*Disclaimer: A ridiculous amount of photos follow this post, but I am so OK with it.

I don't even know where to begin. I love celebrating the holidays, any holiday really. Valentine's Day, 4th of July, President's day (kidding), any. I blame this obsession on my mom. Not only does she have this ability to make any mundane thing exciting (also happily blame this on her having a daycare for over 20 years), but she can turn our house into a holiday wonderland as well. For example I have counted over 20 scarecrows in my house and there may or may not be orange glittered pumpkins lining our entry way, along with a plethora of metal corn stalks. So you can imagine my delight when these past couple of days have been full to the brim with everything Halloween!

It started on Friday when The Lopi clan (multiple Lopez) allowed me to tag along with them to the punkin' patch at Tom's Farm. Pure excitement was running through these little Italian veins when we arrived! There were the obvious pumpkins and ALSO those faceless wooden boards which are painted to make it look like you're a turkey or pilgrim in this case. You know the ones? Yeah. I ran over to these "picture boards" and immediately started taking pictures. There was a pilgrim and indian one, naturally I made Leah Lopez be the indian : ) We bought our little orange rounds and continued on to some caramel apple grubbin'. Fast forward to Leah Lopez and I in my kitchen later that night. One word: Marshmallow. We. Made. Marshmallows. I felt like a mad scientist/confectioner. It was fantastic. Don't worry, as always, there will be photos.

Next up, pumpkin carving party, boom. Saturday night was so good. Madeline and her hubster, Aaron, graciously opened up their home and invited a few friends over. It was hysterical, entertaining, and yummy. There were delicious appetizers, scrumptious deserts, a cozy fire, and warming apple cider. Let me paint a picture for you. Me sitting in front of a fire whilst M. Ward plays in the background on the record player. Laughter ensuing after a humorous story has been told all while pumpkin guts lay everywhere. Maybe pumpkin guts doesn't sound so appealing, but let me tell you, it was. The night ended wonderfully when we all took our pumpkins outside and silently (well almost silently) took in the soft glow of our creations. I say almost silently because we couldn't help but laugh at the jokes being made at our pumpkins. Our friend Danny tried his hardest to carve a Martin Luther pumpkin in honor of Reformation Day. Yet his pumpkin ended up looking more like Michael Myers. Ah, my stomach is still sore from all the giggles.

AND finally the corn maze on Sunday. Oh, corn maze. It was glorious, corn, corn, everywhere. The Reyes' duo, the Lopez, and the Peterson were all in attendance. At first we made a pit stop at another patch. Let me tell you it was quite underwhelming, but it wasn't a complete wash. We did see a pig race, yes a pig race, and reveled in our white trashy ways. Well Madeline and I did, Aaron and Leah are Mexican. So that takes care of that. The maze at this patch was just around 4 feet tall. Now everyone besides Leah Lopez is above 4 feet : ) so this maze was out of the question. Madeline hopped on her iPhone and found a bigger and much better maze for us to get lost in. Oddly enough it was right down the street. We arrived, bought our tickets, and were stomping through this maze in no time. Not only did we journey through this maze until the end, but decided to get our money's worth and go back through it...backwards. Then go through it once more, only this time, a race. All four of us against Aaron, Madeline's husband AND we won! Yeah, we won. Oh, we won. Have I mentioned that we won? Madeline and I, straight cut through the corn rows in order to beat Aaron. We looked like two ridiculous Big Foot creatures plowing through helpless children and corn stalks. It was worth it though because we won. WE BEAT AARON TO THE END. Ok I'm done, promise. After we gloated in our glorious victory we celebrated as was only right, with root beer floats : )

All in all my Halloween this year has been shaping up to be a great one, and Halloween (technically) hasn't happened. Which means, more goodness is to follow!