Our Favorite Halloween Pregnancy Announcements

"I'm not a typical hey-we're-expecting kind of gal," says Holly Briles, mom of three and Happenings Of Our Home blogger. "I like cutesy and crafty, so decorating a couple of pumpkins was right up my alley. The whole project took about 10 minutes, tops."

Holly photographed the adorable mama and baby pumpkins on her porch and blasted the sweet shot to all of her readers. "Everyone was excited and happy to see our family growing," she says. Daughter Lulla arrived on May 25, 2012.

When Ann Winfrey found out she was pregnant, she and husband Doug enlisted their longtime friends, Abbi and Corwin Lacert of ten7six photography, to help them create their adorable announcement. "The pumpkin was Ann's idea," Abbi remembers. "She always referred to her growing bump as her 'little pumpkin,' and since she was hitting the second trimester in October, which is when they intended to announce the pregnancy to the masses, it seemed to make sense."

The parents-to-be used a floor-to-ceiling chalkboard wall in their kitchen as a backdrop, and Doug drew a message bubble above their heads, adding in the words later. Ann posted the photo on Facebook, and it was one of her most popular posts ever. Much of the excitement was from Ann's side of the family, because it was the first grandchild and her family was over the moon.

Baby Anderson was born April 3, 2013.

Every year, Christina and Matt Marcellino look forward to visiting a local pumpkin patch, picking out the perfect one and carving it up together at home. They even did it on one of their first dates! So naturally, when the couple found out they were expecting, their minds went straight to fall's favorite squash.

They snapped up a few at the patch, added some vibrant mums and a bale of hay, and drew up a chalkboard sign announcing their news. Easy-peasy, right? Not exactly. "Since we hadn't told anyone about our pregnancy, we didn't have anyone to take our picture," Christina says. "So we ended up setting up a tripod and taking a ton of pictures with the self-timer until we had the perfect shot."

They sent the Insta-worthy photo to their nearest and dearest. "Everyone thought it was super cute and were very excited for us!" she says. Daughter Caroline Grace arrived May 7, 2014.

Every year, Janie Porter is on the hunt for Halloween costumes that are cute (read: no blood and gore) and able to be worn by the whole family. But one recent get-up got an extra special twist because the She Just Glows blogger was newly pregnant with baby number two.

After making her oldest son's adorable fish costume, she used leftover scraps to fashion a tiny goldfish, which she safety pinned onto the belly of her maternity dress. Then the family went trick or treating.

"I was surprised, but everyone got it right away, even though my bump wasn't that big!" she said of her astute neighbors. "They loved it, and it was a fun, creative way to let people know I was pregnant without it being over the top."

On April 23, the family—and their neighbors—welcomed baby Porter.

When Sara Pierce was pregnant with her daughter, she didn't do anything fancy to announce the news. So when the Life In These Times blogger found out she was expecting again, she decided to go all out.

"I had seen an image of a pumpkin with a pacifier attached to it to look like a baby, and I thought it was adorable so I ran with the idea and decided having a family of pumpkins featuring a new member would be fun," Sara says. 

In true veteran mom fashion, she repurposed some of daughter Keelin's castoffs: An old paci was glued to the pumpkin, and a newborn hat from the hospital covered the baby pumpkin's noggin.

Amazingly, Sara and her husband managed to keep the super cute photo a secret until their nearest and dearest could all see it together. "Everyone loved the idea and were thrilled with the news," she says. "I got such a great reaction that I decided to pin the photo [on Pinterest] and have been so shocked at how many have repinned it!"

Henry Graydon was born May 6, 2014.

It all started with a simple dress-up party at Casey and Jordan Bacon's house. As part of the costume contest, friends and family talked up their outfits to a panel of judges in hopes of snagging the top prize. When it came time for the Bacons to show off their Thing 1 and Thing 2 costume, Casey slowly lifted up the bottom of her shirt to reveal a big "Thing 3" sign taped to her belly—and the crowd erupted in cheers. "Everyone was overjoyed and excited," said sister-in-law Emily Parker, who chronicled the big reveal on YouTube and her blog, Journey Of Parenthood. "We were all beyond thrilled with the news! It was their first baby, and I myself got pregnant the following month. So we had babies only eight weeks apart! It made for a very special time for our whole family."

It was fall when Krista Dolash found out her third baby's gender, so she naturally decided to use a couple of pumpkins to spread the good news. The Pretty Little Blog blogger painted one white, writing "It's a..." on it. (She let the tiny blue pumpkin speak for itself.) The response after posting the photo on Facebook and Instagram was immediate—and overwhelmingly positive. "Everyone was so excited," Krista says. "We have two girls, and I just assumed we would have all girls. We had so many people saying they wanted to use our reveal for their own." Baby Duke Anderson was born March 20, 2014.

Halloween is Julie Sterling's favorite holiday—"I love dressing up," she says. So when the big day coincided with her second pregnancy, she knew she wanted to break the news with a family costume. "When I learned I was pregnant again, the idea came to me: A mother can be a lot like the family nest, so that's what I would dress as," she says. She pinned a little baby owl to her shirt; her husband, Tyler, was a tree, complete with a crown of fabric leaves (#besthusbandever); and son August was an adorable owl.

Julie, a photographer, snapped a photo of her decked-out fam and used it as her pregnancy announcement. "Everyone loved the photo and thought it was cute and creative," she says. "Mostly people fawned over Augie the Owl and how cute he was (and rightly so!)." Little brother Jasper was born on April 23, 2015.

When it was time to announce her third pregnancy, Katie Stahl let her two adorable sons, Charlie and Owen, break the news. In a pair of sweet photos—one where baby Charlie is crying, one where he's not—we see the tow-headed kiddos next to a chair with a pumpkin and a framed picture of the number 3.

"Owen was thoroughly confused because we hadn't officially broken the news to him," she explained on her blog View From the Fridge. "He kept asking, 'Who's that other chair for, Mom?' Sorry, O, I knew that once you knew, everyone might know. He's now completely in the know, and super excited. Charlie has no clue, except that he's added 'baby' to his (very limited) vocabulary."

Baby Benjamin Matthew joined his big brothers on May 25, 2014.

Shelley Coates sent her parents a bouquet of blue and pink flowers to announce her first pregnancy. The second time around, when she was pregnant with daughters Sophie and Chloe, she stepped up her game with a photo of her family wearing Wizard of Oz-themed Halloween costumes. "Lion, TinMan & Dorothy OZ costumes - $80. Treats for Halloween Party - $15. Telling you there are five of us in this picture - PRICELESS!"

And the reactions she got from her loved ones certainly were. "No one knew I was pregnant (nonetheless pregnant with twins) when we spilled the beans," she writes on How Does She. "So of course they were confused, shocked and excited when we announced our pregnancy with 'FIVE of us in this picture.' I was in the room when my mom opened her e-mail. She fell to the floor, started rubbing my belly, crying, and saying, "Are you serious?! Are you serious?! Crazy lady. (Love you Mom.)"

Candace and Lee Coram love Halloween, so when they found out they were expecting baby number 2, they decided to announce their addition scary movie-style. Using 28 Days Later as inspiration, Candace and her photographer friend, Brooke Kelly, created a postcard-sized movie poster titled 40 Weeks Later, complete with the mom-to-be's masked face and the baby's due date on one side and son Harrison, in costume, on the other.

"Postcards were made and mailed to all their family and friends to announce they were expecting," Brooke says. "Some people didn't get it at first, but eventually everyone went crazy over it." And over baby Atticus, who arrived May 25, 2014.

A whole patch of pumpkins has never looked cuter! "We announced our baby #6 pregnancy on Facebook the morning of Halloween 2014," mom Lauren, from Edgewater, wrote when entering our America's Best Pregnancy Announcement contest. "We are due in May 2015. Twins boy and girl, then boy, then girl, then boy, then GIRL!"