The Tangrens

We have three days of Halloween every year. We don't know how long this will last but it's fun while it does. The first event is the Omniture/Adobe (Omnidobe?) Halloween Horror Hoorah. It just keeps getting bigger. This year they had two different time slots that you got your wrist bands for. We took the earlier time slot going from 2-4. I was tending a friends son so we had a friend with us this year. We didn't get a family picture as we typically do. But we did get a picture of our little super hero squad.

I was suppose to join them by being Wonder woman but I didn't get my appropriate costume in time so I opted for the villain busting out the cat woman costume. A fuller figured cat woman this year. But there's no record of it. Probably for the best.

This was the scene when we got to the line. Amazing how many people file through this maze of amazement. I'm pretty sure this was part of a costume but funny nonetheless.

Halloween madness is alive and well at Omnidobe. Derek got home at 2am after setting up for it. The other side of the sign said something like "Stop the madness. Give us our spouses back." It's not really Halloween per se that is taking my husband away so much at Adobe though. They had snake charmers, balloon artists and clowns milling around to entertain while we waited. The boys were as excited about seeing all the other costumes as they were about going through the Halloween fun. That is until it was our turn to go in and Hyrum saw the darkness and heard something about aliens ( It a the Men in Black section ) and he came unglued.

Derek carried Hyrum crying through the first little bit. Until we convinced him that they were made of paper.

The next section we really didn't get. It was a medieval peasant village then you went through this area where there were just pumpkins with menacing faces saying things like "How would you like me to carve YOU"

Then at the end you went through the peasant village again and signs were cut up and there was other upsetting chaos. We left perplexed but maybe we just aren't as cool as the other kids because it won third place.

Then we walked down the red carpet with all of the stars.

Noah was a bit star struck. He is SOOO into 'Cars' right now.

Derek told me about an Angry Bird section

But he didn't tell me that it was INTERACTIVE!

Hyrum had a blast with it.

They had four or five "levels" along the way and Hyrum tried at least three.

There were a few spooky areas this year. And Adobe farms was one of them. Luckily you had a choice of going the spooky way or the not spooky way. Hyrum always opted for the non scary way and Hunter Hyrum's friend always wanted to go the spooky way. But when the ways connected there was a big hay slide which was a fun thing.

Hyrum still looks a little freaked out though. He always put his mask down when he was scared.

The executives did a Toy story theme. I had to get a picture of the solar system hanging because of course Hyrum was studying space in school.

Then there was the triumphant return of the little people as little green men. Tradition continues.

Then there was the Alice and Wonderland area which we saw a bit of because most of it was outside.

I was nervous about these plants being outside with it being so cold at night but most of them were conifers or at least evergreens.

They had a croquet field(?) over here

And a unbirthday tea party going on where all the candy was.

Then we saw a big jumpy castle that the boys all got in and jumped in. Not sure exactly what it had to do with Alice in wonderland but it was a lot of fun

Then we went into the next building and went to Hogwarts

And got wands

Then fought spiders.

You can't see them but there were fishing line hanging from the rafters and you really felt like you were walking through spiderwebs.

And get candy from a toilet!

The boys thought this was GREAT! I was glad the guy was sure to tell them not to eat things from the toilet at home.

Then we got around to the Quidditch field and each of the boys grabbed their brooms on the way in to fly around on them and "catch the golden snitch" (which were Ferrero Rocher candy)

Noah felt like sweeping instead

This is probably from The Goblet of Fire but for the life of me I don't remember a girl chained to the bottom of the lake. We tried not to let the boys look at it too closely.

Then we went to Storybook Land

First up was "The Cat in the Hat" Hyrum needed a little convincing

We had to get a picture with the Cat of the hour.

And get in the Thing one and Thing two box

Well Noah fell in

Then we were off to Where the Wild things are ( Derek's section )

I got some video

Then we walked through the wardrobe to Narnia

And met the white witch

They had a spot where you saw the stone table that Aslan magically appeared on but didn't think to get video.

That was it. The boys sat down to dig in while Derek went back in to get his things.

Then we went over to where we started because we heard rumors of cotton candy and popcorn.

They had a live band playing too. They took a break just as we sat down but they played other music in the interim. Noah was feeling it.

Everyone had a great time eating cotton candy, popcorn and ice cream. I for one probably had 5 bags of popcorn alone..they were small though.

The next event was on Saturday. The ward Trunk or Treat.

Hyrum's friends Alan and Tyler were going to be a mouse ghost from a book right up until the night before the Trunk or Treat but then decided to be Batman instead. I wonder if my little superhero's had anything to do with that?

One of my favorite things about Noah being Superman is that every time he was in his costume he'd start singing the Superman theme song.

After trunk or treating they have a Halloween carnival in the cultural hall and as part of that they have a catwalk so that all of the kids could show off their costumes. Noah wasn't feeling so great because he had a bit of a stomach bug

but he was ALL ABOUT walking down the catwalk. In fact he ran up there when it was someone elses turn and while Derek was announcing who it was and what they were wearing he strutted up there and walked on down. I ran up to get him which he was NOT happy about. He went next but wasn't over his offence and cried the entire way down the catwalk.

Hyrum didn't have any trauma and did his best Spider man run down the catwalk.

Then on Sunday we finally got around to carving the pumpkins...nothing like waiting till the last minute.

We had a bumper crop of pumpkins this year in our garden and as many as we gave away we still had probably six orange pumpkins and four white pumpkins. In addition to the two we got at the pumpkin patch. We didn't even try to carve them all. We did do four of them though. What did we put on the white pumpkin that Hyrum watched from the moment it became a pumpkin? Casper of course.

Hyrum has never wanted to help clean out the pumpkins. He always went on and on about how gross it was. This year we were determined to make him at least try.

Don't know if it will ever happen again. We'll see.

Monday was THE day and Hyrum's preschool Halloween party too. I knew Hyrum wouldn't be able to wear his mask to many events so I bought face paint as well but Hyrum has a thing with face paint. Ever since his friend wore face paint last year as a ghost it has scared him. But for some reason after resisting it nearly to tears on the night of the trunk or treat. ( We made him keep his mask on his head and not on his face-except for pictures) He decided it was ok for preschool AND LOVED IT!

I think I did a pretty good job if I do say so myself.

That night when Derek got home he could hardly stand waiting to eat. He wanted to be out there trick or treating.

Then when we got out there it was all we could do to get him to go to houses.

He'd just walk on by unless we compelled him to go.

At one point I said "Um you know that you have to go to houses to get candy, right?" Then we figured out that he was looking for his friends. Once we found them he was all about trick or treating

Until they had to go back home. He just wants to trick or treat with friends already.

Noah was funny. He loved that glow stick and wouldn't let it go. So when he'd go up to houses he didn't have a hand to take the candy. And he didn't know enough about trick or treating to hold up his bucket so people were left to try to hand it to his glow stick hand which most of the time he'd drop it or just slip it in his bucket which he wouldn't see and just stand there at the door screaming "SOME! SOME!" Hopefully he gets it better next year.

And then it was done. What a great Halloween. Now bring on Thanksgiving.