Our Family's Halloween

Our Family's Halloween:

(Its hard to see his little cub ears here but i promise you they're there! Along with a giant red lip stained kiss mark on his hand from his grammy who was dressed up as the Queen of Hearts)

I just had to show you guys this adorable little lion cub all done up! His costume was so easy, so cozy, so adorable, and such a hit with everyone (i talked about his DIY costume in this post here: Happy Halloween: DIY Costume). I couldn't stop myself from cuddling this little fur ball all night... Okay, well, all of the whole two hours that we were out.  Lol, when you have a little one this young (as most of you mamas know) they don't have much awake time and once it's time to sleep you best be heading home to get them to bed! We usually get him ready for bed at 5:30 (this is the time his littl body tells us he's tired and ready) we put him down at 6pm and he self soothes and falls asleep by 6:30. So we went over my sisters house at 5:30 with both of my sisters families and their kiddos & all the grandparents, and then my friend Kelly and her little fam.  We of course took a billion pictures, mingled, and ate pizza. Then we took the littles out for trick or treating around 6:15-6:30, I put Cash in his carseat with his Sleep Sound Lamb (a stuffed animal sound machine that makes noise to help babies fall asleep easier), and draped a cover over him so he wasn't stimulated by all the trick or treaters. We made it to about 5 houses and decided to call it a night.  It was just too loud for my little guy to fall asleep. Kids were running around screaming house to house, as expected on Halloween. He's just at that age where he wants to be part of the party going on outside. He wasn't crying or fussy, he was content all snuggled up in his carseat watching as kids ran by but this mama knows best and I know he would be all thrown off the rest of the night and next day!

So we took him home before he was over-stimulated and had him fed and in bed by 7:15pm. Only 45 minutes past when he usually falls asleep..but this little guy wasn't ready to end the night. So he layed there for another 30 minutes before finally crashing. Poor guy, I try to think of how he feels and be selfless. I know it's fun to take yor kids out and live our lives according to our own schedule but really his well-being is more important to me. He needs sleep to grow and for his little brain to develop & so he is a happy well rested boy! We love how happy he is and how he rarely is ever fussy! And I think we owe that all to sticking to a routine(for the most part).. Babies thrive off routine. This has been a very challenging part of parenthood (giving up our old lives, when we want to go somewhere and have to stay in because its his bed time or because he needs a nap, etc) but its all so so worth it and makes those date days and date nights even more appreciated and so much more fun!!

Im not sure how I managed to turn this post into my parenting guilt (haha), but we had a blast on Halloween and it was so worth keeping him out 45 mins extra so he (i mean WE) could experience his first Halloween together with all of our family.  We are really looking forward to next year when this little guy is walking around!

I hope you had a great time with your families on Halloween as well!