Harvest Party!

Once again we had a Harvest Party to celebrate the fall season and had our own version of Halloween fun... and it was a blast! Because Atty can't have any candy {as well as lots of other foods most people can have} we've had to get pretty creative to make it an over all fun experience for everyone. My dearest friend came over with her girls again and my mom and sister showed up. Always more fun with loved ones there!All dressed up and ready for the festivities to start! First up... Hay rides! Haha, it was a silly little thing but the kids thought it was lots of fun! Get a red wagon, a wheelbarrow, and some straw and you've got yourself a funny Harvest party hay ride parade!

I got the giggles thinking about what the neighbors must have been thinking watching our strange little spectacle...


I wasn't the only one with the giggles though, there were giggles all around, it's fun to get silly!

The kiddos seemed to have the most fun playing in the straw afterwards though... go figure. Kind of like the box is more fun the the present at Christmas time, haha!

Even grown ups got in on the fun... I wasn't about to because I hate being itchy! So I did what I do best, took lots of pictures!

No one else seemed to care much about getting itchy though... :)

After all the hay fun we went inside to do a craft, fall themed stick puppets. It was a lot of fun, but I don't have any pictures of that as it took every adult there to keep down on the chaos and lend a helping hand.

Then after a little bit of free play to get their wiggles out we moved onto... Pumpkin Play dough! I made my first batch of pumpkin play dough, and it was a hit!!! It smells super yummy and it was the perfect texture, the kids had a blast with it using fall cookie cutters to create with.

They played with the play dough for quite a while before moving on to the next thing...

And while they were doing that some of us grown ups were whipping up some yummy treats in the kitchen!

But before we started in our our harvest feast we just had to have a treasure hunt!

The kids loved it just as much this year and they did last year... maybe even more. I added more clues and made them a little harder and they still did amazingly well! They all worked together to find their gift bags full of harvest treasure. This year I did add a couple chocolate/peanut butter balls for the kids and just left one bag without and clearly labeled for Atty... Then I got Atty his chocolate freezer "candies" and it worked out really well. I just made sure to get the chocolate for the other kids out of the bulk section so that it wasn't wrapped, that way it doesn't look too different from his "candy". They all ended up with a treat and everyone was happy. :)

Spiders! The kids loved this... and it was super easy. We also had chili and cornbread, little sausages, an apple tasting tray, Atty's bread, and sausages Atty could have as well as some yummy fresh apple cider.

Festive!

Getting ready to feed some hungry kids.

After dinner we had to read our "spooky" book, in the dark, by flashlight of course! What Was I So Afraid Of? by Dr. Suess, love that glow in the dark book.

Love their faces!

After the book we all ate yummy pumpkin cookies over vanilla ice cream. Atty had his own almond flour cookies over homemade coconut milk ice cream

It was a lot of fun and we even got to follow it up with a movie and sleep over! I was planning on going a little bigger with the party this year, but none of the other people I invited ended up being able to come... you know what I realized though, it's actually a lot nicer keeping it little and I'm thankful it stayed that way. Of course we would have been happy to see any one of our other friends show up, but I'm thinking from now on I will continue to keep it little with just Iva and I getting together with our kiddos. {and Neenee and Auntie are always welcome as well!} It just makes it more relaxed and gives us {meaning Iva and I} more of a chance to enjoy ourselves instead of rushing around trying to keep everything fun and on time and everything else involved in a bigger party... Anyway another successful Harvest party, and I'm so glad my kids could have some fun, they've been such troopers about not trick-or-treating any more {because of Atty's diet}. Tonight we will be handing out candy free treats, little trinkets, to any trick-or-treaters that show up at our door and I think we will get dressed up as well to do that... maybe have some popcorn and a movie and enjoy this Halloween {candy free} at home together. :)