Halloween

Here are a few pictures of our Halloween and Halloween adjacent activities in October.

We went to a local pumpkin patch.  Here is John getting ready to go through the corn maze.

Scott was with him.  We kind of split up to go through the corn maze.  Scott and John went together.  Emma and I went together.  Anna and Grant went together and Matthew went through alone, although he was welcome to join up with any of us.

This might have been at the end of the maze

Going through the hay bale maze - this picture is very Grant.  He's a really good kid in general, but sometimes he just can't help starting a little mischief.  Here he is sort of bugging John (possibly mis-directing him) mid-maze.  I could be wrong, maybe Grant was genuinely helping here, but I don't think so.

Here we are having a go at pumpkin launching

The younger kids and I visited the petting zoo.  We didn't have change to buy feed for the animals, but Grant figured out how to get a little feed to come out of the machine for free so got to feed the goats.  I told him to stop doing that - again with the light mischief.

We played in the corn bin

We took a hay ride

And then got to the serious business of picking pumpkins.

It was unseasonably warm that day and I hadn't brought any water - and the line to purchase cold drinks was very long.  So some of us were feeling pretty grumpy by this point.

And then there is the task of manhandling seven pumpkins back to the car.

Scott is so tough!!

We met cousins at the Aviation and Space Museum in McMinnville

It was a lot of fun

The high school had a spirit week with dress up days like pajama day.  One of the days was Adam Sandler day.  He's a comic movie star more from my era - and I was surprised to learn he's become sort of a fashion icon among the high schoolers possibly started on Tik Tok - with his very casual baggy clothes.  Scott and I helped Anna get the right outfit of very baggy pants and hockey jersey - a la Happy Gilmore - so she could ironically channel Adam Sandler.  My old LA Kings jersey gets some use along with Scott's cargo shorts.  These new fashion trends are making me feel old.

I made some different festive dinners which felt like a big success for me - its been a rough year for me in the cooking realm - jack-o-lantern quesadillas

Mummy dogs

Mummy quesadillas

Halloween sugar cookies

The younger three kids and I trick or treated at an event in downtown one evening.  We have lived here a little over two years and now see a lot of friends about town - especially at downtown events.

A school Halloween event

Church Halloween party - John as part of the costume parade

Carving our pumpkins

Wow - that was a lot of carving - we got about 8 smaller pumpkins out of our small pumpkin patch this year.

Anna and Grant went trick or treating together without adults!  They had fun.

Anna was Belle, Emma was Ariel, Grant was the grim reaper, John was Sonic the Hedgehog and Matthew (not pictured) was a scary scarecrow.  He had driving class during all the festivities but did pass out some candy.  Scott and I didn't dress up this year but walked around in the rain with John and Emma.

Happy Halloween!!

 

September/October

I got sick the day after Labor Day and didn't start feeling back to normal until mid-October.  It felt really long to be sick  It came on suddenly and took me out of commission they entire month of September and most of October.   I went to the doctor a few times and ruled out Covid and strep, but had a lot of weird symptoms and fatigue.  I spent so much time trying to sleep that I feel like I lost seven weeks.  The house is a disaster, I have gotten zero things done.  Well, not the things I wanted to get done so far this fall.  But we are where we are now.  And, the good news is I finally got better.

The kids have had many activities - sports went on for everyone

Matthew started driver's training.  He worked hard to save up money for it.

He also finished up his tennis season

And he did stage crew for the school play.  Very busy!

Anna finished up her soccer season

It was a lot of work - she did great and I think improved some of her soccer skills this year

She already has her off season training planned out

Good job Anna!  Last year on her 8th grade team there were several Anna's so the coaches started calling our Anna "Guppy" and the nickname stuck.  This year on the high school team a lot of the players who were on her team in 8th grade kept calling her Guppy so she went by that this year too - even though there were no other Anna's on the teaml.  Go Guppy!!  

And Anna is in the school choir as well - here they are at a performance.  Anna is a busy freshman this year.  She has choir, just finished soccer and early morning seminary plus a science AP class (as a freshman!) which was giving her some grief, but it seems like she has it under control now.

Grant finished up his Cross Country season.  He did great and had a great attitude about it all year.

Way to go Grant!

John took a break from activities in October - mostly because everything was full when I got around to signing up.  Emma finished up her soccer season just in time for the cold to come.

Anna braided her hair

Emma has been playing goalie sometimes for her team and doing pretty well.  I hated playing goalie as a kid.  It's stressful!!  But all my kids like playing goalie for some reason.

A super windy day out at the soccer game - I think this was the day the fire started near us.  Warm and windy!

And Emma wearing her basketball shirt at soccer practice.  Emma was really looking forward to playing rec basketball this winter but when I went to sign her up it was already full for her age.  We were both very disappointed. 

And here are a lot of random things...

Making everybody's favorite treat - s'mores bars

Emma has been wanting to learn to cook more and writing down a lot of "recipes" in her recipe book.  Some of them are very easy like these ghost bananas.

Emma opened a pretend cafe and got all the kids to participate

Emma's cafe

Crafts!!

And building snap circuits with the kids one day

Me finally ironing on some brownie badges Emma earned

Playing the sushi go game one night.  

Grant kept hoarding all the pudding.

I have some different books for Halloween and some different magnet board pieces to go with them.  I like making the little story pieces out of paper 'cause I am weird.

Making pumpkin cookies

A cute Halloween craft Anna made at church

Taking a walk by the river - the water level was pretty low in Sept/Oct

I hardly used my desk while I was sick and it got really messy - the kids do crafts in there and pile stuff on my desk and don't clean up after themselves.  We're working in that.