Halloween Memories 2010!

 What a wonderful Halloween weekend
we had this year! 
Costumes, Concert, treats, a date
and a whole lot of FUN!

Here are some of the highlights!

I went and helped with Ethan's Halloween Class party and watched the parade as all of the kids in the school walked the halls showing off their costumes. 

I love the joy and excitement of watching the kids!

Tracy got Ethan ready for school and this is how he did his hair...

a Faux-Hawk spray painted green!
 

Ethan's school class

posing for a Halloween photo...

priceless!
 

Ethan Kip...

he called himself the "Joker Pumpkin"!
 

My Pumpkins!!
 

All dressed up to head

to the Annual Halloween concert 
as the Funky Pumpkin Family!

It was a hectic afternoon, as Tracy came right home from work and had to take tents and gear down to the area where his scouts were having their camp-out that night. He then raced in the house, put on his shirt, sprayed a little green in his hair and we were out the door. 

Lucky to have these photos as we almost forgot to snap some!
  

This happy t-shirt

was worn by my Sweetie!

With the hectic day, I didn't ever get a photo snapped of him wearing it.
  

If you were to ask me what my most favorite thing that I look forward to all year long (other than our yearly backpacking trip and dates with Mr. Smith), my most favorite thing would be the  

Halloween Symphony Orchestra Concert!

Tracy and I have been going for the past 20+ years. 

I Love it! 

It's such a FUN event and they perform such great music. This year had a little different flair as they had a Western Concert, but it was amazing, nonetheless.

The comedy acts were hilarious, 

the fiddler, Yodler and blue grass numbers were amazing 

and the Symphony Orchestra 

music fed my soul!!

Here are the numbers they performed:

--The Cowboys Overture.......... John Wiliams

-- Dances with Wolves Concert Suite........John Barry

--Three Dance Episodes from "Rodeo".......Aaron Copland

     I.   Buckaroo Holiday

     II.  Corral Nocturne

     III. Saturday Night Walz

--Hoe Down from "Rodeo"......... Aaron Copland

Even though I don't have a stove/oven at the moment, I made up Pumpkin cookies for Jade to take for dessert to the dinner he went to on his date to the Halloween Dance.

I cooked them 6 at a time in my little toaster oven.

SO yummy! 

It was so delicious to have a homemade treat to enjoy!
(here for recipe)
 

I can't believe my Jade

is old enough to go on a date!

A sweet girl in his Resource Class asked him to go to the dance with her.
She went as "Alice"

and Jade went as "The Mad Hatter".

We had fun getting his costume all together.

We were going to do his makeup like the Tim Burton Mad Hatter, but since they were eating at 6:00 and pictures weren't until 8:30 we decided to forego the make up so he would stay looking nice for the dance photos.
 

Carissa's mom had the most amazing table-scape set up for dinner. Jade ate dinner with her and her family and then they talked and enjoyed the evening and then drove the kids to the High School for the dance.

She made the yummiest caramel apples ever and Jade has been talking all week about the delicious spiced cider she made up as well and begging me to buy the apple cinnamon tea and make some up for us to enjoy as well.
 

Sweet adorable kids!!

It breaks my heart

as both Jade and Carissa have learning and social challenges and neither of them can drive at the moment either.

SO happy that they could go and have a wonderful time!

They got 3rd place

for their costumes at the dance!

The dance went from 9-12 and Carissa's mom thought for sure that Carissa wouldn't make it more than an hour at the dance.

However, 9, 10 and 11 o'clock came and we never heard from the kids.

They were having SO much fun they stayed the whole time at the dance.  Tracy and I picked them up from the dance.  They came out all smiles (except that Jade teased Carissa with spiders at the dance and she had to tell us all about that).
After dropping off Carissa and talking with her mom for a bit, we didn't get home until 1:00 am and then Jade came and sat on our bed and talked to us about the dance until 2:30 am. I LOVE that my kids feel comfortable to talk to us!! I woke up at 6:00 and Jade was crashed in the middle of our bed.  Good times!

We think the world of Carissa and she has the most amazing and loving parents that I have ever met.
 

LOVED my spider barrette from Tracy and since Halloween was on Sunday, I decided to be bold and to wear it in my hair to church.  I am the ward chorister and I had all kinds of young ones coming up to me after Sacrament meeting to tell me how COOL that spider was.

Life is too short 
not to have a little FUN!

I can't believe that November is here.
 Last night we enjoyed grilled Salmon, fresh beets from our garden (cooked on the hot plate in our garage), enjoyed a two mile walk under the starry sky and came home and played three rounds of Bananagrams as a family!    
LOTS of fun!!
 
The time is just flying by faster than ever.
Only 23 days until Thanksgiving.
 We are hoping to start putting Polyurethane on our floor this Wednesday evening. We have had a busy past week with church callings, holidays and little areas of the floor that we had to spot sand and stain to blend better.
YAY for progress and I can't wait to get my house back!

Funny sidenote...
the weekend of October 23rd we quickly did up all of the laundry because we knew it would be a week before we would realistically be back in our house. HOWEVER, the fumes from the floor stain, got in our dryer vent and all of our clothes smelled AWFUL like exhaust.  We all noticed the horrible smell at work/school on Monday the 25th and it was such a miserable day to have to sit and smell that awful smell all day long!  YUCK! I don't know what was worse, wearing clothes that smelled that way all day long, OR, drying off with towels that smelled that way.
That evening after dinner we went and soaked at Heise Hot Springs...it is much nicer to smell like sulfur than exhaust! (wink)
SO, for the past 3 days, I have done over 16 loads of laundry, with the laundry room door shut and the garage door opened to have fresh air for the dryer vent to circulate through to get the smell out of our clothes!!  
Happy to say it worked! Yay!!
There is never a boring moment at my house right now!