Trick or Treat!

Halloween 08 was a success! Not nearly as many trick or treaters as we anticipated, but I think it's because our street is just one loop that doesn't connect to any other streets in the neighborhood....which is ok by me! I'll save money on candy next year for sure! Other streets in the neighborhood were loaded with kids when I drove Jonah's friend home to his house! It was about 70 degrees tonite...perfect for us, but everyone else thought it was a chilly Halloween! Either way, I still got bug bites...a first for me on October 31st! All in all, it was a perfect Halloween...only thing missing? The VeStrands (our best friends, who have trick or treated with us for the last many years!)

The cutest witch ever! About halfway through, she decided to ditch the hat and be a Halloween ballerina instead!

Evan was a "motorcycle dude" who's seen more than his share of pavement...

as evidenced below!

Jonah was going to help Bruce pass out candy, but a friend of the neighbor across the street said he could borrow his mask...so Jonah grabbed a pillowcase and started his candy haul!

This was Bruce's Halloween throne, complete with fog machine

Pumpkins!

Since it actually felt like fall in Florida today (I actually turned the heat on this morning...it was in the low 40's!) we decided to go ahead and carve pumpkins! Evan and I usually end up cleaning out the guts, but we've got it down to a science so it's not so bad. We love the pumpking carving patterns...it makes us look particularly crafty!

Evan is as surprised as his pumpkin!

Jonah with his Mad Scientist!

Isabella likes spiders almost as much as her mom does!

Puppies!!

Our neighbor, Caitlin's dog Jazzy finally had her puppies yesterday! The kids have been waiting forever for them and yesterday, six puppies arrived! Five girls and one boy and one very proud, but tired mama. Jazzy was very patient with the kids and let them hold her new babies and they were just thrilled! Of course, they want us to adopt one but that's not gonna happen!

Caitlin

Isabella holding Bella

BOO Fest...

On Friday night, the next (HUGE!) neighborhood near us, had a Halloween celebration in their downtown shopping area. They had an awesome haunted house (well that's what the boys told Isabella and me!), a costume parade and all the stores were giving out a candy! A pre-Haloween sugar implosion! We met up with some friends there and even though it had been raining all day, it stopped shortly after we got there!

Pierce, Isabella, Mason, Evan and Jonah

Everyone kept telling Evan he needed to go home and shave! He was a "motorcycle dude", Jonah has a vampire mask (told him he had to have some kind of costume to score some candy!)

Look who else showed up! Sarah Palin, Trigg and their Secret Service Agent! Best costume of the night!

These are a little hard to see, but this is in front of our house!

Another Day at the Beach...and Fun with Seaweed!

The kids were home from school today so we took advantage of a beautiful day and headed to Manasota beach! Even after living here for six months, it still takes my breath away to walk over the dunes and see the gorgeous water of the gulf!
We went with Jonah's friend Ben, his mom, Lindsey and his sister, Katie. We spent lots of time searching through the beach full of shells looking for shark teeth and found quite a few, though it took a little longer than usual. Lindsey's friend Sharon and her daughter, Becky joined us and all of the kids had a great time!

Me with Sharon and Lindsey

Isabella and Katie

Katie, Isabella and Becky

The beach was covered with shells today!

The kids entertained themselves for hours...who knew seaweed could be so much fun??! Nice mohawks huh??

Ben

Puberty is juuuust around the corner!

The boys found a pretty big crab that kept them busy for quite a while...they even took him for a ride on the boogie board!

My Kitchen...and Family Room

So here's my kitchen! The colors were almost exactly what we had in MD, more golden than the pics show, so that made decorating easy! The ceilings are ridiculously high in this house so there is lots of (useless) extra space to decorate. Not crazy about the appliances...the oven is gas, which I'm getting used to and the fridge is way too small and side by side, which makes it even worse! They're all only a few years old so I can definitely live with them for now! The countertop is Corian...very nice...but I miss my granite, which I only got to enjoy for a few months in the old house. We added the brushed nickel hardware on the cabinets and drawers and switched out the faucet.

I ordered these kitchen chairs (seperate from the table) about a month before we moved so it took six months to finally get them...but they were worth the wait! The leather seats are huge and very comfy! It's such an awesome view from the table and when the weather cools off, we open up all the sliders and let the breeze in! I should have taken a closer picture of the side table in the background...I've had it forever but it was just pine. So about a month ago, I took my trusty can of black spray paint and voila! ...new table!

I was totally stressing about where I was going to put all my scrapbooks and supplies since I had a beautiful library (my scrapbooking room!) in the old house...but, since I've gone digital with my scrapbooking, I picked up these Pottery Barn-ish-but-much-cheaper-from-JCP bookshelves and they're perfect for the space!

This is the view from my kitchen...tried to get one so you could see my view of the lake through the lanai. It's really pretty (bright today!) and it's what sold us on the house!