Candra Georgi: My Toy Story 3

I can not truly express to you in words how wonderful our weekend was, but this picture pretty much sums it up.

Halloween weekend festivities [back in GA] were so fun...

1. i didn't even have time to blog

2. i'm having to use extreme self control to not post ~~hundreds~~ dozens of my favorite photos and instead stick to my rule of 15 photos [per post]

3. i didn't count my calories because travel food, Starbucks & Halloween candy were too tempting

As you know, we're in Dayton for another 6 weeks, but we went home for the first time since leaving in August for a much-needed-break. The drive down was "quick" & full of excitement. We slept in our own beds, played in the backyard, and saw all our wonderful family & friends. We enjoyed small group, a wedding, our church fall festival, Sunday service, and trick-or-treating with our family & best friends [The Martin's].

The drive back was lovely & peaceful [3 kids+8 hrs=miracle].

I attempted to take things home from the apartment to "lighten our load" when we return for good [either Thanksgiving or mid-December], but ended up bringing back with me just about the same amount of random things, ha.

Charles & I jammed out to Pandora, even stopping by the Garth Brooks station while Charles "Singing Bee" quizzed me [by randomly pausing it and seeing if I knew the lyrics] to 90's country songs...which duh, I did. We'd switch back and forth between that and the Rihanna station. What can I say, it was loud & kept us awake.

The kids talked, played, ate, slept, and watched a Tom & Jerry DVD right before we pulled up. We left 70 degree weather in GA and pulled up to 40 degree weather in OH. Yikes.

Before you ~~are tortured with~~ enjoy looking at ~~too many~~ photos of my family dressed up for Halloween, I don't want to forget to give you a quick run-down of how I made and/or acquired the costumes.

If you know me, you know I don't sew, and I refuse to learn [until I produce a female offspring]. So...I put these costumes together with a glue gun & safety pins. It ended up not taking very long or costing much. There were no how-to's online so I hope this post helps other non-sewer's in the future.

Woody:

Hat: $25 Amazon

Scarf: $1 Boot store

Shirt: $3 Thrift store

Vest: $3 Thrift store

Badge: $4 Boot store

Jeans: Already had

Belt: Already had

Boots: A lot, but were purchased for hunting season as well, I'd recommend just borrowing someone's

Jessie:

Hat: $6 eBay

Shirt: Borrowed

Felt: $3

Yarn: $4

Cow material: $5

Boots: Same story

I bought the fabric 50% off at Joann's and just used a hot glue gun to attach to vest and jeans. I did the same with the felt for the shirt. I used so little of the yarn you could literally make a scarf out of the leftovers. I did buy red glitter glue to decorate the sleeve cuffs, but it didn't dry in time so I just cut new pieces and left them plain. My glue gun & sticks were $5, but most people already have those. Safety pins are expensive, dang, how did I not know that? I'm saving mine from the dry cleaners from now on. I used those on the cuffs.

Charles' hat was the only real expensive item, but I plan to resale our whole outfits on eBay next year so I'm sure I'll at least get my money back. If I'd had more time, I'd probably found or ordered him a cheaper one.

Nation's costume [Buzz Lightyear]I got used [once] from eBay for $20. His googles [not shown] were just as expensive and will be resold, but we're keeping the costume for dress-up.

Photo Credit

Solomon's busted lip was free. His costume [Pizza Planet Alien]was $20 [new] from eBay. I'll be reselling this as it's not really a dress up costume, although Solomon did have a blast in it, [pun intended].

I got Moses' costume [Rex] from the Disney Store online clearance for $16. His will be resold. I was shocked that he wore the hat all most the whole time both nights.

This post is long enough, but without further ado, here are my favorites: