Happy Halloween!

This Halloween Justin and I had a Halloween party. It seemed like a great idea, when isn't it a good idea to wear costumes and get friends together? We spent a good chunk of the week prior to our party cooking, decorating, and buying fun thing for the party. The day of the party was full of decorating and getting everything together... and, oh yeah, Justin blew out his back. Poor guy. I don't know that I have ever seen him in so much pain. Two hours before our guests arrived, he was laying flat on his back on the floor writhing in pain. Not good. Of course, I won't mention the brilliant (ahem) idea he had to put his youngest son on his shoulders to hang a mechanical spider, knowing that his back was already hurt.

To start, the costumes:

Somehow Justin still managed to get into costume, though we did his (her) makeup lying flat on the floor on a heating back (see the top of the picture). It was a little disturbing to put makeup on my cheerleader. If nothing else, I was irritated by how freaking long his eyelashes were. How is it possibly fair that the majority of men I know have the longest eyelashes EVER?!

A little while later after more heat to the back, the pretty princess was up on his feet ready to cheer. With me, the football player.

And I'm actually wearing my guy's old football jersey from when he played in high school.

Posing for the camera... or flexing the muscles. I wish I could say he was doing a cheer but I blocked that part out of my memory.

And a shot of Oliver as mario. Justin's mom is in the left of the picture. She dressed as a VERY obsese lady with a shirt that said, "Help, I need a trainer." It was cute.

AND....the decorations:

My neighbor let us borrow their two lifesize skeletons, one of which we put into the bookcase that usually goes to the left of the TV (we just didn't have the shelves in so it was like a coffin). The other life size skeleton greeted people at the front window when they came to the door.

We moved all the furniture so the outside walls to open everything up. And of course, there were spiderwebs all over. Naturally.

A shot from the upstairs loft to the eating area.

Upclose of the bloody mirror.

And looking into the spider web covered kitchen.

AND....the food:

I made little gravestone cupcakes...

And witches' fingers cookies which were perfect when they went into the oven but came out HUGE. It was a big bloated witch, I guess. To the right were spice cookies.

A pumpkin cake roll... which is AMAZING, by the way. I grew up on this stuff as my mom made it and I absolutely love it. It's great for parties. But the above was my second attempt... the first didn't work out so well as I forgot to grease the pan. Whoops.

And in keeping with the fall foods theme- pumpkin dip with ginger cookies.

A view of the spread- there was all kinds of dips, veggies, cheeses, breads, etc. We also made hot finger foods later in the night which were gobbled up.

A shot of the skeleton candle that when lit "bled" out of the eye. It was pretty weird, actually.

And my little goblin cheeseball. It was actually really tasty!

AND... at the party:

Me with the hippie behind me (aka: Bailey).

The cheerleader delivering jello shots (which one of our friends brought and were SO STRONG). She used absolutely no water in them. I think we had Grey Goose and Tequila shots, they were pretty awesome. What halloween party is complete without jello shots?

My friend Kaylene and I trying the jello shots out to make sure they were safe.

Turns out, they were more than safe... jello shots, take #2! And, that's where the fun ends for the night... at least on camera. We had a great group of people and had so much fun! I think it might be an annual tradition to have a Halloween party.