Contrasts

I am a woman of contrasts. On the one hand, I like terribly uncool things like scrapbooking and embroidery. On the other hand, I like to watch roller derby. One day I might feel like baking cupcakes and later that night I'll want to hang out at the tranny bar. I'm all over the place, and can't really be defined by any one label, but I'm okay with that. This is me, and the world can take me or leave me, right?

This Halloween fit right into how random I am. It's almost like I celebrated two very distinct, separate Halloweens - the family one and the Miss M one. Here, I'm going to tell you about the first one. We'll get to Halloween Numero Dos later.

It actually started for us earlier in the week. Our playgroup was having a costume party Thursday morning, and as usual, it was scheduled to be a potluck. I decided to try making the cake pops I had seen on Bakerella's site for the first time. They turned out really well! Here are the mummies:

They're really easy to make, they just take a lot of time. They're relatively inexpensive to make too, since they're made with a box mix and store bought icing. The most expensive part was the candy melts for the coating. Of course, you have to buy the sticks and the bags too. The big thing with these is the labor, but they're SO cute, I think they're worth it!

Being the cupcake lover I am, I already had a ton of different sprinkles in the house so I didn't have to buy any of those. I ended up with about 80 cake pops, which is insane! I took about half to our playgroup, gave a half dozen to the baby's godparents-to-be, and then sent the rest to work with my husband. I may have eaten a few here and there too, you know, for quality control purposes. :)

The costume party was so cute. We took all the babies and put them in the back yard in an attempt to get a group picture, but now that a lot of them are walking and most are crawling... well, it was like herding cats! We put them down and they just scattered everywhere.

Bubba does NOT like grass. Luckily, his costume kept him off it pretty well, but he was definitely on edge and refused to give up the binky.

Since it's finally cooled off here, and the party was at 11 am, there was still some dew on the grass. This made some of the babies cry, and those babies set off the rest of them. We have a bunch of sympathetic criers in our group!

Bubba joined in on the fun!

Eventually we got them all settled down again.

I was so not going to buy a costume this year - I had no plans to go out and we're still playing catchup financially. This tutu was from my costume year before last. I paid a lot for it, so I was glad to get another wearing from it. The cat ears I've had for many, many years. If you've been reading my blog for a long time I'm sure you've seen them before.

I just threw them on with a 3/4 sleeve (yay for being able to wear sleeves!!!) tee shirt, some leggings, and my Coach ballet flats. Instant costume, and I got a ton of compliments, haha!

We also took the baby to the pumpkin patch. They don't really have pumpkin patches around here, except Schnepf Farms. They charge $15 a person to get in, and I wasn't about to pay $45 to get a picture of the baby in front of some pumpkins, you know what I mean? Maybe if he was older and could enjoy some of the other stuff they had going on there, and maybe if we had more disposable income, but right now? No way in hell.

Our playgroup had gone to one last week that had an admission price that was a lot cheaper, but I skipped it because I felt that my husband should get to go on the baby's first trip to the patch too, you know? It didn't feel right to do it without him! That's where we ended up going.

When you first enter, they have this standee where you can measure your growth from year to year. Check out our little man standing tall all by himself! He's doing that a lot more now than he used to.

We had to get his picture in this cutout too. Silly, but cute.

They had some animals there too. After all, this was "Mother Nature's Farm"!

There was A pig. That's right. As in ONE.

There was A coop with some chickens and a couple of turkeys.

There was a pen with a few goats, A sheep, and off in the distance, a single cow lounging in the shade. Can you tell I was not very impressed? I guess you get what you pay for, huh?

Each day, Bubba picks out a new item that is his "thing" for that day. Usually, it's one of the rhythm sticks, or some mardi gras beads, or something small like that. He never really developed that whole attachment to a woobie or comfort object like a lot of babies do. His object of fascination rotates. This day, it was a spoon. We were sitting up front on the hayride and I was so scared he was going to drop it over the edge and pitch a fit!

Chillin' with his pops at the front of the hay wagon. Okay, maybe not really "chillin'" It was freaking 83 degrees and my dumb self wore a sweater, jeans, and boots so the photos would look more "seasonal." Yeah, I'm an idiot.

I wasn't particularly impressed with the hay ride either. It was a big wagon with bench seats and a couple of bales of hay tucked between them for looks. It was hitched to the back of a tractor (with which Bubba was completely enthralled) and it drove us on a small circle of part of the property. We saw a small lot of what I assumed to be firewood (bunches of cut up branches), some big cage like carts filled with decaying gourds, a couple of fields of this grass like stuff with teeny purple flowers, the animal pens, and (very oddly in my opinion) a stand of stunted palm trees, all squished together.

Lame was an understatement.

Oh, and worst of all, the ride was PACKED and the dumbass who was sitting next to me would NOT put her diaper bag on her lap or on the ground. Inconsiderate much? I mean, if I can put my $700 Gucci bag on the ground, I'm sure you can put your Walmart special down there. If she didn't want it to get dirty she should have left it in the car!

As we were sitting up front, we were some of the last people to get off the wagon. I had my husband sit with the baby in a spot in front of the hay and got this cute photo!

When you're leaving the farm area so you can go into the pumpkin patch area, they have this cool old tractor so you can take photos.

Farmer Bubs is giving directions.

He's wearing the awesome skully shirt his godparents got him, along with some cute skull socks I got in the dollar section at Target.

My boy is handsome. :)

Like I said before, it was SUPER bright and sunny that day. Hence, squinting baby.

He liked this one.

Scowly man.

The fence around the "patch" area (hay bales strewn with harvested pumpkins AKA what passes for a pumpkin patch around here) was made from dried corn stalks that actually still had corn in them. Bubba found one and decided to check it out.

It didn't taste very good.

At the exit they had their championship pumpkins, so we got some photos with those too.

After we left the patch we headed over to our friend's house. They have a huge Halloween house party every year. Since we have the little man, we decided to skip it but still wanted to show off that cute teddy bear costume.

Our friend was in town from Chicago. We haven't seen him in a while! Bubba liked him. Here I had started to paint his face but he decided halfway through he wasn't having it and we were all hot from the wrestling match that ensued. That's why he's in his diaper.

We had to give up on the rosy cheeks and the freckles and just settle for that smeary nose. Ah well. Here he's cheesin' it up with his future godfather.

Finally happy again!

They had this guy set up in the yard. Bubba was definitely curious and kept poking him, as if to ask, "Hey man, are you alright?"

He remained unimpressed. His look says that this is not scary to him AT ALL.

And this guy, well... he LAUGHS in the face at your attempts at horror!!!

We did not take him trick or treating, because I just think he's too small. Sure, I'd like to show him off, but at the same time, I've always been irritated by people who bring their kids around who can't even walk just so they themselves can scrounge some free candy. As someone else put it, until you can SAY "trick or treat" you do not need to be going trick or treating!

We had a grand total of six kids (two groups of three) come by our place last night. We just don't get many here. I got a last minute invite to go out with some friends, so I did. That's the second part of my Halloween, and I'll post about that tomorrow.