Daley Halloween Party

Our Daley Halloween Party ended up being on Halloween this year. I love Halloween; the smell of Fall, the pumpkin flavored everything and the decorations. Each Daley Family has a holiday hosted at their house. Cam has the 4th of July, Aly has Easter, Kyle has Mother's Day and we have Halloween. This was our 4th or 5th Halloween Party, and they just keep getting better.

I had the perfect costume ordered by the beginning of September and then it never came in stock, so my Gypsy costume was a fallback but it was still really fun to put together.

Heather and Asher

Ryan and our Gumbi Casualty

Asher and Season

Nick made this costume out of scrap pieces. He's Ash from Army of Darkness. He always does an amazing job on his costumes!

Asher was Kratos from the God of War video game. Nick made the whole costume out of red fabric, plastic storage containers and plywood. He made the swords with a couple pieces of wood. My only contribution was the face paint. His costume is pretty accurate, wouldn't you say?

Asher and his first pinata

Gardner Village

Every year we have the amazing tradition where the women of the McCombs Family go to Gardner Village. It's only of my favorite things of the whole year and I look forward to it as soon as August hits. We eat at Archibald's restaurant, which is always so good, and then we shop. They have tons of little craft, clothes and candy shops. This year was even better because my sister and I were able to find sitters for our kids, so we were free to enjoy the beautiful fall day. I got some really cute stuff and I had so much fun! I would highly recommend it! We're even thinking of making it a bi-yearly event.

They have these witches all over especially for Halloween and they crack me up every year.

Me, my Mom, Rachelle (sister-in-law), Ashley (sister)

This sign made me laugh out loud. It was on the door to the candy store.

My Halloween Holabaloo

Halloween is always an extremely busy time of year. Nick and my Anniversary is on October 27th, we have the Daley Family Halloween Party the Saturday before Halloween, and we always make a big to do at work.

Tuesday, October 28th
We had 5 of our associates read Tarot Cards for all our associates. They did an amazing job, and most of them didn't take a break through 4 hours of reading!

Wednesday, October 29th
We had our Annual Halloween Petting Zoo. There is this amazing guy, Cary Drage who helped me out 4 years ago when I started this. He comes every year, and brings all his own animals. He said that he owns hundreds of animals, and even has his own business. http://www.creatureencountersinc.com/

This is his Albino Burmese Python, Whitey. She's gorgeous!

I brought my ferrets and everyone loved to hold them. The only reason I got this hat on Gadianton is because he was so sleepy!

Me with my two guys, Gadianton and Sparticus.

It took me 4 years to build up the courage to hold the tarantula, I hate spiders. I finally did it.

Cary then tried to get me to hold the Black King Scorpion. When I said "No Way Jose" he tried to show me how harmless they are by sticking it in his mouth. I freaked out!

Thursday, October 30th

We bought all the fixins for Caramel Apples and had all the associates come make their own. It was a very yummy and diet ruined day.

Friday, October 31st

We had a costume contest for all of the associates, and then employees were able to bring their kids in to Trick or Treat. We ended up having about 175 kids show up.

Me and Asher

I'm holding the pumpkin, because once he realized that it rolled off the haystack, he wouldn't leave it alone.

It ended up being a great Halloween, but I'm definitely looking forward to a time when I am able to celebrate my Anniversary on my anniversary. I guess for now, Tarantulas, caramel apples and flying monkeys will have to do.

A Daley Halloween

Every year we host a Halloween party for Nick's family. The attendance has slowly gotten bigger as our family has grown. We now have 12 adults and 6 kids. It's always a Costume Party, which is great because it gives us adults an excuse to spend money on a costume we'll only wear once. We always take a family picture, this year we decorated sugar cookies, and we always have a pinata. The weather was perfect, so we were able to spend the majority of the party in our backyard. Here are a bunch of pictures . . .

Asher was a flying monkey, we bought the monkey costume and then made the hat, vest and wings.

Nick decided to dress up as his little brother, Kyle. Kyle always wears polos from the DI, and in High School he grew a blond Afro.

Nick's Mom, Diane with Asher. The black kiss is from me.

We always take a family picture, here's the whole fam damily.

All the girls in the family, we almost outnumber the boys now!

Nick's sister, Aly with her family. Cherish the Devil Woman, Brandon as Papa Smurf, Aly as White Trash and Milo as a Hot Dog.

Kyle and Heather as a Creepy Old Man and Jackie O. Kyle stayed in character for half of the party.

Nick's brother, Cam with his family. Season the witch, Boston as a dinosaur, Tyton as Captain America and Cam and Betsy as Adam and Eve.

Nick's brother, Ryan and his fiancee Mandy were high schoolers attending a dance who got attacked by zombies. You can't see it very well, but they both had gashing wounds and Mandy even had a scraped knee and ripped tights.

Nick's parents were the Wicked Witch and a flying monkey. No, we obviously didn't talk about our costumes before the party, they're usually a surprise. Imagine my surprise when out of all the costumes in the world, Nick's parents, and Asher and I are the same thing.

We tried to get Asher to take a nap before the party, but he wasn't tired enough. Halfway through the party he was sitting on my lap, fell asleep and slumped onto the couch.

We had a great party, and it was fun to get to see everyone and we always get so many laughs out of all the costumes. I need to recooperate a little bit, but I'm excited for next year.

Haunted Houses are a "Hell No!"

Since I've had Asher, I've been spending more time with my Mom and Ashley on my days off. We go to the library, out to lunch, to the Gateway, I love having 4 days weekends!

One of my favorite things to do around Halloween is make sugar cookies. All the yummy sugar, Crisco, and butter just make me want to eat them till I get diabetes and then sneak them when the nurses aren't looking.

As my Mom, sister and I are making cookies, my Mom says, "Do you want to go to a Haunted House?" "Really?" My Mom has never expressed interest in anything scary, or haunted housey before so I was a little shocked. When I asked her why, she said that she had seen a review of a bunch on Haunted Houses on KSL and thought that they looked fun. She then went on the explain what some of their spooky features were

At one, if you wear a poncho into the Haunted House, you're saying that you are OK getting man-handled and squirted with stuff like fake blood, ooze, whatever. One is strewn throughout a forest and one is actually in a maze where the maze changes while you're in it. You go down one corridor, turn around and the hallway that you came from, is now a wall. They all sound pretty cool, except for the bodily fluids one. It actually reminds me of a concert one of my friends went to in High School; she said that they hosed the crowd with fake blood. Hhhhmmm, something tells me it wasn't a Hannah Montana concert.

I blatantly and forcefully told my Mom that under no circumstances would I go to a Haunted House. Here's why . . .

When I lived in Reno, my Dad was the Bishop of our ward. He used to have Haunted Houses in this little basement classroom. Now it wasn't anything too gory, but I remember that they had a guy laying on an "operating" table and they had spaghetti and fake blood as his guts all hanging out. Talk about the Spirit! I could definitely feel Heavenly Father's love as the patient screamed, and played with his own entrails.

Ever since then, I am terrified of Haunted Houses.

At Universal Studios we went into a ride for the Mummy movie. A couple turns through the line and a Mummy park employee jumping out at me was enough for me to insist (insist is a nice word, more like berate them) that they get me out of there. I was led through a back hallway, and to a service elevator. Of course when I saw 8 year old girls with pigtails skipping into the ride, I felt like a wiener.

So, while my family is being pummeled with intestines and hosed in blood, I'll be at home eating sugar cookies.

Gardner Village

Each Fall my Mom, sister Ashley and I go to Gardner Village. It's become a tradition that I get so excited for and start looking forward to in August! For those of you who haven't been, Gardner Village is a tiny little village with about 20 shops that sell tea, crafts, candy, clothes, jewelry and tons more. They always decorate it up for Halloween with stuffed witches all over the place. They sell mucho amounts of Halloween decorations, which is the main reason that we go.

We always eat at the restaurant there, Archibald's. They have a delicious Turkey Gravy Sandwich! Before we went to Gardner Village I attempted to mousse Asher's hair, but he fell asleep on the way there and consequently ended up with this . . .

Our waiter kept chuckling every time he came to our table.

After about 45 minutes of going through different shops, Asher started getting angry. He always gets restless if he's in his car seat or restrained for too long. We plopped him on the ground and he had a blast crawling around, and playing with Grandma.

I think that Asher has started teething, although no teeth have poked through yet. My sister Ashley had her baby, Noah Kristopher, about 3 weeks ago. He was such a good baby and slept almost the whole time.

We stopped by the candy store, and I sampled some Heath Bar Fudge which was so yummy. I ended up getting some great Halloween decorations and we had a wonderful time like we always do. I love getting to spend time with my Mom and Sister, we've all grown closer as we've had children. It makes you appreciate your mother so much more, when you experience what they did for you. I'm already looking forward to next year!!

Halloween

Halloween and Fall are my favorite holiday and season. I love the cool weather when you can start wearing jackets and hats. I love the colors of all the leaves, and I even love the smell of Fall. Halloween is just fun. The costumes that you get to wear, the little kids all dressed up like their favorite character, it's so nostalgic.

I put up our Halloween decorations at home, and I was so excited that I wanted to post some pictures.

Nick and I created a spiderweb a few years ago. He does a great job decorating the outside of the house. His favorite part is dressing up as a huge reaper and scaring the kids.