Veteran's Day Parade!

Our girlies got to march in the Mesa Vet's Day Parade this past Thursday! This was Tabby's second year and Ella's first time. They both had fun and I was a proud mama! I kept telling my kids how fun it is for parents to get to see their kids do awesome things.

The only bad part of this great day was when the girls were waiting in the staging area and a car rolled over a full water bottle that had it's lid on. The water fired out like a rocket and was a direct hit on Tabby. All she heard was a loud BANG and next thing she knew, she was soaked. Poor thing. All she was worried that her wet pom poms would get water on the girls next to her.

Other than that, is was a perfect day.

Here are some pics of the girls before the parade started:






The preschool aged girls get to cheer from the trailer. Here is Ella waiting to start.



All the Dance Addiction girlies!


Here's our group that came to watch. We are all excitedly anticipating the dancers coming by!


Luckily, they weren't that far back in the parade order so it was a short wait!


Ella gave us a wave:


Tabby told her daddy that he better not yell super loud for her and go crazy. So of course he did. Here she is trying not to be embarrassed.


There they go!


Here's the video we took. You can hear Dale yelling like a fool.

Halloween

My favorite holiday has passed. A moment of silence please.

Out with spooky decorations and fun costumes in with turkey, shopping, and supposedly crisp fall air which has yet to happen here in AZ. It's still 90 outside! I should not be sweating in my house in November!

We had lots of activities to make Halloween fun. Pumpkin carving was one of them, of course.

Ella had her reservations about cleaning out the insides of the pumpkin. This surprises me because usually she delights in all things yucky.

Rex giving it a shot:

Tabby was all gung-ho about it:

When it was time to carve, the kids helped me pick out a pattern which ended up being a spooky owl on a branch. Gifted in the ways of carving, I am not. What started out being a pretty good looking owl ended up in a headless unidentifiable shape.

Yeah, no.

So I quit on the owl, got my sharpie, turned the pumpkin around and drew your standard 3 triangles and a mouth jack-o-lantern. You can even still see the black marker on this bad boy. That's how much I cared at that point.

Note the detail of the blood coming out of the corners of his mouth. Such fine craftsmanship. His name of course was Jerk-o-Lantern. And he was proudly displayed on our porch for all to see.

So now here's pictures one of my favorite parts of Halloween! The costumes!!!

Tabby was a dark fairy. She had originally set out to be a vampiress but the teeth were hard to work with so we ditched them and the dark fairy was born.





Rex won't ever let me make his costume. He insists on being the latest super hero. This is good and bad because it's fun for me to make my kids costumes but then again, so easy to just buy one at Wal-Mart and hand it to him to wear.

I am Ironman!




Ella Rose dressed in a flower fairy costume that Tabby wore a few years ago. She looked just as precious as I remember Tabby being.




I made Gunner a viking costume. It's perfect for him because he is a savage beast!



We had a fun Halloweenie roast in our driveway where we invited all our neighbors! Unfortunately, I didn't take any pics myself but my lovely neighbor Marcy did. I did what any friend would do and stole her pics to post them here.

Here youngest boy taking a swing at the pinata:

Chaos ensues when the pinata breaks:

My neighbor Janeice who is the master of Halloween costumes. Here whole family was Alice In Wonderland characters. She was the Mad Hatter. I WISH you could see how detailed her costume was!

Her oldest was The Queen:

And her youngest was Alice. I kept telling her how happy I was that she chose to dress up as me!

My girlies enjoying all the fun:

We share our driveway with our neighbors so it makes a pretty good place for a party.


Another fun activity was our church's Trunk Or Treat.

Tabby ran around with her friends the whole time and I barely even saw her.

Rex ate gobs of candy:


Ella kept returning to the cupcake walk:


And Gunner kept trying to pull his costume off:


So that's it! Until next year!

Boutique Pictures

A couple weeks back I was lucky enough to participate in a fun boutique!

After borrowing a few things and using some decor that I had around the house, I was able to assemble a pretty cute display.

The boutique was a success and I was able to raise money for a good cause!