Trunk-or-Treat!

Yesterday evening was the second annual Trunk-or-Treat event at our church!  The kids love having the chance to dress up more than once, and it's a fun event in which the whole community is invited! As the picture indicates, the girls are both going as Minnie Mouse this year, and Shane man is the Hulk! 

 

With the event being at our church, we of course had the van open for business!  We didn't go too crazy with the decorations, but our witch hat ring toss was a hit!  Olivia is asking for more m&ms!!

 

One thing that I overlooked in preparing for the event was buying Olivia a pumpkin for her candy!  Last year she dressed up, but being 11 months old, she was not exactly into the whole trick-or-treating thing!  Of course that is not true this year.  She realized very quickly that there were just two pumpkins and three kids!  And the big kids were not about to give their pumpkin to her!  So Steve made a run into the 99 cent store on the way!!

 

Big kids waiting to play the games at the carnival car!

 

Shane attempted to win a full size candy bar many times by bobbing for apples.  Poor kid came up short every time! Thankfully he did not let that bother him!

 

Faith enjoyed having her face painted at one of the trunks!

 

It was a fun event for the kids and adults, and it even included a chili cook-off!  And Steve's famous poker chili won second place out of eight!  From now on he will be reminding us that it is award winning chili!   

Faith's First Cotillion

Friday afternoon, after the pumpkin patch!, Faith attended her first Cotillion.  For those not familiar with Cotillion, it is a time for elementary and middle school students to learn etiquette, manners, and do some dancing.  In our area, it is a highly sought after opportunity!  While it starts in third grade, Faith has been on the waiting list since kindergarten!  We were both very excited about finally being able to attend!  And of course part of the fun is buying a new dress, shoes, and the required white gloves!

 

The third and fourth graders are grouped together, which is nice as approximately half the group has done all this before and can help the younger ones a bit!  In this picture Faith is dancing the cha cha!  Those running the cotillion do a great job of teaching the kids all the little details such as how both the boy and the girl is to hold his or her hands while dancing, leading on and off the dance floor, and always properly thanking your partner for the dance.   And they rotate partner 3-4 times, so they are able to dance with a variety of people.  Also, there are more boys than girls, so the boys can practice cutting in while dancing.

 

Here Faith is being escorted to her seat, and the boys were taught how to properly do that! After they practiced this a few times, they couples had to converse for about two minutes!  Coaching was given on how to ask non yes or no questions in an effort to create conversation!  It was really cute.  Something else that was done was punch and cookies were served.  Faith learned how to eat a cookie making as few crumbs as possible.  The adults watching picked up a few tips as well!

Faith had a great time, and it is really cute to watch her practice some of the conversational pieces they focused on and see her try to teach Shane the cha cha!  We're looking forward to the next cotillion in a month!

Pumpkin Patch Field Trip

After coming back from the lake Thursday evening, we ventured out to the pumpkin patch Friday morning with our Better Together co-op.  To make the adventure even more fun, we took a train to the pumpkin patch.  About five years ago we took the same train around Christmas time to a Christmas tree farm and were able to see Santa.  This train ride was less traumatic (Shane was petrified of Santa!), and of course it was fun to be with friends.

 

Olivia thought she was pretty tough carrying around her pumpkin!  She would for about ten seconds and then look at me and say, "heavy! heavy!"  With pumpkins everywhere, she had fun just running from one spot to another and pointing to all the pumpkins!

 

Sweet Faith!  She is a little disappointed that we are yet to carve them!  I assured her we will do it before Halloween!

Trip to Lake Havasu

This past week we spent five beautiful days at one of our favorite vacation spots - Lake Havasu!  We enjoyed gorgeous weather (there is a reason fall is our favorite time to go there!), made great memories in the water and on the boat, and had fun just being all together as a family! 

 

Each day we spent time swimming in the pool.  The kids especially enjoyed it when Daddy went in the water and played!

 

All three kids love to help Steve drive the boat!  Olivia especially thought it was fun since it was her first time being able to do that.

 

Here is Faith on the EZ ski!  The two oldest took turns riding on that and the inflatable.  Olivia wanted a turn too, but we told her she needs to be older!  She wasn't too thrilled with that idea!

 

One of the fun treats about being on vacation is lying in bed and watching movies!  They think it's so fun that they can all fit in there together!

 

Looking forward to our next trip and savoring the memories made on this vacation!