A change of weather brings out the crazy!
Amanda was Iron Man. She also got a pink morph suit (like B's), but didn't wear it. Shocker :) Sydney was Elmo. Here's the background for some of their outfits:
Sydney was to be one of the 4 girls dressed like Sesame Street monsters. But, this past couple of weeks, we are experiencing mean girls again....honestly, it's a good thing I love this time of year, or I would start to dread it like I do with January!
Yes, there was a similar story last year with Amanda. Now it's Sydney's turn. This involved finding notes that were written about her conveniently dropped by her so she would see them. Mean Snapchats that I had to put a stop to and more.....Anyway, she ended up going around with one of the girls...just because that girl had gotten ditched by the two other girls....and now the trick or treat friend is telling lies to the other 2 about Sydney. Ugh! I told her to be done with these girls and go with her nice friends that she has at school. I will drive her anywhere or those girls can come here! Sydney is a tough cookie and is doing ok with all of this....only a few tears....let's move on....
Amanda decided to have a party this year. We said ok and kept asking her how many kids she was inviting...To her friend's credit, they told Sydney to hang out with them and the 9th grade boys....which was nice and we were ok with since we were chaperoning this party and would know most of the kids...
Somehow it all worked out. Brandon went out with Spencer and his parents. I was glad that both Mike & I would be home because a little after 7:00pm....there were cars full of kids being dropped off at our house!
We figured we had 60 kids here. Sounds crazy, but it was fine. You know there are a lot of kids when you have some of those kids coming upstairs when everyone else was in the basement (yes, the unfinished part...so weird), and saying there are so many people down there you can't move!
Amanda had everyone go to the haunted house down the street, Shadows of Fear, put on by the Cheneys. They do this every year for a charity and it's a really, really good haunted house! This year they advertised on tv on Channel 2 and on radio at 97.1. They don't have a price, they just ask for donations. I know some of Amanda's friends went through for free, but most of them gave money and we gave Amanda a little extra for them. The Cheneys loved it and told the kids to come work it with them next year! Mike & I went down later (mostly because one of the boys stayed at our house and handed out the candy) and the line was so long, we didn't go through.
We also sent the kids down to the Elliots Halloween house. Every year, they do a theme and everyone including their next door neighbors are the actors. Katherine, the mom and wife, is amazing at decorating (she has a couple of books) and Rob, the dad and hubs, is music and acting. (He wrote the score for The Saratov Approach....an amazing movie I'll talk about later.
Our neighborhood is just fun anyway at Halloween. Many families that don't live here come because there is so much going on. The Wilsons finally put up their decor after Amanda gave them a persuasive essay about it! He is our Kaysville legislature rep and he is one of the owners in Destination Homes. They had just had a grand opening for a huge building project here in Kaysville and it made putting up their own decor seem overwhelming. Jeni, Brad's wife, was super involved because one of the designers was not able to help....
Anyway, back to the party. The kids were good! They hung out. Didn't watch the movie I got them. We made them scones. They listened to music. They handed out our treats. One of the boys was dared to hug Mike and they hugged it out. Hiliarious! The boy Amanda liked was there, but I never figured out which one he was. We made homemade rootbeer and it was gone in a few minutes!
They all started leaving about 11pm and many of the kids helped to clean up or offered. I was shocked! The last few boys were gone by 11:30pm and Amanda immediately came inside and started vacuuming and cleaning. I think she wanted to leave a good impression because the party was fun and she might want another one at some point! Good move, Amanda! Sydney only stayed out about an hour and a half and then hung out at the party. Brandon was out the longest which is unusual for him. We ran into him at the Elliots and brought him home, but he had a great time and thanks to the Harwoods for letting him tag along! Their son, Spencer, seen here with our kiddos is our adopted son. We live next door and our boys are usually at each other's houses and we always call Harwoods if we need somewhere for B to hang when no one is home. I love that....
We got up fairly early on Friday morning and because the kids were out of school, we headed to St George! After a few hiccups along the way, we got there about 2pm. The girls and I saw Thriller by Odyssey Dance Company at Tuacahn and shopped and went to see The Saratov Approach. This movie is about 2 missionaries that were kidnapped in Russia in 1998. Like I mentioned before, Rob, did the music and it was amazing! The girls and I cried at several times and were laughing out loud at other points. The best part was the conversation we had on the way home. There were several parts in the movie that sparked this conversation about sacrifice and faith and the things we discussed because of it will be priceless to me. The boys went golfing with Spencer Jones and Hal Morrell....18 holes! Brandon is starting to love golf! Then, because B is a huge Beatles fan, they went to Tuacahn and saw a Beatles cover band, The Fab Four. They had a great time, too!
On Sunday, we stopped for a visit to Bud & Kay. Bud had a biking accident again a few weeks back and so we thought we'd be visiting a broken man, but he was up and walking with a cane. They had even been to church. He's not one to stay down....We had a great visit and then headed home to cold weather and yes...snow.
