October

The city recommended there be no indoor gatherings and as the year went on, it became strict to only have outdoor gatherings. Then at Christmas time there was a $1000 fine for anyone gathering together, even outdoors. Kind of crazy how things have gone! When school started my friends group decided to do a park play date every week. They started warm and continued on even through the snowy days. It was really fun for the kids to play and for us adults to meet together and chat, even if it got a little cold some days! We also went to the pumpkin festival at the corn maze with the Rodych's and picked out our pumpkins. It happened to be really chilly that day but we still made the most of it and did most of the activities too. 

I let the kids paint pumpkins this year and they had a blast doing it! Leo especially loved it, and just stood there painting his pumpkin blue for a long time. Then I let them put a little glitter on it too. They became our front door decor, along with the few other things I have for Halloween decorations.

We continued our tradition with the Bennett's and carved pumpkins together! It was at our house this time and we grabbed some pizza to eat beforehand and then dug into our pumpkins. I couldn't believe how long Leo sat there playing in the pumpkin guts and seeds, and Deacon and Bentley loved everything about it too. We played some Halloween music and partied! Jeff had bought a huge pumpkin from the corn maze, which was really fun, and I helped Bentley carve a unicorn on the smaller one. They all looked great lit up together. Cooking pumpkin seeds is always really fun to do afterwards too.

Halloween happened before too many restrictions were in place, so we had a small party with the Lockings and McNaughtons. I made some soup and mummy dogs and everyone brought some fun and yummy Halloween treats. The kids paraded around the house and then we put on The Nightmare Before Christmas for the kids while the adults played cards. It was actually so much fun!! Halloween happened to be on a Saturday which worked out great! Later that night we met up with the Lockings again to go trick or treating with them. We were slow, but it was perfect. It was also really interesting to see how people changed things due to covid. There were many creative things like chutes to slide the candy down and people laying out treats randomly all over their lawn. 

Bentley wanted to be a mermaid this year and Deacon loves sharks so I thought it'd be perfect to do a whole family "under the sea" theme. Jeff and I wore a lobster and jellyfish hat, and Leo was a fish. It worked out really well, although Deacon's shark costume was a little hard for him to walk in! He still loved it though, and there was definitely no shortage of candy. It was so nice that the kids could still experience a pretty normal Halloween through this pandemic. Also, the weather was probably one of the best we've had in a while, it was beautiful to walk outside in! The kids had a blast sorting all their candy afterwards and we let them eat it that night, but decided we should hang on to it because Leo just doesn't know when to stop!!