Happy November!

I love Halloween! I love everything about Halloween! So...last Friday night we had a pumpkin carving party. We set up in the kitchen (so we could watch the Rangers stomp the Yankees) and carved our pumpkins. We had a great turn out and a wonderful time!

This is my pirate pumpkin! By the time I took the picture, it had been in the garage for a week and had a lot of mold inside. It is still pretty put together for being a week old.

This past Friday, Matt and I had our own little pumpkin carving party with Wayne, Allison and Emily. Wayne and Allison bought an 87 pound pumpkin to carve. Matt and I carved our small pumpkins while Allison worked on their giant pumpkin.

Here is the size difference. For real, the pumpkin on the left side is a regular sized pumpkin. The pumpkin on the right is the giant 87 pound pumpkin!

This is Wayne and Allison's 87 pound pumpkin. It is beautiful!

This is Matt's regular sized pumpkin! He did an excellent job!

I took the pumpkin's to our house to light and take pictures. When I came back we were looking at the pictures and this one totally freaked me out! I couldn't figure out why there looked like a man standing in our door way. (I think it must have been a darker picture on my phone.) Once I figured out what it was, I showed Matt and he freaked out too! It was just the stem. We are dorks!

This was my pumpkin. By the next day was was almost completely shrivelled up and caved in!

On Saturday, Matt and I decided to join Wayne and Allison on their trip to the nursery to find more big pumpkins. Matt and I bought a 60 pound pumpkin and Wayne and Allison got a 55ish pound pumpkin. I don't have any pre-carved pictures of the pumpkins. Oh well!

This was Allison's big pumpkin! This was my big pumpkin. I think we need more lights in it!

On Halloween, Matt and I got up and went to church. We are on a section that the church is calling Guardrails. It is about setting boundaries in your life. The introduction to Guardrails was last week and after church Matt and I had a discussion about where we think we need boundaries in our life. We had a hard time figuring that out...I guess because we feel like our boundaries are already set. However, this week, they talked about friendships and I think a light bulb went on for both of us. Mostly they talked about being around people who are not on the same path as you are and how that can affect who you are as a person. Being core friends with people that are pushing you in a direction you do not wish to go or make you feel like you cannot be yourself around them is something that needs to be changed. Matt and I had a conversation about those friends in our lives who we are so blessed to have. The people in our lives that treat us like friends, who truly care about our well being, who not only talk the talk but walk the walk of being our friends. We are so lucky to have so many true friends in our lives!

We got home around 2 and my parents arrived shortly after. We watched the rest of the Cowboys' game (if you could call it a game) and made carmel apples!

This is my first time making carmel apples. We added pecans to some and walnuts to others. YUM!

After Isaiah and Audra had nap time, Dennise brought them over to trick or treat. Matt and I set up our men that we built and arranged our pumpkins. We got a lot of compliments and a lot of people took pictures with our men and with our giant pumpkin. This Halloween was pretty simple in the decorating department but I think if we work up slowly, we can expand each year. (Matt and Wayne are already talking about making a haunted house in a garage next year!) In my eyes, it is a successful Halloween if you have at least one little child who is too scared to come up to the door to ask for candy...let's just say, this was a VERY successful Halloween. I cannot wait to start planning for next year.

Here are our pumpkins!

Here are our men!

I can't believe we will have our own little trick or treater next year! I can't wait! Y'all have a great week!