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Halloween is upon us, not my favorite holiday, but having kids always makes it more fun. Today I made these witch brooms for our ward party. They were easy and quite yummy, just a cookie on a stick. In the mayhem that can only be a ward party I witnessed children waving them at each other sword-style, so I assume they were a hit with the younger crowd.

We had a grand total of 8 pumpkins here this year. Some bought at the store for a smokin' price and some more at an even better price- free. The girls begged and pestered so finally Sunday we decided to carve them. Five minutes into scooping out the innards I hear complaining. But it wasn't even fazing me, I was having WAY too much fun drilling pumpkins. The only disappointment was having just two drill bits to work with. Too many home remodeling projects, apparently Cody had broken them. He was stunned when I told him he better buy more and lots of them, for next year's pumpkins of course. The drilling was super messy and after the carving and cleaning up of six of the eight beauties I called it a night. The next day I spent a half an hour getting the seeds ready to cook, thinking of everything I could have accomplished other than separating seeds from gunk. What a labor of love, sometimes my 'waste not want not' trait is a serious flaw. Then in an effort to get them toasted just perfectly I burnt one of only two huge pans. Ugh, you notice there's no picture here, so you can keep on believing that everything in my kitchen comes out just lovely. Thankfully Cody prefers things a bit on the dark brown side. What a good pair- Cody and my cooking. He graciously declared them "just right." What a nice lie.

But, speaking of lovely, I had to get some close up shots of the girls. I never buy school pictures, which I feel a teeny bit guilty about, but I don't like them. So lots of in-your-face shots the girls despise happen.

Well, happy halloween to all! I'm sure there will be more pictures of the crew- pumpkins and children.

On a completely unrelated note- I am an aunt once again to a sweet little gal named Callie Anne! Congrats to Loren and Carrie! I forgot how big Ivy was until I saw this precious girl today. Ivy was captivated! She loves baby dolls and seeing one that made cute sounds and moved was just her thing!