Halloween 2014

This is the Halloween I've been waiting for for many years-- the first one I have with my own child. Of course, Luke is a little young for most of the festivities but we were still able to start some of our traditions-- going to a pumpkin patch, carving pumpkins, getting excited about costumes and even a ward trunk or treat. I love Halloween-- I'd say it ranks second in my favorite holidays list (next to Christmas, of course). I love the excitement in the air and I, of course, love the season in which it falls (seriously, no pun intended). I love the decorations and the preparations. I've been planning this Halloween since before I was pregnant. I knew that if I had a boy that I would dress him up as Link, from Bryan's favorite and beloved childhood video game The Legend of Zelda. I like doing things that are special to Bryan-- Luke's dinosaur nursery was also in homage to Bryan's childhood. Now we're just hoping for our next to be a girl so we can dress them up as Luke and Leia. :)

First things first, we went to a pumpkin patch in the earlier part of the month. Apparently some of my pictures are automatically being made into GIFs, so I thought I'd post some of those. You can see from below that Luke and Dada were having a lot of fun!

Classic shot of baby at the pumpkin patch.

On the Saturday before Halloween, we were able to participate in our very first ward Trunk or Treat. We ate chili and all the little kids from our ward made the rounds getting their candy. We got to show off our costumes for the first time, though we had to explain it to most people.

Another family tradition we have is carving pumpkins on the Monday before Halloween-- it's one Family Home Evening each year that is a given. Luke only stayed for the beginning. All he wanted to do was push his little pumpkin off this tray. So we snapped a couple of pictures and put him to bed.

I took some pictures with finished pictures the next day. Luke is checking out this weird thing-- we carved his for him as a very classic Halloween Jack O'Lantern. Bryan, in keeping with the Zelda theme, carved a Hyrule crest and I tried to do an owl in honor of Hedwig.

Finally Halloween arrived! Honestly there isn't much to do with a baby but I took him downtown to Dada's work and we went out for lunch. Everyone is the restaurant, including the owner, were oohing and ahhing over my adorable baby. A couple older ladies kept calling him the Jolly Green Giant. I didn't have to heart to correct them. The owner insisted on giving Luke some free ice cream at the end, which was cute. Bryan's coworkers (also software developers and more likely to be aware of video game characters...) were mostly all able to appreciate Luke's costume right off the bat. It was so fun to take him there and show him off. If you want to make a mom feel happy, tell her how adorable her baby is. I live for that when we're out in public. Anyway, that evening we took a little photo shoot to get the full effect of the costumes and then Luke was in bed before most of the trick or treaters were out. We'll see about next year!

He didn't want to keep his hat on.

Bryan isn't really in to the whole dressing up thing and initially all he was going to do was wear his Zelda t-shirt but after playing Hyrule Warriors he really wanted me to make him Link's scarf.

Scarf detailing.

I knew I wanted to do something to go along with Luke but I wanted to be something simple so he'd get most of the attention. There is a very well known little fairy named Navi in one of the games that is a ball of blue light with white wings. She says, "Hey! Listen!" to Link all the time. As his mom, I thought that seemed very fitting.

Spooooky Halloween dinner.

Well, it's sad that Halloween has come and gone but there are plenty of exciting things to come this month and next. They can be very full and slightly stressful months but they are oh so fun! Coming up we have Bryan's birthday, a little pre-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving with my parents, actual Thanksgiving in Utah, Luke's first birthday (!!!) and of course Christmas. It's time to go blog crazy!