Halloween

What a great night!! There were so many things that could have gone wrong with this whole haunted maze thing but amazingly enough, it was a lovely evening. I'm still smiling and everyone left over 3 hours ago!! For starters, it's been a really long time since I've had company over to my house. In fact, it was probably last Halloween when a bunch of us got together at my house to go trick-or-treating. I love to have people over but I have a stupid hang-up about the state of my house. When we're busy with the business, which is most of the time, the house winds up dead last on the list of priorities and it makes me crazy. I love when my house is clean and warm and cozy and it just doesn't happen often enough. My friend, Sam, used to say that she was coming to visit me, not my house, but I still get caught up in wanting things to be "company-clean". Thankfully I've had extra time on my hands lately and I've thoroughly enjoyed it. On Tuesday I even cooked a turkey for dinner complete with mashed potatoes and gravy!! I've been really working on deep-cleaning my house all month and I feel like I'm finally getting somewhere. Gloria has been enjoying my recent domesticity as well. We made cookies AND cupcakes today for tonight's party and Gloria informed me that she was planning to be a famous chef. Actually, she said something like this: "Mom, you might expect me to be a famous singer or horse rider, but I'm going to be a famous chef. A famous singing chef." Sounds like a good reality show:

I've been a little concerned about the liability of people walking through this maze and getting hurt. We even had a little neighborhood drama on Tuesday night when a bunch of older kids were running through the maze and wouldn't leave. Rob had been setting up all day at the fairgrounds for the Light in the Night event and I went down to take some pictures. While I was gone, the bigger kids took over the maze and ignored Zach's and Gloria's demands to leave. Long story short, Rob rushed home and let 'em all have it. . . a couple of the kids had banged into the pipes and had goose eggs on their foreheads and there was one unhappy, defensive mom. . . anyway, all of that set me to worrying just a little bit about what might happen tonight. . . I wasn't worried enough to call it off and tried to capture what I could on video. Rob and Zach did such a great job putting all of this together. The video doesn't do it justice at all, but there was plenty of scary music, lots of fog from the fog machine, stringy cobwebs hanging all over the ceiling, loud sound effects, spiders and snakes and scary guys in scary costumes wandering around where you least expected them.


Rob's mom and dad came by with Matt, Marr and McKenna and Jeanie even went through the maze. She was shocked at how scary her grandson was!!!

Andrew was Cousin It and was the last thing kids saw as they exited the maze:

Stephy was a mangled rodeo clown but she's doing a pretty good Vanna White imitation as she shows off my new window coverings:

Megan was a very beautiful witch with long, long eyelashes:

I've been waiting a really long time for the chance to post this picture!! I think it must be 2002 when the girls were 3 and 4:

I tried to get the kids to pose in the same positions as in the old photo, but Elsie wasn't taking any chances being that close to scary Zach!! My, how they've changed:

Here are the rest of the party-goers:

Alyssa was perfect as a creepy skeleton:

Gary brought their fire pit which added great ambiance to the festivities. Here's Quinton enjoying the warmth:

Lori came by for a good scare and I don't think she was disappointed!!

Shawn, Katrina and Scary-Gary:

Vic and Kristin went through the maze together and it was hilarious to hear them scream the entire way!!

I had such a good time hanging out with everyone tonight. It just makes me want to have another party!! I love these people!!

Andrew may not have needed a mask after all!!

Well, the maze was a success. We heard many great comments from parents who went through with their kids. Most of the kids thought it was cool and only 4 of them cried. We had quite a few people go through and several of them came to our neighborhood because they had seen the maze when driving by and were curious. Zach and Rob were pretty proud of themselves!! I was pretty proud of them, too. What a fun evening!!

Good Things

Even though I was suffering from a braces-induced headache all day, even though everything in me wanted to stay in my warm house and not walk through a field of corn, and even though I wanted to stop spending money on Halloween anything . . . we still went to Linder Farms Corn Maze and Pumpkin Patch on Monday evening. My kids don't get to go on school field trips to these types of places, so if I don't take them, they just miss out. And then I feel guilty. So, even though I was motivated by guilt, when all was said and done, I was really glad we went.

We met the Adams' there around 7:00 p.m. The girls spent some time on the big jump-house slides:

The boys ate deliciously warm, homemade donuts sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar. Yum!

We all took a hayride out to the pumpkin patch. . .

. . . and wandered around looking for perfect pumpkins:

We weren't actually looking to buy a pumpkin but it was still fun to look:

Megan was very proud of her pick:

We rode the hay wagon back to the main area and prepared for the corn maze.

We managed to make it through the maze without any mishaps in less than 20 minutes.

The weather was just perfect. We were plenty warm in sweatshirts and mittens.

As we walked through the maze we reminisced about coming to this same place last year with a bigger group of friends. The Longs and Ritchies had come along last year and now the Longs are in Maryland. :(

The girls rode on the barrel train. I rode on it earlier in the evening with Gloria and it actually made me kind of carsick!!!

We had someone take a group photo for us which reminded us of the group photo from last year. Kristin told me she would e-mail me a copy when she got home.

Here is the group that went to Linder Farms last year around this same time of year. For some reason Ashlie wasn't able to come with us, but Kristin sent her and Victoria each a copy of this picture when she sent it to me. Ashlie responded to the three of us with one of the sweetest notes I've ever received. I asked her if I could put it on my blog so I could cherish it forever (since I'll probably blog forever!!) She said yes and I've copied it below. She's wise and mature far beyond her 16 years.

"Thank you so much for that picture. although i wish i had been able to go to that. seeing that picture makes me cry. I miss you all so much. Its sad that you don't realize how much someone means to you, until they are gone, or in my case you can't see them anymore. The other day at church we were talking about role models and how much adults are a part of kids life. I know for a fact that this is true. I don't think you, victoria or tanya understand how much you guys have impacted my life. i would not be the person that i am with you wonderful ladies being my role model. I can't even begin to explain how much you have effected my life. Between the three of you and my mom I have no better people to look up too. When i am older and have kids you are what i want to resemble. Thank you for being a part of my life and being there for me when i needed to talk. I loved the times when we would get to talk. I learned so much about christ through you. Again thank you for being a part of my life.
i love you and miss you
Ashlie"

I love you, too, Ashlie, and you have given me an amazing gift just by being who you are!!

Denial

On Saturday I spent a huge chunk of time sorting Gloria's stuff. She has way too much stuff. I convinced her to part with some of it, but I'm still working on the rest. I dumped out every bucket and tote and drawer and box and sorted everything into groups: barbies, pet shop toys, horses, babies, baby clothes, even tiny little Barbie shoes got their own little drawer. On Sunday evening, I got to enjoy the fruits of my labor. These two were able to find every little thing they needed for hours and hours of fun:



The boys spent a lot of time working on the maze and wrestling snakes. . .

. . . and lizards:

I haven't posted anything about the "big decision" this family is making because I'm totally in denial. I know I'll have to come out eventually, but it just wrenches my heart to think about not having these kids over to my house on Sunday afternoons and for Friday night sleepovers and . . . back into denial. . . .

It was a very fun evening.

Halloween Maze, Phase Two

Rob and Zach have invested a lot of time and money into this project. It's not just your everyday, run-of-the-mill, maze-in-your-front-yard type of a thing. All of the metal pipes in these pictures have gone through quite a process. First, they were measured and cut, then they were welded together with the correct pieces according to the measurements in the plan. After Rob welded them, Zach had to grind off all of the stray metal shavings and drill holes with the drill press into each and every end. Rob then welded nuts and bolts into each hole so that each corner can be tightened onto the pipe during construction.

This was a lot of work:

The pipes and corners had all been cut to fit a very precise plan. I was very impressed at how easily and tightly it all fit together:

They referred to the plan often and had to make very few adjustments.

This is where the dead end will be only Rob will be the one with the chainsaw!!!!

Putting on the black visqueen wasn't nearly as easy. It took all three of us to pull it, measure it, cut it, stretch it and tape it as all the neighborhood kids looked on. I was afraid the neighbors were thinking we were putting in an addition to our house. The final product was well worth the work.

The dead-end:

We are the people your parents warned you about. . .

Well done.

Halloween Crafts

This is the time of year that I start to feel crafty- Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas have so much crafting potential!! I'm not especially creative, but my kids are, so it's fun to just put stuff out and see what they come up with. I googled Halloween crafts and came up with a couple of ideas, but the kids gave the projects their own special twists.

McKenna came over during part of the process and helped with the painting.

These pipe-cleaner creatures looked easy on the website!! They turned out OK but were tricky to make. We improvised a lot.

Gloria made the pretty glittery centipede and I made the other one:

Gloria and I each made a ghost tree:

Zach used pipe cleaners but he chose to paint a tennis ball and turn it into a black widow.

He painted his pumpkin green and made a great witch. . .

. . . complete with a wart on her nose:

Gloria calls this her Christmas Pumpkin:

These were created a few weeks ago when grandma came to visit. Pretty cute:

It took me all weekend to clean up the mess we made, but it was worth it!!