Yes, yes, the much awaited post.  We won’t tease you any longer.  I’ll keep this short and then let you all go look at pictures.

The attached photo album starts off with a picture of the au pairs (Left to right: Jasmin from Germany, Marte from Norway, Melissa from Brazil, and Laura from Australia) all dressed up in Halloween attire.  You see, not very many countries celebrate Halloween the way we do in America.  Thus Laura’s regional coordinator, Lucia, invited all the au pairs she oversees to dress up and come on over for some good old-fashioned pumpkin carving.  In true pumpkin carving fashion, Melissa sliced her hand and required 3 stitches.  Oops.

The next set of photos are taken from a trip out to a Snohomish pumpkin farm the weekend before Halloween with Robyn, Barry and little Alex.  You might remember Robyn and Alex from the boys’ swim class.  Anyway, we managed to hit a sunny morning and fields full of fresh mud.  But before we could pick out our pumpkins, the boys needed to navigate their way through the corn maze (in the form of the state of Washington).  So, we got on the tractor and headed out to WSU in Pullman.  It was then up to Spokane and over highway 2 to the Grand Coulee Dam.  We tromped through mud puddles, which Alex adored.  The boys had not had much exposure to mud yet but got plenty that morning.  So did Joel’s and my jackets and pants.  :)  We took the North Cascades Hwy over the mountains,  jumped onto I-5 headed north and walked through the Peace Arch into the pumpkin patch.  Nicholas walked the whole way.  Dexter enticed Joel to carry him in western Washington.  Not to shabby for their first big walk and in boots no less.  Then it was off into the pumpkin patch where we all admired pumpkins and some of us ate a little mud.

Finally we come to the costume pictures and Halloween.  Nicholas channeled his inner lion and Dexter buzzed around in a little bumblebee outfit.  Seriously cute these boys.  Somehow, I ended up as the lion tamer (and did a poor job of it at my folks house because this lion did not want to be tame) and Joel suited up as a bee keeper.  He must have blown smoke Dexter’s way because that little bumblebee was as docile as could be.  Anyway, you’ll see some cute pictures of Laura with the boys taken prior to last night (smart girl), and the boys entertaining us  in their costumes last night.  I felt bad for my parents.  By the time we had all suited up and headed their way, we had only an hour left before the boys’ final bottle of the night.  Nicholas and Dexter roamed their living room like a caged lion and a bee in search of honey.  All my dad wanted was a family photo and you’ll see what happened.  All the boys wanted was to play with the TV remotes, pull pages out of my mom’s crossword puzzle dictionary, and pull CDs off of the shelf.  After trick-or-treating a couple of houses on my parent’s street, we came back to our cul-de-sac and walked around, visiting the neighbors.  By this time, my little lion was tired and gnawing on a monkey he’d snared along the way.  We picked up some candy in the rain, and then Joel swapped out with Laura so she could trick-or-treat a couple of houses with Dexter.  Oh, you should have seen the smile on Laura’s face.  It lit up the night it was so big.

And that’s about it.  The boys did great.  Joel, Laura and I survived and the remaining candy is still in tact.  Well, a few pieces have gone missing so we’ll have to look into that.  ;)

Hope everyone else had a safe, a sane, and a very HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!

Halloween 2009