Autumn harvest

Tuesday afternoon, while heading to Walmart for groceries, I had a splendid idea... "Lets invite over our family for dinner and to decorate pumpkins tomorrow night!"
Lance didn't think many of them would be able to make it, with it being in the middle of the week (and a school night for my oldest niece and nephew) but since Wednesday nights are really the only night that Lance and I can do anything, we thought it was worth a try.
We knew my mom and sister could make it, so even if that's all that came, it would still be a good time.
But to our surprise, most everyone was able to make it!
Jenn, G, Landry and Dane came

Weeder, Randi, Ellie and Gunner.

Our BFF's Wendy and Pepper came too, with their kiddos Cooper and Madi.

My sister had class, but she somehow wiggled herself out of there early and her, Karleigh, Jesse, and Jennifer showed up too, pumpkins in hand!

And even Papaw came.  (David is out of state on work, so he missed the festivities)

This next picture makes me laugh, because I said to my brother, "me and mom both sported our leggings tonight, get our picture!"
(we could be naked from the waist down and you'd be none the wiser-- I think he missed the point!)

For dinner:
I made chicken and steak kbobs, wild rice, fresh carrots and potatoes in mushroom gravy, mom made her yummy potato salad and homemade mac'n'cheese... (thankfully mom came down and cut up the raw meat for me! I made a good attempt, but couldn't stop gagging long enough to get anything done!) AND she actually made the rice for me too, now that I think about it!  Lance grilled burgers and smoked sausage too, so  there was quite a variety!

Mom made a pineapple upside down cake, Allison and Wendy brought cookies, and Randi brought mini cupcakes.

I made these caramel apples, but we forgot about them until most everyone had left.  :(

After dinner, we went pumpkin crazy!

 Here are a few of the finished pumpkins... (L-R: Randi, Jennifer and Karleigh)

Allison's was a super-cute skull and crossbones, but apparently she gave up on it since I found it 1/2 finished on the back table this morning.
Wendy's and Jenn's were probably the cutest, but somehow I missed the photo-opp on both of them. :(
Mine was suppose to be a scary castle... it just looked like a scary mess!

The younger kids played, more than they messed with the pumpkins, but they had so much fun together.

Maddox crawled into my lap tired and whimpering last night after everyone left... He was saying, "I miss my Elwie, I miss my Dane and I miss my Weeder!"

The boys stayed by the grill or the tv..... which is why this is the only picture I have of Lance!

All in all, our fall night, was a complete success!!
I hope everyone had as much fun as we did...
If anything, it proved to me that we need to get the cousins around each other more-- they had such a great time together!!
...And with our new, exciting news-- we should be able to more often! ;)

A couple random thoughts:

1. I think this fiesta was the only thing that would light a match under our hineys enough to get that back room finally finished and put together, the yard mowed and porches cleared, and the final boxes that we have had no place to put, stored away in the shed... So the party ended up as a 2-fer, but our house is finally in order and I am sooooo thankful!
2. I would love to thank Randi and Karleigh for washing all the dishes last night and putting my kitchen/ house back in order.  I can not tell you how much I appreciated that!
3. I still feel sick that Maddox broke Ellie's brand new $18 headband.  Sorry Randi.
4. I think it is funny that I am surrounded by creative girls... my mom, Randi, Jenn and myself all enjoy being creative, and personally-- I think we are all good at it too-- we should put our minds together and get rich somehow!!
5. My toe (that Gunner dropped a 72 pound rock on) and my head (that Dane threw a football at 72mph) both feel great today! :)
6. I was annoyed because I only had enough room on my big camera for a few pics since my card was full... but I didn't want to delete any either because I haven't backed them up to my external hard drive yet.  And my little camera died, mid-party.  :( I took some on other people's cameras, but of course that doesn't help me here! -- but I guess the 634 I posted were plenty!