Halloween

It was chilly, but beautiful. The prize-winning pumpkins (if there were prizes LOL).

From PinkOne:

And Scout (who gets major points for execution, but the idea was not original; he saw it in the local paper):

The trick-or-treaters--PinkOne as a Spider Princess (notice the pink candy bucket!), Scout as a Secret Service Agent, and our neighbor The Rabbi. They had a blast! I love our neighborhood on Halloween.

The Event That Stole October

The Family Fall Festival.

Yes, I guess I was pretty naive when I agreed to head up this event at our church. It was supposed to just take a few days to plan and then a few days to execute. RIGHT! God definitely had other plans for this event. It was exhausting, but so much fun to watch it all unfold. He just kept dropping all this cool stuff in my lap--ice cream, wood for a fire, petting farm volunteers, workers, bakers, chili makers, candy, beautiful weather (after over a week of nasty, cold, wet, damp, yuck!), boxes--everything we needed exactly when we needed it.

I must confess that I don't always see God at work around me. I mean yes, I see Him and I KNOW that He's always here, but real tangible God-work? Over and over proof? Unfortunately, not always. Maybe I'm just too busy and too unsure if it's really Him. But there was no denying that God was working in this event. It was so big and so amazing it could only be God. Things came together in a way that only He could have arranged. And it was so obvious to all around that God was at work in it all. I was so blessed to be in the middle of this. What a ride!


We had a petting farm--thanks 4-H Pirates!--a fire truck and police car with awesome firemen and policemen, a wagon ride...

...Games, Crafts, a Fun House, a Black Light Maze, a Box Maze, an Inflatable Obstacle Course (the kids LOVED this and stood in line a long time to play), a puppet show, bonfire (with the Senior High band to sing)...

We served 500 hot dogs, 700 scoops of ice cream, gallons of chili--oh yeah Chili Cook-Off was a blast! (Except for our pastors; apparently they were a little "indisposed" for a bit with the 17 different chilis they had to taste to choose a winner. :-( )

The crowd was way more than we expected--but everyone had a great time and we planted a lot of seeds that night. Friends and neighbors were invited and saw what a great church family we have. Hopefully, they'll want to hang out with us again soon.

And yes, I'm already thinking about NEXT year...

Masquerade Ball

Scout heard about a homeschool high school dance in the paper last year. He thought it sounded cool, but wasn't old enough to attend. I filed it away for later, but I really thought he'd forget about it. Dancing isn't his thing. I was proven wrong, when Scout started asking about the dance at the end of September. I tracked down the info, emailed the coordinator of the event and got the info. There was to be a Masquerade Ball at the end of October. He was very excited! (Yep, he really was! LOL)

Masquerade meant coming up with a costume--he did very well, I think.

He gathered some friends and I agreed to drive them all over to the dance. (It's about 50 minutes away.) We all met at one house so Moms could take pictures (of course LOL). They were a handsome/beautiful bunch.

They all had a blast and are planning to attend the next one--December's SnowBall. It seems to get increasingly difficult to find friends in the homeschool community as the kids get older. So I'm very thankful that the dance worked out so well and Scout--and all--had such a good time together.