with some yummy Halloween candy too. :)