Family Halloween Party....and a bit of good NEWS too!!

Every year for the past oh... maybe 17 years? My mom's family throws a big Halloween Party. We love getting together, seeing all the funny costumes that people come up with, eating the traditional potato bar meal,
and playing lots of Halloween games!!

This year Evan was once again( third year in a row) an army guy. We've definitely gotten our money's worth out of this costume!! Eli was a slightly injured ninja.

I bought Gabe the cutest little ninja costume this year and Glen and the boys taught him how to kick and punch while yelling "hi-ya"
Cutest thing I've ever seen, well one of them anyway...
There was too much excitement at the party and the last thing Gabe wanted to do was stop for a picture. We tried to force him to a few times and then we got the result shown below.... so I didn't even get a good one and some setting was wrong on my camera so the pictures I did get did not turn out very good.... so the pictures do not even give the party justice, you'll just have to take my word for it that we had a great time!!

I got about 15 shots like this of Gabe turned side ways or running away from me... oh, well!

Gabe adores his "papa" even if he was dressed as a devil

My mom's costume was perfect for her... an angel!!

I didn't get many other pictures of all the creative costumes. there were the 3 pigs, a safari tour guide and his animals, the Beverly Hillbillies, characters form Star wars etc....I dressed up as a cow but I looked too much like the real deal (I keep trying to justify it as a bad camera angel?) that I had to delete the evidence and Glen was a farmer. But the award for best costumes goes to... (drum roll please....) my grandma and grandpa who came as Sonny and Cher!!

Some of the games we look forward to each year are the fish pond, a bean bag toss into a jack o' lantern face, and pictionary. Evan is shown below after playing the mummy game. With a partner and a roll of toilet paper the team who makes the fastest mummy wins!

cleaning is fun when it's giant piles of soft toilet paper

Donuts on a string is definitely a favorite game too!! it was especially for Gabe this year... He'd walk right up, grab a donut and take a bite. My little sister Julie and her family were in town and able to come to the party too!!! I really did a poor job as photographer... anyway the adults in our family had a competition of donuts on a string. In order to win you had to be able to whistle... I also had to delete the evidence of this... I won and I'm not sure it's something to be proud of, maybe.... if I wouldn't have felt like such a COW already!

And the big news of the night was this little dessert that we brought.... (which might also explain my negative COW thoughts)

Yep, that would be me... I am going to be a new mummy!!
I am 12 and a half weeks along... due in May...HORRAY!!
We are so excited!!
I just want to officially apologize to those of you who I have completely ignored the past few months... phone calls, e-mails, thank you cards etc....that I have not returned, responded to or sent out... it has pretty much been all I can do to function on a daily basis. A few days have been better than others, but for the most part... I have been constantly nauseated, with a headache off and on and SO TIRED... so there you have my excuses and my heart felt apology... now that I've hit the twelve week mark I can tell a bit of an improvement and am hoping it will just continue to get better!! I will give more details about how we told the boys, our families etc.... and post some cute ultra sound pictures soon too!!