Yesterday was a busy day with trick or treating fast upon us, but despite the time crunch, Corey still made good on his promise to take the kids who went biking to go get pumpkins. ...and a few others earned the right to go too. We didn't have time to carve them yesterday before trick or treaters came by. Oh well, it's Halloween today, so there's still time to be festive. The kids carved them after church. Here are the finished projects ~ I don't know which pumpkin is whose... But Peters is the tiny one by him, and Owen is sitting by Daniel's. I know that cause he had a hard time cutting through to finish the mouth. Owen's in the left one on the bench.
Corey might have gotten a video of the whole process. I'll see if I can find it. Here are a few pictures he shared on our family group chat with our missionaries.
I'm not sure how it happened, but Sophi was the one who really earned the pumpkin by suffering on the cold on the bike ride, but somehow she was reading a book or fell asleep and wasn't clued into the carving party happening outside and she missed out, and someone carved her pumpkin too. I'm not sure how it all went down, cause I was taking a nap, but yeah, Sophi was sad. Sorry Soph.
Peter the cutie - helping Corey. That one might have been Sophi's pumpkin.
Owen did a very good job.
Peter though this was very fun. He got a little bit of help, but we also let him use the knife by himself and he liked stabbing the pumpkin.
After everyone got cleaned up, Wes was a horse in the kitchen.
He would like to share that it hurts your knees a lot to be a horse on the kitchen tile.
Our neighborhood mom's are all in a GroupMe chat, and we all checked in with each other about if we were going to do Trick or Treating Saturday night or Sunday. Most said they were going to go out Saturday/today, but that they'd hand out candy both nights. We were in the Saturday crowd. In fact, I think Halloween should be on the calendar like Thanksgiving - it should always be the last Saturday in October (maybe Friday). That would be a good idea. So we told the kids they had to clean their room AND practice music if they wanted freedom to collect candy today. Natalie did such a good job practicing, I was very proud of her.
We didn't do review today, we just focused on getting the bowing right on Minuet 3. After she had done the slow practice for 15 minutes, I told her she had to do 15 more minutes. She asked how long the video was (3:26) and she did her own math and said "Ok! six more times! and then we'll do fight song..." And I was going to let her stop but she just kept going and she ended up practicing for a total of 45 minutes! Good, solid, deep and focused practicing. Way to go Natalie! Let's do this everyday! Sophi usually cranks through all her pieces without a metronome and way too fast and she was done in 15 minutes. I told her to come do more, but I don't think she did, I'll try to watch her more closely. She is consistent though and does a good job doing it by herself. Lily got out of music today too. She spent the day at Lagoon with Isa, but she's practiced every day this week, plus jazz band every morning, plus concert band during school everyday, plus clarinet lessons on Wednesdays, so I told her she's good to go. Abi practiced after she got home from a youth campout - they went out to the desert for the night and were shooting clay pigeons this morning! Abi said she is a good shot, and I think she looks like she means business.
Abi was home at 2. Corey took kids out to buy pumpkins, per a promise he had made to Owen and Sophi a few weeks ago that he'd give a pumpkin to each kid that went on a bike ride. It turned out to be very cold (packed ice/snow on a lot of the trail, Corey took of his socks and gave them to Owen to use as gloves, which Owen thought was super funny. I said Natalie deserved a pumpkin for her hard work today. We didn't have time to carve them because we had to go to a Hale Center Theater play, so that we wouldn't waste out money. We should have changed it to a different date, but you can't do that the day of. The kids kinda didn't want to go and miss out on Halloween stuff, Sophi had been invited for Pizza but this was going to go past 6pm. But she willingly came. We only had 5 tickets, so Natalie got out of it and she went trick or treating with her friend Lani May at 5:30.
Natalie had quite the hair-do!
Abi, Soph, Owen and Daniel came with me to the play.
We went and saw the play "The Mousetrap" by Agatha Christie. I didn't know anything about it, so with my zero expectations it turned out being pretty fun and very Halloween-ish (Murder mystery). Abi and Sophi were following it well and liked it. Owen and Daniel fell asleep during the first Act, but were awake for Act 2 after I gave them candy at intermission. Also during intermission, I thought someone in front of us looked familiar... Oh, it's just cause he looks like Father David. No... Oh! It's Elder Callister!! Who gave the "God's Compelling Witness" talk in General Conference, which is one of our favorites and shows up in the bloopers of Ethan's House video! Fun!! After the play was over, I got up the courage to talk to him and tell him we have three missionaries who love his talks and that we'd love to get a picture with him. He and his wife very kindly obliged. :)
Before we got that pictures, someone else tapped him on the shoulder and was talking to him about their gratitude for his powerful messages. His daughter offered to take the picture so I could be in it too. "Does he get recognized often?" I asked. "Oh yeah!" I was glad that the kids humored me and let me take a few more minutes of their trick or treating time. We hurried home after that and they put on their costumes. Sophi took off without saying goodbye, Lily was home with Isa, and I put a nose on Isa and then they left. They took Owen, which I didn't know until later. I went with Daniel and Peter went with Corey to drop Abi off at a friend's house. We just put out a bowl of candy on our porch since we were out and about. Abi met up with her friends -
Daniel had to make a big decision - which candy to pick... so many choices!
I was texting moms as we walked - Sophi had found her friends, good. I wasn't sure if Owen went with her. But we found him with Lily and Isa, oh yeah, you told me that when you left. It was a little crazy though, but good, I'm glad he's safe.
One neighbor Dave does a tradition of cooking scones and serving them up with honey butter.
And across the street from him, the Hanson always serve hot dogs and smores. We live in the best neighborhood.
The kids liked the decorations around the neighborhood - video here.
And we stopped for a couple of minutes to dance at the Thriller window -
Maybe I'll get a refresher for myself of the steps and teach it to the kids. It's fun to dance Thriller.
My little sister Jerusha and I learned it years ago in high school. It was fun. This video had it right, but then the song keeps playing and they have the computer images keep moving but they are doing the whole dance in reverse, I guess to save on programming. That video above is the reverse. I was dancing along during the correct version.
So it was fun. The kids still aren't die hard for going to every house, which I appreciate. So we walked home and they ate candy while watching the Hobbit. And I'm up here blogging. Joseph sent these pictures tonight of him and his girlfriend Amber. It's Rapunzel and Flynn Ryder! Joseph knew Flynn Ryder was a simple and do-able outfit for him, since he's played that part before, and Amber makes a great Rapunzel! Don't they look great?!
I especially liked the bare feet! Nice touch.
So it was a busy day and we all came from and went in different directions, but it was a good Halloween.
Today was the Halloween Parade. The parade was outside, which I thought was great and much less crazy and crowded than other years of parents and children cramped in the cafeteria or school halls (like 2015 or 2017). I rode my bike over with Daniel and Peter in the trailer, and will remember to get a blanket for them if we go on a bike ride again this fall. They were cold after that and it was pretty chilly until the sun came out, but after it did it was perfect. D&P went to play on the slide, but then Daniel's hands were cold. Peter took off his jacket cause he had to show his Spiderman outfit, so I used his fleece jacket as a neck warmer for Daniel for a bit. Finally the parade started. The younger grades started first and they ended with the older kids. So Owen and his first grade class was one of the first groups to go around the school. He's the Lego guy.
Natalie came along with her class - she put together this Cruella ensemble.
Sophi was a strawberry Jolly Rancher candy.
After the parade, Daniel and Peter wanted to play, so we did.
It was good to be outside. Peter coming down the slide!
In his "cowboy" hat.
Weee!
I love my little boys.
Abi and Lily dressed up for school yesterday. They didn't have a parade, but they just got to wear their costumes. Lily found this Mario outfit last night (and last minute!)
And Abi and her friends had been planning for weeks to be the Care Bears.
Abi was "Share Bear" and brought some dumdum suckers to share with people, cute. After the kids got home today, they all wanted to play G-switch. They've all been pretty obsessed about this game recently, and I've let them play it too much (cause I'm not feeling that great). Natalie introduced it to them this week. Last week they were all about Fire boy and Water girl. I thought this picture of the kids after school was kinda funny. You've got Sophi there in her Jolly Rancher outfit, next is a part of Natalie's head (her body is wearing black on Sophi's left) next Lily, holding Peter in his cowboy hat, then Daniel, Owen, and a neighbor friend Lani May.
Corey and I went on a date tonight at Bandits. People will be trick or treating in our neighborhood tomorrow night instead of on Sunday, so we'll be taking a break from video games this weekend and will trade it for an overdose of candy I guess. Happy Halloween tomorrow!
Brighton had a Halloween "Band Bash" tonight. They had bands from the two middle schools that feed into Brighton come perform and all the Brighton bands. Needless to say the parking lot was a little nuts with all those supportive parents coming to attend, and also cause most of the parking lot is still under construction. But we made it in time and even found a place to sit in the gymnasium stands, yay. The little kids were so good and cute as we sat and waited for the performances to start and as we watched all of them. Peter wanted to wear Sophi's hat, and I thought he looked SOOOO cute.
Group selfie -
And then Sophi said "What about Owen?" He was sitting on the other side of Sophi and was being so quiet and sweet. I didn't think my arm length could do a group selfie with him in it too, so he gets his own picture. He was being so good.
He is wearing his all red outfit for Spirit week today. Peter swaying to the music
My heart was really full with gratitude for all my sweet little kids tonight. Three cuties.
Wes was supposed to dress up in a costume for tonight, so he took/borrowed Ethan's unicorn onesie (pic #3), because Wesley insisted it was the only costume he could find that says "I don't care about this" - which was the message that he wanted to send. He sat there kind of sulking most of the time. Corey, Abi, and Lily came from Corey's parents house. They were over there cause Abi stayed after school for help with math and cause Lily had a clarinet lesson. They missed most of the middle school performances, no biggie, and arrived just in time to see Wesley's number. Wes mouthed to Corey several times "I don't want to be here" and Corey mouthed back "Yes you do!!" Wesley did the trumpet solo in the UP song (at 1:24) and sounded great.
He was a reluctant trumpeter but we were proud of him and I enjoyed the performance.
We stayed for almost the whole thing - I snuck out with kids after Wes was done and before the final number of the marching band. It just seemed to me like a marching band performance would be longer than the kids could handle after how patient they had already been. I let Corey and Lily stay to wait for Wesley. I ran to the store and Wes was rewarded with sushi for dinner. Halloween concerts are done, and think we will be ready for Christmas shows when they come in December.
We're happy to be back home with our kids. I'm especially happy to get to see this little face again all day~
At Corey's parents house, Peter was loved playing with this little three race track car toy - a picture Wesley sent me on Saturday night -
And when we were back at home, I remembered that we had a Fisher Price car track thingy. I looked downstairs and brought it up for him to play with. The Fisher Price toys have still been out at the top of the stairs and Peter had lots of cars and characters to ride down it. He also liked pushing down his Disney Cars characters.
It's so cute - he'll be playing with the toys, and when we walk by, he'll sweetly ask if we want to join him. When Corey walked by this morning before work, Peter said "Dad you wanna play cars with me?" And he sat with him and play cars for a little bit. If I sneak away, he'll catch me when I walk by again "Mom you wanna play me?" (Sometimes he gets the "with" in there, sometimes he doesn't, either way it's adorable). My favorite character is Bo Peep, and think I'm giving her a southern belle accent, but maybe it's an accent of my own creation. It's fun. The track isn't great, and the cars can't make it around the loop and through exit unless they get an extra push, EXCEPT for Snot-rod! He is the only one that can do it, although just barely, I think his heavier weight in the back lets him make it, so that was exciting for us as we played cars. Yesterday was a lazy rest day for me. Abi and Lily lucked out too cause it was the end of the term, so they didn't have school. Corey got to go to work, so that is not fair for him (but thanks honey!) Today I've been catching up on stuff. We got a little bit of snow this morning during our carpool drives. Nothing that made the roads too bad, but it did make the mountains beautiful! I was catching up on laundry today and this was a gorgeous view from our laundry room window -
It's Red Ribbon/Say No To Drugs week at the elementary school. Yesterday they did an activity in class, and today was crazy hair day. Corey took Lily to jazz band so I could stay and help the Sophi and Natalie ready. I usually get photos of their crazy hair, but I didn't today cause after I got them ready, I had to take the jr. high carpool. S&N were gone at orchestra when I got back. I didn't remember to tell Corey to get pictures, so I'll just have to describe it. Last night, they remembered it was crazy hair day, so Natalie had me put tight curlers on the top of her head, so the top of her hair was crazy curly (like Lily's when she was Amelia Earhart) and the rest of her hair was down. She put a bow in it too and it looked pretty silly. Sophi had me dampen her hair last night and put a French braid in half of it, so today she went with half a head of wavy curls and the other half of her head was a high side ponytail. Owen wore a hat. Tomorrow is crazy sock day, then on Friday they get to go to school dressed in their Halloween costumes and there's a parade at 9.
Tonight after dinner, Corey shared a few Dry Bar comedians with us. I did the dishes while this guy Brad Upton was on, pretty funny. We liked him and other comedians there were good too. Brian Regan's brother Dennis is one of our favorites. "Well I don't know! And now I'd like to learn it!" Funny stuff. It's good to be home.
The highlight of today was visiting the 9/11 Museum and Memorial. A view as we descended the escalator to the museum.
Our tickets for there were at 2:00. I really wish we had had more time to stay and see things, but we had a plane to catch. We'll have to come back again. So this morning we packed up our stuff and dropped off our luggage in a storage room by the front desk, and headed to the subway to go to church. But, alas, the church was empty.
Some sister missionaries let us know that it was take conference today. That started at 10. Corey said "That's a wild card. You just can't plan for that." So we didn't take the sacrament, but we did catch the last hour of the New York New York Stake Conference messages which were broadcast into a room at the church. We got to hear the Mission presidents speak - President and Sister Holmes. They are from Draper! And my thoughts turned to Corner Canyon and I missed biking. We walked home after church, because it was just past noon and we had time before our 2:00 tour, and cause I am too cheap to spend $12 bucks on a subway pass again for the four of us. We had to go back to the room for Abi to change her clothes.
Abi's shoes were not made for walking though, they were made for tripping.
That is one of her many stumbles. Her shoes were a bit too loose. And she was cold.
She was laughing/crying, we were mostly laughing and were not very sympathetic. "Can't we get take the subway?" she'd ask again. Corey said "This is literally a 'walk in the park'!" (aka something very easy to do and pleasant!) We tried to help her face her hardship by thinking of the pioneers of Martin's Cove. They didn't even know when their suffering would end! You've just got 40 minutes of this, you're ok.
A picture near the end of our journey.
It's pretty cool having a green park in the middle of a big city. Group selfie.
The walk was a little long cause we were going slower for Abi, so we had to change our clothes super quickly at the hotel - get luggage, go to bathroom to change (down one floor via the elevator, good thinking Abi to keep her room key!), changed, pack luggage, check luggage back in to storage, then we ran to the subway. We got there in perfect time and took the train Downtown for the 9/11 Memorial and Museum. It was pretty amazing and sobering. On our flight home, I was reading in the book "Considering the Cross" by John Hilton III and this quote from Joseph Smith on page 49 stood out to me. Joseph recorded this while travelling with Zion's camp in 1834: "Whenever a man of God is in a place where many have been killed, he will feel lonesome and unpleasant." That was the feeling at the museum ~ quiet, reverent, sad... Here's some links to some displays of the collection are online. I kept searching through items on there trying to find the Etch a Sketch that was on display there - in a part where we couldn't take pictures. I think it was from a firefighter. He wrote a note to his daughter on the etch a sketch that they found later after he died. That just made me bawl and I was trying to control myself, cause it was so quiet in there except for me choking up. So I walked around to try and calm down. Here at this link - "Inside the collection" - are even more things than we were able to see in the museum. You can search things by items used by First responders, or specifically by the FDNY, other recovered property, items from the victims, and things worn or used on 9/11. And it's cool that on any of those items, it will link to the person with a photo and where their name is in the memorial. At this link is a guide to the pool memorial, showing where the names are for the people from the flights, the first responders, and even the 6 people killed in the 1993 bombing. In the museum, behind a big art work with a blue square for each person, is a repository of the remains that they are still trying to identify - two more people were identified this year before the 20th anniversary. Also there is a glade with monoliths, honoring the thousands of people who have died since 9/11 due to their exposure to hazards and toxins in the air at and around the World Trade Center cite as they helped in recovery efforts. It is really neat how the memorial above continues to the museum beneath, so the big fountains above show the shape of where the two towers were above and below in the museum. It helps you appreciate their size and you can imagine you are walking below them before they fell.
They had a beam that was at the first point of impact from Flight 11, and they know it was the point on impact because each steel beam was marked with a number, so they were able to figure it out. We weren't allowed to take pictures in most of the exhibits. Corey told me I'd like this one though - Some colonial era finds that they recovered during the clean up! Very cool.
Flags representing the nations where each of the victims were from.
After that, we took the subway back to our hotel, got our luggage for the last time, and headed back to the subway for a long ride our to the Jamaica Center, and then to the JFK train. As we were waiting for the subway, we saw our first New York City sewer rat!
He wasn't that big and wasn't dragging a pizza along with him, but we'll take what we can get. At the airport, check in went smoothly. Corey tried to get us all into the Delta Sky Lounge. with his business account, cause at the Dallas Airport, he was able to bring two guests, which worked perfectly for Seth and Wesley. But not at JFK. It would have been $40 each. So Corey went in and got a bit of food (that he snuck out and shared with us) and we went to the gate. The chicken and rice they had was amazing, and all I wanted the whole flight home was another bite. Especially after Corey said that he thinks our Premium Delta Amex card probably would have worked to get me in. Nooo! I could have had my own cup of food. I wish I had the recipe. The flight left at 6:30 pm and it was good. I read the book "Consider the Cross" for most of the flight, when I didn't pause to close my eyes cause I got tired. we arrived pretty much on time around 9:15 Utah time. Wayne found us, and we headed to pick up the kids. We missed them and we all cheered and hugged. Natalie was relieved that we made it home safely (even though we did not pick up four parachutes like she told us to!) Hugs all around. They said the kids were very very good. Wes practice and practiced with Peter to say "Who are you?" when he saw me, but he forgot when the moment of excitement came and just followed the lead of the other kids who were jumping up and down and cheering. Then Wes reminded him of his line. And Peter said "Who you?" I'm glad that he remembers me. He climbed in my arms and said "I wanna go home." So we did. Joseph had come up from BYU and helped out a little bit this weekend, so that was good and gave us enough room in the cars to get everyone home. It's good to be back with all our little chicks.
Peter the cutie - helping Corey. That one might have been Sophi's pumpkin.
