We started the celebrations a day early on Thursday at another local shopping center's Halloween festivities, where the kids could go from store to store trick-or-treating. Ari and Alex are getting really good at it, and kept saying "more?" after every store! Kira rode along in the Baby Bjorn, which is really too small for her now and especially with the extra bulk of her bumble bee costume, but it made it easier for us to navigate through the big crowds without a stroller in tow.
We had a big, exciting day planned today. It started out with school and today we were the Shabbat family, so Daddy came home early so that Mommy, Daddy and Kira could all be there. We led the Shabbat prayers, helped the kids with their lunches and played outside during playground time. Ari and Alex both mentioned how they were "sooooo happy" to have Mommy, Daddy and Kira come into the classroom, and Mommy and Daddy were happy to see the class in action and watch the kids interact with each other and with their teachers.
After an attempted quick nap during which Alex ended up just playing quietly in his room (we're guessing everyone was too wound up in the excitement of the day to really rest!), we headed out to a local Halloween celebration. It was another perfect Halloween day for the second year in a row-- temperatures in the high 60's and warm enough for short sleeves! The kids' hair salon where Alex gets his hair cut was right next to the festivities, so Daddy took him in for a quick hair cut while Mommy, Ari and Kira scoped out the fun activities and goodies being handed out. Alex, who dressed as a fire fighter this year, was elated to see the fire truck at the celebration and even got to climb up in the truck for a picture. We also met up with our friend Savannah and her mommy, saw a ton of other friends, visited the petting zoo, Ari went in a moon bounce, and both Ari and Alex collected lots of sweets and goodies. 
After the Halloween festival, we headed over to friend Matan's house for a Shabbat dinner celebrating his 3rd birthday. Ari and Alex were excited to see their friend from their "old school" and all the kids had fun playing with each other before dinner. We tried to get all four together for a picture, but that was almost as impossible as getting Kira, Alex and Ari to look at the camera and smile at the same time:
We came home from Matan's house to meet Nana and Poppy Jack, who came over to hand out candy while the rest of us went out trick-or-treating. We met up with all of our neighborhood friends and headed out in a stampede of little people. There were three fire fighters (Alex and friends Jeremy and Mitchell), Minnie Mouses, Batman and Robin, and lots of other really cute costumes. Kira even joined in the excitement for the first half of our outing, and then rested at home with Nana and Poppy while the big kids (including Mommy and Daddy!) went out for some more candy. When we got home, Ari and Alex were each allowed two pieces of candy...Alex chose Dots and M&M's, and Ari chose M&M's and Skittles. They only had two mini-bags each, but by the sight of them shortly after they ate the candy, you'd think they ingested a gallon of sugar plus three cans of caffeine! Probably from the excitement of the day, in addition to the sugar, they were bouncing off the walls and crashed at about 8:30, barely making it to their beds before they fell fast asleep. 
It was so interesting to look at the changes that have happened in just one year, from where we were last year at Halloween until now. First of all, this year Ari and Alex really "got" what Halloween was all about, and even chose their own costumes. Alex, who was timid and a bit overwhelmed at Halloween last year, was excited and eager to go up to every house and say "trick or treat" (followed by "thank you!") Second of all, this time last year Kira was still in Mommy's tummy and getting ready to make her big appearance. This year she's almost a toddler. Tonight she opened two of her first birthday gifts- a doll from GG and some clothes from Nana and Poppy:
Mommy used to get very sad when Halloween was over, because it meant the start of the cold winter and another whole year before Halloween would come around again. This year, though, the excitement of the season has been extended into November as we now have something just as exciting to celebrate- Kira's birthday!!!
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