Handley Halloween 2013

The Sunday before Halloween, I decided to take Juliet to the pumpkin patch closes to our house.  Ray and I took her last year, when she was just a couple of weeks old, and took pictures.  I thought it might be a nice to try to start a tradition of going to that same pumpkin patch for as long as we can.  And, to be honest, Juliet was having a rough afternoon in terms of her fussiness, and I was hoping a change of scenery would lead to a change in her attitude.  So I changed her into something that might look cute in the pumpkin patch and loaded her into the car.  At first, she was pretty excited about the pumpkin patch.  But then I set her down in the midst of the pumpkins.  And all hell broke loose.  Juliet was not excited about the pumpkin patch.  But I took pictures anyway... I didn't want to walk away pictureless just because she was crying.  And, let's face it. Some of these pictures are hilarious.

Oh my God! I hate these orange things!  They are as big as I am!

Please don't make me hold this pumpkin, Mama.

I'm holding this tiny pumpkin, but I'm not happy about it!

This is as close to smiling as I'm going to get, Mama.  Deal with it.

I saw lots of families at the pumpkin patch, some with babies as tiny as Juliet was last year.  I cannot believe how much she has grown since then.  I'm kind of looking forward to having this pumpkin patch tradition.  Since Halloween is just 30 days after Juliet's birthday, it should be a neat way to track her growth in pictures.

Halloween is Ray's mom's favorite holiday, so every year, she hosts a Halloween party.  All attendees are expected to be in costume, and the kids trick or treat on Ty Ty and walk down to the festival at the nearby church.  Juliet is still too young for trick or treating, but she is definitely old enough for costumes.

I am trying to stay sane and not go over the top with costumes and parties.  (It's tempting, though, to go nuts with costumes because it's been so long since I've been able to craft.)  So I decided to that Juliet would just be a ballerina.  This gave me a great chance to make a tutu, and it also was very cost-effective.  Black onesie + pink ribbon + one spool of pink tulle = baby ballerina! 

I need to give some credit to Cheryl Smith for Juliet's costume.  She taught me eighth grade English, Spanish I, Spanish II, Spanish III, and Creative Writing.  Each year, she'd do a lesson on Halloween and the Day of the Dead.  Part of the lesson included an exercise designed to stretch our imaginations by seeing how many costumes we could come up with using a black sweat suit as the base.  When trying to plan something simple for Juliet, I started with that basic concept, asking myself what baby-appropriate costumes I could make using a black sweat suit or onesie.  So thanks, "Miss" Cheryl, for helping me keep it simple. :)

 

She doesn't have enough hair to do a dancer's bun, so I just let her rock her crazy baby hair.  I thought it would accentuate her pink Chucks pretty well. 

 

 

 

 

Ray and I got home from his Warrant Officer Candidate School graduation at 2:30 a.m. on the 30th, so he didn't have a lot of time to pull together a costume.  I think his outfit of "cowboy who waited too long to get a good costume" worked well for the amount of time he put into it.  I made myself a poodle skirt and went as a 1950s high school girl.  Although I think my costume was pretty decent, I am more proud of the fact that I remembered the mathematical formulas for finding diameter and radius when given circumference.  And not only did I remember the formulas, I was able to do the correct math and cut my circle skirt properly the first time around.  Thanks, Mr. Knight!  

And, for the first time ever, Ninja was without a costume.  I'm a bad dog mama.  Next year, Ninja.  I'll do something spectacular.  I promise!

Although we were still a little tired from the crazed trip home from WOCS graduation, it was so very wonderful to have Ray home for this.  I'm already looking forward to next year when Juliet should be big enough to trick or treat!