Happiest Day of the Year! (yes it is!)

 I was the class treat mom for Preston's party today.  Pintrest is the devil's playground, and I should never, ever look on there because I find things like "Dracula's dentures" and think 'gee that looks easy and fun' and then I spend 2 hours making them, get done, and have Cameron come home and beg me to make some for his choir class.  Then Madison came home from work and wanted some for her friends.  All told, I think we made about 60 of these, but at least with the last 30 or so I had tons of help!  And the reward of seeing how funny Preston's 3rd grade class thought they were was totally worth it!

 The little girls and I attended Preston's class party, then watched Quincy's school parade and then came home and got ready to go trick or treating.  There was a high school football game (which should not even be legal) tonight, so the big kids were all tied up with that.  I took the little ones trick or treating with some friends and we had a great night.  

 Adolf has grown significantly since we first bought his costume, and it was a huge struggle to get him into it.  After a few minutes, he wiggled free and hid from me!

 Quincy in her zombie costume - from the boy's department because girl costumes don't cut it.

 Harper was Tinkerbell.  

 Preston was a grave ghoul.

 Mallory went for a little while as a crazy cat lady, and Madison was a farmer.

 Saige was Daffy Duck

 Madison and Mallory had to change it up a little bit because the halftime show included the band playing "Thriller" and they all were supposed to dress as some sort of zombie.  Madison was a zombie farmer and let me do her make up - sort of - she started complaining halfway through that I was going overboard and she was going to break out and that I was making her look like a freak.  (Like zombies aren't freaks?)

Mallory was not a good band member.  She only consented to one small scar on her forehead.  She is just no fun at all

Cameron was also helping with the band and was very excited because he was in charge of wetting down the dry ice.  He was dressing as a zombie, but he had to stay after wrestling practice and didn't ever come home.  Colin is of course on the football team, so there was no dressing up as anything but a football player for him tonight.

Halloween is always the greatest day!  We had a ton of fun and I can't wait to do it all again next year!

The big 2-0

 This old guy and I got married 20 years ago today.  While we aren't always the perfect couple, we aren't always appropriate, don't always make the right decisions, the best thing I ever did was say yes to marrying him.  We are so very, very blessed.

20 years ago, Jim and I promised to build a life together, in front of our family, friends, and most importantly in front of God.  We have taken those vows seriously, and I think it has worked out pretty dang great!  I love you Jim.....here's to 20 more.

A cool honor

 Cameron had a band and choir concert tonight.  He seems to really love music and that makes the choir dork in me smile!  The choir did pretty good.

 The band sounded awesomely fantastic.  I am not joking when I say they always impress me. 

 In the middle of the concert, the director stopped to say that one student had been selected for North East Kansas Honor Band.  It was Cameron!  Cam says 'some guy' came and listened to the band, and they take one student from each band they listen to...if they decide to - they could decide not to take anyone.  He was pretty excited to be chosen.

We are very proud of you Cam!

The great football wrap up

 Cameron (above) and Colin (below) are both wrapping up their football seasons for this year (and just in time because it is getting rather cold and rainy!)  Cameron had his final game the night we left for vacation.  His 8th grade team had a rough season, with only 15 kids joining the team, and those had a hard time staying eligible and healthy.  A lot of nights, they played with no subs.  They even had to forfeit one game because they had no subs when a kid got hurt.  I am proud of Cameron.....every week he stayed eligible, every week he played almost every down, on offense and defense, and every week he put everything he had on the field, even when they were so upside down score wise it was depressing.  He played hard, he played fair (as much as possible when your Uncle Jay has taught you his motto "if you ain't cheating, you ain't trying) and he gave it his all.  I called it character building.  He called it looking forward to high school!  :)

 Colin's JV team played their last game last night against Baldwin.  My nephew plays for Baldwin, so it was awesome to finally have time to go watch him play too!  SFT came back from being down 14 to 0 to win the game in the last 5 minutes!  It was exciting (unless you are from Baldwin)!!  Colin played awesome!  The high school varsity team has one more game and they will have to win to play more.  I am not sure that they will win.

 I was surprised they both agreed to let me take photos of them!  They are both good guys, and it was fun to watch them both on the same field at the same time!  :)

A fun weekend so far...(aka yes I love taking photos!)

 Preston had a few of his besties over for a birthday party last night.  They had a lot of fun and it worked out ok even though I forgot when inviting a bunch of 8-9 year old boys over that Mallory and Madison had to be up early this morning to take the ACT test.  Luckily, the boys were awesomely behaved and did not keep the girls up all night.

 This morning we were up early to return Preston's friends to their own houses and take Quincy to her final game before the tournament.  Her team kicked rump and Quincy played really well....and even scored a goal.  We had heard that this team had a "big, mean girl" on it - but she was no match for Q!  ;)

 I always take the kids to the Shaake's Pumpkin patch.  We had not made it this year, mostly because when I started realizing how fast October is flying by, we were on vacation and just hadn't gotten there.  I was surprised that the kids asking when we could go were not the little ones - mostly it was Colin and Cam who couldn't wait to make the journey!  A good pumpkin is fun to find!

 Since we went on a weekend, the place was packed.  This was not a big problem, as it is a very large farm and they had a lot of workers so the lines were not long.  The good part of going on a weekend was that Jim was able to go with us.  He loves the excitement over the Halloween holiday!  

 Cameron carried Saige's pumpkin back for her - in his hood.  I worried about it causing him to be strangled, but it didn't seem to bother him too much!

 I tried to get Jim to pose as Dracula's wife, but he didn't see that as necessary.

 After daddy did it, Saige loved it.  She kept wanting up again and again.  

 Mallory decided not to join us, she said an afternoon of peace and quiet sounded better than pumpkins to her!

 After the pumpkin picking, we all ran some errands where Quincy picked a costume from the boy's side because "girl Halloween costumes are freaking stupid." We then enjoyed dinner with Jim's folks.   Then  we had to do some table clean off so we could carve up our selections.  I am not sure if they were happier about using sharp knives, or about the seed roasting.

 Several days ago, Quincy and I read a really cute book about a boy who put his Halloween pumpkin out in his garden, then watched it rot and the next year he had a pumpkin vine with new pumpkins.  Quincy was fascinated by this, and she was sure to leave some seeds inside her pumpkin, and I have promised her that we can try to set her pumpkin out after Halloween and see what grows.  

 Harper was more excited about roasted seeds than about next year's garden.  When she went to bed she told me to make sure nobody eats the rest of the seeds because she is having them for breakfast!

Uncle Jay bought some Pumpkin Masters with a KSU theme for the kids.  Colin worked pretty hard on his, but said he didn't think it turned out very good.  Now I feel challenged, so tomorrow I will try my hand at it.  We shall see who is the pumpkin master!  :)