Our Halloween In Pictures

At the beginning of this school year, as I visited each of my children's classrooms for back-to-school night, I dutifully located the parent sign-up sheets and filled my name in the slots that I felt I could reasonably manage.  Having already been appointed as the PTA Reflections Chair, I knew I wouldn't have too much time to give, so I tried to balance my commitments accordingly.  Yet somehow I still ended up as one class's room mom, and a music time pianist for another child!  Oops. The pianist duties have actually been quite fun and very manageable.  Room mom duties, however, made things just slightly  hectic during Halloween week.  And by hectic, I really mean a few too many trips to Walmart, swollen legs by the end of each day, embarrassing corners of the house, completely out of control busy. I am sure I disappointed many people.  Halloween preparations are already fairly time consuming, but when you add planning and putting on a 4th grade Halloween class party into the schedule of a non-super-mom like me, it gets a little messy.  HOWEVER, it was all worth it in the end.  Everything was a success, and another fun Halloween is now in the books:). 

Emery was maybe more interested in the rocks...

FHE carving night:)

Halloween Day!!

Our "Teen Beach Movie" Biker

Creepy Zombie boy and mini-Hulk

(Two lessons learned this year. Walmart Halloween make up? No. Good.  Also, I used to be bugged by the generic super hero stage, but I think now I kind of find it a relief. It was quite nice to only have to put three costumes together instead of four!)

Check out these fancy parent costumes at the school costume parade!  Some people are amazing:)

 The green one with embarrassed body language is mine:)

Ashton's class party.

Our traditional spooky pre-trick-or-treating Halloween feast.

Ready to go get candy! With the cutest little lamb ever.

Ashton looks demonic here.  Ew, sorry. 

Oh, and here's Talmage with his best friend, Tim.  He has an Adam's apple. 

I was kind of proud of my glittery scroll-web design.  I know it's really not that awesome, but for this girl who doesn't even know how to properly apply eye shadow, it was spectacular:).

Our fantastic jack-o-lanterns. Is anybody surprised?

The melting ghost is mine.

It took a few houses for Emery to begin to enjoy the whole trick-or-treating exercise.  And he seemed to think he was invited into everybody's home.  It was just adorable.

And finally, going to see Grandma and Grandpa:). My favorite pictures of the night.  Just look at these two!

Love this man:)

Productivity rating for November 1: zero.  

Oh, Wonderful October...

I love October.  It makes me happy in every way.  A chill in the air perfect for sweaters, bright, warm colors flanking the view of otherwise ordinary streets, gentle breezes making red leaves flutter past my face, that sound of golden aspens rustling in the wind, and of course the two major components of autumn life...football and Halloween.  These were the ubiquitous joys of fall that we got to experience during this month.  

One of my favorite days this month was just a simple Saturday when we didn't have much else going on, so we took the morning to clean up the yard.  Everything was perfect outside, and everyone was happy (well, almost everyone; Talmage was maybe having a extra-hormonal day).  I love how physical work can make a boy feel so free and useful.  Even Emery wanted to help:).

LOVE Joseph's tongue hanging out.

My unskilled attempt at capturing the deep red of these leaves.

Also this month, we enjoyed a few less expected happenings, including a rather last minute decision for Joseph to try wrestling.  This added excitement brought with it two practices a week right during dinner time to which a parent was required to attend AND siblings were forbidden to play at.  Thus, every Tuesday and Thursday from 6:00 - 7:00 while Super Seth took care of things at home, I got the privilege of beholding this sort of cuteness:

(pre-instruction play)

 

And on Saturdays, this:

The season ended last week, and after working hard to learn and complete the necessary requirements to earn his "gray shirt", Joseph ultimately decided wrestling isn't exactly his sport (phew!), but he sure had a lot of fun trying it.  

Another rather unexpected event was our decision to visit Fetal Studio at South Town Mall for an early gender check.  I normally wait until the full anatomical ultrasound at 20 weeks, but with this being our last baby, and final attempt at a conceiving a much desired girl, I knew I would not be able to stand the wait any longer.  And would you know it?

Yep, another boy. 

Another post to come with more of that story.  

Don't worry, I'm okay now.  And happy.  Boys are awesome!:) How could I not be?

On to more fun...


Now, when I mentioned football as being one of the joys of October, I wasn't just talking about BYU.  Ashton tried his hand at tackle football this year and loved his experience.  Unlike wrestling, this wasn't a last minute decision.  Seth and I discussed this one at length and decided to allow Ashton the experience.  His season actually began toward the end of the summer.  The first two weeks included 2 hour practices, 5 days a week. After that grueling initiation, they decreased the intensity just slightly to 3 days a week (still 2 hour practices).  Needless to say it was a huge commitment for our whole family.  The month of September welcomed in the actual game season.  Sadly, that month wasn't very successful for our little Vikings.  But when October came, they began to turn the season around and were actually winning games! It was most enjoyable for all.  

Football wasn't easy for Ashton.  There were moments that he wanted to quit.  But we were so proud of him for persevering and finishing strong.  By the time the season was over, he had quite a handful of key tackles and important plays to claim.  After his final practice of the season, he was thrilled to come home to find this surprise poster on our front door (the balloon had popped by the time we took the picture).  To see the smile on his face after overcoming self-doubt and some pretty challenging obstacles for a 9 year old was a truly priceless moment for this mom.  

And of course there was BYU football!  Seth and I loved taking each of the boys to at least one home game with our three season tickets.  Each of the boys savored their time in LaVelle Edwards Stadium. Talmage was the lucky son who got to come to two games with us.  Unfortunately, however, he was the attendee when we were defeated yet again by Utah.  Tears flowed. It felt like a wake inside the car as we drove home.  I think I learned that such is not the time to give a speech about having love for all mankind.  It took him a few days to recover.  When it was time for Joseph's turn, I wasn't sure how he would hold up for the whole 3+ hours of a game he, though he is growing up in the Seth Barrus household, doesn't quite fully understand.  But he loved it, the entire thing.  In fact, since we were leading by a comfortable margin by the middle of the fourth quarter, we decided to leave a bit early to beat traffic.  Joseph was acutely disappointed to be ending his first real BYU football experience prematurely. I think Seth has successfully impassioned yet another child.  

(Please forgive the poor camera phone shot.)

And finally, Halloween!!  This was a big day for us, so I will be dedicating a separate post entirely to the festivities of the day.  But for now, I will leave you with our family costume shots (one of us had to be taking the picture each time). I give you Rocker Dad (kind of his traditional-no-time-to-plan-a-costume getup), Zombie boy, mini-Hulk, Teen Beach Movie Biker, and precious lamb:).  

Oh, and I guess large, pregnant, non-scary witch (I don't do gore, much to the dismay of my children).

I hope you were all able to also bask in the wonderfulness that is October:)!