Halloween Pumpkins

   Here are my pumpkins this year.  Honestly not sure where the time went, I was seriously carving these 2 hours before trick or treaters started knocking on my door.  Usually I have 4 big pumpkins carved a couple days before the big day--1 pumpkin for each of us. Sadly this year the adults didn't get a pumpkin, just the kidlets. My oldest, the little witch for Halloween, chose the dragon on the right.  She's on this dragon phase, loving the movie How to Train Your Dragon.  And my little one, the skeleton, wanted the cat on her pumpkin. I'm perfecting how I like to carve pumpkins. I like to just take off the skin of the pumpkin, and take enough of the soft rind so that there is still a glow when you light the candle inside.  I prefer this method so when then the pumpkin starts to wither and crumble in on itself, that I'm not left with a giant hole in the center.  Anyway. I thought they turned out pretty good.  Next year I really need to start earlier.

   The girls went trick-or-treating tonight, even though it's the day before Halloween. One of many reason I do not like Halloween on the weekends. Anyway, the night started out with a down pour of rain. We were worried that the girls wouldn't be getting any candy tonight. BUT there was a small window of opportunity, treaters came a-knockin, so we hustled out the door and did our small circuit of houses in the neighborhood.  I'll confess, I decided to fill a big pot of candy and leave it on the doorstep with a sign saying, "Happy Halloween, enjoy the candy, leave the pot." hahaha. I'm always the one stuck at home handing out candy, I wanted to be out with my girls as they run from one doorstep to the next. I loved it. and I really didn't care that when we got back the entire pot was empty. I'm just happy that the pot was still there. :)

Happy Halloween everyone!!

girls in costumes and a new library

   Kids in costumes just make me laugh.  Earlier this week, my little one got to wear her costume to her gymnastics class. At first she was going to be a kitty cat, to match with my oldest being a witch, but sadly the cat costume did not survive. The little one decided that she wanted to be a skeleton. Found one on sale! and she loves it. :) Here's a couple pics of her in the gymnastics class.

   Then today, my oldest had her school Halloween Parade!  Everyone crowded in the gym and the kids walked up and down the aisles showing off the costumes.  Some of those 6th graders were very creative (one was a toilet brush, with a huge styrofoam toilet around him). Here's a couple pics of my little witch!

   While waiting for my oldest daughters class to end, the little one and I walked over to the newly built library! YAY!! The opening was last week, heard it was chaos, and chose to wait a few days...I don't do very well with crowds and screaming children.  Anyway, we had about 10 minutes until the doors opened and found the neatest thing just between the library and the soon to be rec center.  I was waking down the sidewalk and I stepped on this cement tile and it chimed back at me.  Curiosity go the better of me and we found these 9 tiles chime when you step on them!  (pictured below).  Definitely kept my little one entertained until the library opened.  The chairs you see scattered around are actually cemented to the ground, and the seats are engraved with little town factoids.

   The library. I have missed you. miss having my library card which was on my car keys.  Did you know that I still have not found my keys. seriously. where the fudge are they! I almost went into a panic this morning before taking my daughter to school when I couldn't find the only spare key. I really need to find my keys. Anyway. the NEW and improved library. The little one and I walked around, loved it, she loved it so much I almost had to drag her out.  While we were there I had to pay a few bucks to get a newly issued library card so I could access my account online, check out new material....can we say finally! I have a library card (yay!) and 3 new books to keep me busy (yay!).

   Later today...hopefully starting pumpkins and carving tomorrow. crossing fingers that pumpkin carving happens. Been a busy week, have the pumpkins, just need to gut and cut. that post later. :)

Movie Review: Red

Good movie. seriously. RED (Retired: Extremely Dangerous). 

Red is an action-comedy starring Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, John Malkovich and Helen Mirren, with Mary-Louise Parker, and Karl Urban (love him). Basically the movie is about these former black-ops CIA agents(Willis, Freeman, Malkovich and Mirren) who are now targets of the CIA for knowing too much about an old mission.  Willis is trying to accept his retired life, meet someone knew, when a team tries to assassinate him.  In order to find out what's going on, he finds some of his old friends and they set out to take care of business.

We liked the movie. The movie was entertaining, a lot of gun fire, the cast was great, the story maybe predictable, but I was just looking for a good movie to watch.  If you like the cast, you'll like the movie. :)  Old retired agents that are still dangerous, and kick butt just as well as any other agent.  7/10 stars.

Weekend in Zions (long post)

photo by my friend Adam

This is a very long post filled with pictures and is more like a journal entry for myself. I posted more pics on fb if interested.

the group. nice guy offered to take this shot.

Our friends invited us to camp/hike in Zions National Park over the weekend. Luckily, we were able to meet with my in-laws and our girls got to play on the grandparents farm for 3 days!  The adventure started with trying to find a campsite, who knew it would be over the UEA holiday when this trip was planned? Zions was packed, cars lined the streets, RV's were everywhere. Speaking of RV's, is it really considered camping if you have a little mobile home decked out with a generator, kitchen, satellite tv, and a soft cozy bed? i think not. Anyway, to make a long story short, we pulled up to the ranger station and ONE walk-in spot was available. Seriously lucky. We did not care what it looked like, how far we would have to walk in our stuff, we just needed somewhere to camp.

part of walters wiggle

After finding our friends and setting up camp, we headed to Angel's Landing.   The trail is 2.5 miles to the top, it starts following the Virgin River and then once it starts ascending the mountain the trail becomes paved.  My favorite part of the trail up? (being sarcastic) is called Walters Wiggles, which is a series of 21 steep switchbacks. After the switchbacks from hell, and your legs are on fire, you reach the Lookout Point which is the last spot before the last .5 mile summit.  This last .5 mile is scary if you're not prepared. Very sharp dropoffs, narrow paths, and they have a chain grip to hold on the entire way.  Great hike. beautiful views.

warning sign before going on Angels Landing

The next morning, after deciding to finally get up and get going, we headed to a day hike at The Subway. You need a permit for this hike, and most need canyoneering equipment so you can go down into the Subway and then hike out.  Since we don't know how to canyoneer, we started at the end of the trail and worked our way up to the subway. The first .5 mile is easy through the trees and then you descend down what I like to call the cliffs of insanity. It's another .5 mile down a very steep loose rock trail before you reach the bottom near the creek. All I could think was...we have to climb back up this to get out!

one of many beautiful scenes on the Subway

At the bottom of the cliffs of insanity we follow the creek, cross it back and forth countless times to follow the trail 4 miles up to the subway.  The trail going back and forth on the creek is gorgeous.  Obviously I'm sharing a lot of pictures since my words cannot begin to describe how breathtaking the hike really is.  Once we made it to the top, we turned around and hiked our way back with looming dark clouds waiting to pour down on us. Once we made it to the cliffs of insanity it started to drizzle (not what you want on a loose rock very steep climb).  When we were driving back to town it started to pour, so we decided to take a quick stop for nachos and margaritas. 

going into the subway

Our last night we became a tiger team and had to create a shelter so we could make our dinner and have somewhere to keep our heads dry.  We worked together and with some brainstorming we made a shelter out of a tarp, twine and a couple walking sticks. It was awesome. Once it was setup, we had somewhere to make our dinner in the rain.  The next morning we made breakfast, packed up, and started our looong drive to pick up the girls at the grandparents. My girls had such a great time on the farm! 15 hours later we were home. Fantastic trip. Great friends. too long of a car ride. :)

morning after the rain picture. (pic by husband who needs credit to feel loved..all other pics are MINE!)

Engh Gardens. and pumpkins!

The other day, I was invited by a good friend to take our little kidlets to a little pirate party at Engh Gardens.  I haven't been to this place in yeaaarrs...like when I was kid looking for christmas trees with my dad.  Not what you'd expect from a place where you buy beautiful flowers. :)  Some of the kids dressed in their costumes, and when we got there, they took you to this tented area where a pirate told the kids a couple scary/fun stories.  Then they were let loose to play around the flowers and the pumpkins.  They did a great job decorating for the holiday, pumpkins everywhere! (which you'll see lots of pictures, my daughter and I wanted to share the different kinds!).  Other decorations they had were a small pirate boat for the kids to play in, a hay bale maze, other cute halloweeen decorations throughout the facility, did I mention pumpkins? Thanks Ash for including me and the girls to your outing. definitely fun!
Ok picture time.  

All the kids in our group (minus one tiny one)



my little one saying "Boo!"

 

ahh..my boyfriend. :) I was wearing my mummy shirt.

 

Found Cap'n Jack drinkin his rum.

 

pale pumpkins! never seen this color. I think they called them New England Cheese Pumpkins?

 

Neat Pumpkins. Sign said Cinderella Pumpkins, they looked flat. loved these.

 

the white next to the pale pumpkins. I think I want a white one this year!

 

"spooky" pumpkin decoration

 


Just one of the piles of small pumpkins for the kids to pick from.



Saw this one as we were leaving with our little pumpkins...thought it was fun :)



time for a change....hair wise.

Don't you ever get an itch to change something, like your hair?? I needed something different. what better than changing your hair? I've been growing my hair long for a few years, which I haven't done since high school. And I've stopped playing with different shades of red and let it grow out natural blonde. But lately I've had the itch to change it, and change it I did. :) Ok, maybe this might too drastic for some of you, I'm still getting used to it, but I like it! And the best part is hair grows back.  For now here are pictures of before and after...to show you how much I took off. :)

Before

After

and just for fun, a front shot (I hateposting pics of myself)

tada! the end result. my daughter woke up and the first thing she said was "wow mom, I love your haircut!" gotta love kids. they say the sweetest things when you need it most.

what's on my mind.

I feel like I have been avoiding my blog this month.  So far this month I've been keeping things low-key, so not much to write about. BUT today is 10-10-10 and I had to write something! I was going to do a 10 random things you may or may not know about me, or my top 10 favorites of something, 10 things I can not live without, but honestly my brain is no functioning today and I'm just staring at the computer screen wondering what to write.


How about 10 things on my mind right now.


1. Where are my car keys?! they've been missing for a week and I have no idea where they disappeared to. I've looked, everywhere..I'm ready to turn my house upside down. lucky I'm using the spare key, but that's the spare, and the only one. Now I'm paranoid in losing that key. Did I mention my library card, my favorite Australian key chain is on my keychain! grrr.


2. New book. I haven't had any new book reviews lately because I'm taking a long time to finish this book. Currently I'm reading Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss...all 670 pages. I'm almost done. So far I'm really enjoying the story. I don't know how else to describe it other than it is fantasy, magic, mystery all wrapped in one.  The author paints a very vivid image in my mind when I'm reading his words. Not sure why it has taken me 3 weeks to finish this story. good book!


3.  My hair!  I have been growing my hair out now for a few years. Looking back, I don't think I've had my hair this long since high school.  I'm ready for a change! I'm ready to chop it off and try a new color.  Growing up I was a blonde, by high school a dark blonde, I've meddled with different shades of red, and this time I'm playing with the idea of a medium brown. why not. If this happens, I may post pictures by the end of the week.


4.  Recently took a break from looking for a job, but I'm ready to get back into that search. I have applied for a few things, but nothings come back. still looking. glad it's not urgent, but still would like to find something, even just part-time.


5.  Feel like I'm starting a new chapter in my life, maybe that's why I'm changing my hair and looking for a job.  Feels good. exciting and new.


6.  I'm addicted to a new game on facebook. City of Wonder. wonder if it's time to collect my coins yet?? or research something new.


7.  Excited that my sister and I are finalllllly going to have a girls weekend with our big sister in a few months. tickets bought. the trip is set in stone.


8. Need new recipes. Do you ever get tired of the stuff you make for dinner?? are your kids super picky about what they eat?! yeah. I need to try something new, the recipes I have are getting boring and over used. I've looked at food.com, kraftfoods.com, friends blogs, but I'm still at a loss.


9.  Frustrated that my attempts at losing weight are not showing. I know...be patient. whatever. going on a month of workout classes (which I love going to), watching calories, and I may have lost a pound? really?? I'm being good! and I haven't been this active in years. Since I'm enjoying this, I'll keep at it, hoping that my body will catch up down the road.


10.  Babysitters. I need to find a new reliable babysitter that doesn't mind that my hermit brother in law lives in the basement. So far I've been looking at sitter websites, which charge a monthly fee just so you can reply to girls that are interested in watching your kids! seriously?

p.s.  my daughter has her first loose tooth! (she wanted me to mention it)


And because I have not posted a song for the month, here is another Bside track for Muse. Easily.

Movie Review: Legend of the Guardians (Owl movie)

Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole

Beautiful movie, graphics wise.  Simply stunning for an animated movie. The movie itself is basically about 2 owl brothers, each having a different path--one for good and the other for evil.  A rogue group of owls, the Pure ones, have kidnapped young owls to turn them into soldiers against the legendary Guardians. One brother was able to escape and sets off on a journey to find the Guardians for help.  Supposedly the movie is based off a book series, but I have not had chance to read them.  The owls in this movie are not only wise, but are warriors; they wear razor sharp talons, helmets, and they have amazing fights.  You do not want to mess with these owls. My friend and I left the movie thinking the movie itself was too dark for our 5-6 yr olds, but then you look back to the old Disney movies we grew up on and which of those weren't terribly dark for our age? The movie gets 2 thumbs way up for the amazing graphics that make the movie, and maybe 1 thumb for the storyline.    5/10 stars