A Royal Halloween

This year for Halloween, Jesse and I dressed up as the Royal Couple: William and Catherine, Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. Our costumes rivaled the Today Show hosts royal get-up. Ha.

Kate's wedding dress was a little difficult to find in my price range, but I found an excellent knockoff of her Issa engagement announcement dress at Nordstrom Rack. She wore black, closed-toe pumps with this number, but my nude open-toe slingbacks seem to slightly resemble her L.K. Bennetts that I love to covet.  I even wore eyeliner on my lower lashes, which I hate doing. And I found a ring just like hers, only fake and really, really cheap.

Jesse's double-breasted jacket is from a thrift store. It costed $5. We changed the buttons, glued on sashes, and bedazzled until he was fabulously royal-looking. He's attempting a smile that looks like Will's, but I'm not so sure of where he got his inspiration for this one.

Finally, Jesse got done at school early on Halloween, so he stood in line for 30 minutes at the local Party City for our crowns. We realize that Will and Kate don't wear crowns, yet, but we decided they were necessary in order to make our costumes obvious, since we were attending a party of med school students who are either too busy or too nerdy to keep up on pop culture.

Thank you to Reed and Melissa Garza, for hosting another incredibly fun Halloween Party. This year, Jesse and I dominated the games. Jesse won the game of "Find as many pieces of yarn in the Garza yard in the dark and tie them all together to make the longest string."

I won the "Eat a donut off a piece of yarn as fast as you can without dropping it on the ground or touching it with your hands" contest. Jesse was so proud when I won. We used cake donuts, which are a little more dry than a regular glazed donut. All I could think about was the aspiration risk d/t the dry texture and my head not being elevated to at least 30 degrees. My fellow dietitians will appreciate that.

The donut didn't stay on the string for long. I can't believe I ate 2/3 donut from this position.

Jesse kept trying to coach me, but it only made eating more difficult because I was trying not to laugh. 

Victory is SWEET. And cakey.

Jesse and I also painted pumpkins this year. Jesse's is a self portrait. Mine turned into abstract art on the front, so I took a photo of the back. My Grandma Coles paints pumpkins every year for all of her grandkids. She mailed mine to me and I was so happy to display it on my mantle.

As soon as I opened the pumpkin package from Grandma, my mind flooded with memories of Halloween as kid. These are some of my favorite memories:

• Dressing up with Allie and insisting on leaving my coat at home
• Chili in "pumpkin" bread bowls
• Trick-or-treating with Sarah and running from house to house in Herefordshire (despite Dad's warning, in an effort to maximize my candy accrual) and often falling and scraping my knee and a hole in my tights
• Dressing up as some version of a cheerleader at least 3 times in elementary school
• Gourds from Grandma Moore
• Painted pumpkins in Grandma Coles' garage
• Visiting grandparents before trick or treating
• Using my pillowcase as a candy bank, and hiding it from older siblings
• Halloween parades at North Park Elementary
• Colorful mountains
• And finally, candy binges. At least one of my memories can be (and IS) still an occasional reality.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Love, Will and Kate