Catch up. Fall break and Halloween

Brad and the kids had a Fall Break from school in October. We hiked up Adam's Canyon to get some pictures of the changing leaves. It was a lot of fun and a good workout!

All that walking makes you thirsty!

The leaves were gorgeous!

3 Goofy kids!

A few days before Halloween, we carved pumpkins. The girls scooped out their own pumpkin guts this year!

Josh mostly just watched, but he pretended to carve one for a minute.

We somehow didn't manage to get pictures of the finished products.

Halloween came and the kids dressed up as Minnie Mouse, a frog, and a witch!

I had to work but Brad took them trick or treating.

Enjoying some candy at the end of the night. We did the candy differently this year. We no longer totally avoid artificial dyes. I myself don't eat them at all because I choose not to, and we still don't buy them a ton, but we don't restrict them anymore. Various reasons, I still don't like them and I still think they aren't good for anyone, but we decided it was better for us all to let this one go.

But we still didn't like the idea of gobs of candy hanging around the house. Dye or not, the kids didn't need to have buckets of it for weeks on end. Too much sugar, and too much temptation for the parents who are trying to eat healthy and lose weight. The kids got to eat several pieces Halloween night...

...And then the next day they got to choose 15 pieces of whatever they wanted from their pile and then the rest went to a Dentist office that was collecting candy to send to the troops. It was a win/win for everyone. The kids got to eat any of their chosen candy whenever they wanted until it was gone (the first day or two was all it took!), and we got the rest of the candy out of the house quickly and avoided sugar comas for weeks on end. I'm sure the troops will enjoy having some candy to eat too. I think we will probably do this again next year too.

I'll be posting about Abby's birthday party pretty soon too, so stay tuned! Yes, I'm still a slacker and I'm way behind!