Happy Halloween!

With Halloween being on a Sunday, it seemed to make it last ALL weekend long.

Friday night was our ward trunk-or-treat.

Taylee went to a birthday party, Rylee passed out the treats from our trunk and Treyson and Abree partook in the treat gathering.

Saturday we did the official trick-or-treating.

We dropped Rylee off at a friends house for a party, then the other kids went to ward member's homes, who were passing out treats. After an hour, we dropped Taylee and Treyson off at their party and finished trick-or treating with Abree. It was weird only having 1 kiddo again. These kids are getting busier, as they are getting older!

Our ladybug with a little 'tude.

Our Clown for World Peace.

Our cute, freckled Pippi Longstockings... complete with Mr. Nilsen, the monkey.

HaPpy HaLLowEen!!!

Noteworthy

Cantus Youth Choir,

invited the female acapella group

NOTEWORTHY

(from BYU)

to come sing for a fundraiser here in Meridian.

Rylee invited some friends from our old ward/school, to the concert.

It was fun and entertaining.
They encouraged audience participation, as we learned how to "beat box".
Ya, I'm still no good at it.
They also awarded prizes (NOTEWORTHY CDs) for correct answers to personal information questions about themselves.
Afterward, the singers were more than happy to give out their autographs.....

...and take pictures.
At first, I didn't want to disturb others trying to get autographs, so I took the first few shots with only a few singers. When the singers kept popping in and out of my shots, we finally decided to get everyone together and do a big group photo.

Next, we went outside and goofed off.

We did about 20 or more of these jumping photos.

The girls thought it was SO funny, they kept wanting to do another and another and another.

Next up, goofy line up.

Toe star.

Finger star.

Charity, Shay

Maddie, Gretchen, Rylee

And finally, the pyramid.

Rylee had so much fun hanging out with her old friends. She's already making plans on when she gets to see them next.... maybe birthday time?

Daddy-daughter Date

The girl's middle school had a fundraising dinner and auction on Friday... the "Husky Howl".

Taylee was babysitting that night, so Jason took Rylee on a daddy-daughter date.

Rylee talked Jason into letting her put make-up on him and dressing up for the event.



Jason said he ended up being the ONLY adult dressed up.
A little awkward, but he was a good sport about it.


I think they had a good time together... or to be more accurate, Rylee had a good time hanging out with her friends, while Jason got ditched and hung out with the other dad's.
Again, he was a pretty good sport about it. :)

Super Saturday... on a Tuesday.

Recently our ward had a "Super Saturday" ....on a Tuesday.

Our regularly scheduled Tuesday was the best option, since the building was booked every weekend for the month of October.

The theme for the evening was, "Centering Christ in our Holidays". Being on the Relief Society Meeting board, I was volunteered to give the lesson that evening.

Probably because I had expressed my feelings about Easter and talked about the new Easter traditions we created as a family.

I prayed about what to say, for weeks. Even so, the day of, I was VERY nervous. I gathered a few things as visual aids to give ideas on how to center Christ in our Holidays.

I started out by sharing some things I had learned in my Positive Parenting class that morning. I was feeling inspired to share, although the topic didn't seem to have a connection.... pride.

I went on to talk about my experience with Easter. Going from NO Easter Bunny as a child, to the Easter Bunny visiting my children, back to having the Easter Bunny "hop on by". I read my blog post I made 2 years ago.

I told them about our Easter traditions; Jerusalem dinner and "Easter in an Egg".

I also shared about other things I've done to center Christ in my holidays....

I collect nativity scenes. One of my favorites is this Fisher Price nativity. I love it because the kids can play with it, interact and retell the story of Jesus' birth.

The pillowcase with my name was a tradition we had as children. We would put our Christmas pillowcases on at the beginning of December. When we would see our pillow we were to think of Christ and how we could serve one another.

The heart shaped pillow is an idea I read on a blog. During the month of February, you take turns passing around the "Love Pillow". When you do a service for someone in your family, you put the pillow on their bed. Then they have the next 24 hours to perform a service for someone else in the family. The "Love Pillow" gets passed from one bed to the next all month long.

The stocking garland is another new tradition I'd like to start in my family. Basically it's a advent or countdown to Christmas. Each day a slip of paper is drawn out of the stocking and then our family does what it says. Each day we focus on Christ with our activity for that day.

Next, we moved on to dinner and crafts.... or "gifts of love" to stay within our theme. :) We enjoyed a huge variety of homemade soups and rolls. One of the most popular soups of the evening; Butternut Squash.

There were several wood projects; temple pictures, family photos, and holiday blocks. Also available; cloth headbands, glass etching, embroidered nativity and decorative jars/cans.

If you're curious about what projects we did, you can click on this link

http://2010giftsoflove.blogspot.com/

I got to be in charge of the glass etching station. I pre-cut family names onto contact paper, using a Cricut Thank you very much Karen. Then we carefully placed the contact paper stencil name on to the bottom of a glass pan. Trying to get it straight with no wrinkles was the hardest part of the whole thing!Then we applied "Armor Etch" cream to the name stencil, waited 5 minutes and Voila!.... a pan that can be easily identified at ward functions. Many made them as Christmas gifts.

Here's the poem to include, when giving as a gift...

Have you ever been asked by a very good friend,
For one of your favorite dishes to lend?

And when it was time for the dish to come back,
A strange looking object was returned in a sack!

Now I can help so your friends you won’t blame,
I have this nice dish that now bears your name.

So lend it or take it to any old place,
Your name you will always be able to trace.

It was a successful evening.

Many "gifts of love" (crafts) were completed and lots of fun and talking too.

Scarecrow!

My friend Jilene was asked to make a scarecrow for her daughter's school class. The donated scarecrows were to be auctioned off, to raise money for the school. Jilene didn't feel confident in her scarecrow makin' skills, so turned to me for a little inspiration and crafty know-how.

Initially, we were thinking of making a full-sized scarecrow. As I was researching and looking on the internet, I found many smaller versions.... scarecrows as plant pokes, pins, made with candy, as shelf-sitter decorations and holding baskets. Many of these were super cute, so I asked Jilene if the scarecrow HAD TO be full-size. She called the school and found out that making a smaller version would be just fine, so we shifted directions and came up with a plan.

This was our inspiration. I've had him for years...unfinished and kind of sloppy. He was useful in our scarecrow makin' though. I used his general size and shape to make a pattern.

I have since done a few finishing touches on him and he now looks great sitting on my shelf.
I found these old dish towels, yellowed and stained. I don't remember where they came from. Probably from a grandma hand-me-down fabric box. Even though they weren't in perfect condition, I thought they would make a great head/body for a scarecrow.
Scarecrows are supposed to me rustic and dirty, right?

I cut out the body, making the arms and legs really long, so they could wrap around a basket. Next, we ironed on a nose and patch cheeks, stitched a mouth and used buttons for eyes. Then I arranged some raffia around his head and pinned the 2 body pieces together. I sewed around the head and raffia hair, then around the rest of the body, leaving an opening for stuffing. I was pleased and surprised when the raffia hair actually worked. It's a little crazy and Jilene may decide to give him a haircut, but I like him.

Then it was on to making his clothing. I used our inspiration scarecrow to make a pattern, once again. I was able to leave some raw edges and not get too particular about things...because it was a scarecrow for goodness sake. We tied jute around the neck, waist, wrists and ankles and left some raffia sticking out for cuteness.

Here's George..our finished scarecrow. Jilene will probably fill the basket with apples, mini pumpkins or candy for the auction.

I was very please with how he turned out, especially because he was our own creation.

Would you bid on George?

Halloween Party

A lady my mom works with, has a Halloween Party for her neighborhood kids each year. She asked my mom if she would like to bring her grandchildren to the party.

My mom said, "How many? I have 14."

"Oh, maybe just a few of them then."

When other grandkids were busy, out-of-town or still too young to come, my kids got lucky enough to get on the invite list.

Treyson decided he wanted to be a clown, when he found a costume and wig, in my stash.

He wore Jason's Converse shoes to achieve that floppy, big shoe look.

Abree found this costume in the stash. Taylee raved about HOW CUTE! she was, so Abree decided she wanted to be a ladybug.

Taylee had decided she wanted to be Pippi Longstockings this year. We had waited to the last minute, only having striped tights, to come up with her costume. We felt we had found a treasure, when Rylee discovered an actual wire hanger in the closet (those are rare and hard to come by in our house). Taylee gathered mis-matched pieces of clothing and I began bending and cutting the hanger to go in her braids. Another awesome find was when we discovered the orange hairspray in my stash. Only thing missing was Mr. Nilsen, the monkey. He was hiding out today, but maybe he'll make it for Halloween.


Isn't she just the cutest Pippi.... or maybe Wendy, from Wendys?!

Quite the trio.

Who wants to bet, Treyson comes back with his clown make-up looking like the Joker, from Batman?