Halloween 2013

For the third year in a row, Tyler was an astronaut for Halloween this year.  He thought he could just wear his costume from last year, but he has definitely grown in the past 12 months, and you can see for yourself in this picture.  I ordered a new astronaut “flight suit” for him, but it wasn’t going to be here in time for his school Halloween party, so he made due with the too short, riding up one from last year.  I certainly haven’t had to spend much money on costumes for my kids!  This one was hand-me-down from Matt from two years ago, and Ava just picks a dress out of her princess dress up bin and calls it good.

Halloween has become a pretty chaotic time for me at work.  3 years ago, we started hosting a community Trick or Treat event on our campus, and it’s evolved and gotten bigger each year.  Here was the first year, and this was last year.  This year, we decided to keep it simple and not do any kind of haunted house attraction. That’s the part that takes the most work and costs the most money.  The thing people are coming to the event for is the free trick or treating.  We had a ridiculous amount of candy donated by the students of our campus—I personally counted 1250 bags on Wednesday, and there was at least another 400 bags that didn’t get counted.  We did end up with about 400 left over after it was all said and done.  The word is definitely out in the east valley about this event—we had over 1400 people.  The other two years we did this event, we tried to gauge how many people were there, but never had an accurate count.  This year, we had a welcome table with volunteers using those hand held crowd counters (like they have at the Costco front door).  By the end of the night, over 1400 people had come through—and that didn’t count the volunteers or those who came in through another entrance.  It was massive this year….and everyone was happy!  There were a few who expressed disappointment that there was not haunted attraction, but no one seemed to mind too much.

The bummer about having a big event like this at work is that this ends up being the only option for my kids for Halloween night.  I don’t think they mind, but Tyler did say “why don’t we get to go trick-or-treating around our neighborhood?”  I tried to explain to him that last time we tried going around our neighborhood, we walked and walked and very few houses had their lights on.  This event is what parents want anymore—free, easy, safe…they can spend an hour and get all the candy their kids need, along with some fun games too.  It all works out!  But, it is a ton of work.  Luckily, there was a great crew of student volunteers that helped us out this year.  I was amazed at how hard they all worked.  I didn’t do too much actual “work” during the event because I was walking around enjoying it all with my kids.  The students and Beth Ann were all super busy though.  We had about 3 or 4 who ended up being the candy runners and they kept all 30 of the booths loaded with candy all night—that was a big job!  One of the students was even barefoot the whole time because he was Aladdin and didn’t want to ruin the effect!  Afterwards, we had a bunch of awesome helpers stick around and clean it all up.  This event amazes me every year.  I never wanted to do it in the first place, and it has certainly caused me and others some stress and heartbreak over the years, but all in all, it is a great event for our campus and our community.  I am always so relieved when it’s all over. 

So, this guy gets the award for the best costume of the night.  Darrell is the curator of our animal exhibits on campus and is always at the Halloween event with some of the critters.  This year, he had a couple snakes, cockroaches, scorpions and a tarantula.  The amazing thing though, was that he shaved his head so that he could be the character Megamind.  That’s dedication right there!

Here are some of our outstanding student leaders…Emily (one of my student workers), Lyndsey, Shelby (lead student worker), Cristian, and Cara (my tent buddy from the Grand Canyon trip).  They were all so helpful!  This event wouldn’t be possible without these students.

I initially planned on wearing this big, foam Bride of Frankenstein wig, but when I saw these Batman pajamas on a Groupon, I couldn’t resist.  I knew they’d be much more comfortable for the night, and I was right.  I loved them!  Here I am with my good friend Amy (aka: Harry Potter) and my boss and friend, Meredith dressed as Elvis.  Amy’s costume was so convincing she actually had one of the librarians tell her that she was going into the wrong restroom! 

Ava picked an “Alice in Wonderland” dress out of her dress up bin. Since my mom is still in town, she got to join us for the Halloween festivities too!  I’m so glad she was able to share the fun with the kids, and that she got to see our big event at work.  Ava is still pretty thrilled about getting candy.  She had about 6 pieces in her bag and was running around showing everyone “all her candy!” 

I had to take a photo of Tyler with another one of our great student volunteers.  Yuri is a student who I just met this year, but he’s been great.  He’s gone to space came 3 times, so he was wearing his official jumpsuit.  He insisted that Tyler wear his medal for the picture.  I’d love for Tyler to be able to go to space camp one day!

The students led a bunch of great activities at their tables this year.  We tried to encourage them to have something to do at their table, rather than just giving out candy. We came up with some of the games and provided the supplies, so that made it easy for the students. 

This is another good friend of mine, Niccole.  She is the advisor for our Multicultural Club, and their activity was painting sugar skulls.  She and a few of the students had their faces pained for Day of the Dead.  It was really cool!

If you’d like to see all of the photos from the event, you can click this link.  Our kids ended up with giant bowls full of candy, and they haven’t really even asked to eat much of it.  Hopefully they’ll forget about it soon enough and we can find another use for it.  My friend Ashley said she freezes it and uses it in the kids Christmas stockings and in Christmas gifts—genius!  Thanks to all of the awesome students and my staff who helped make the 3rd annual Halloween Extravaganza a huge success! 

Pre-Halloween trapeze

We wore our Halloween costumes to trapeze on Wednesday night.  Mom came with to watch, and I always tend to do better when I have family there cheering me on.  I guess I must be trying to show off for them!  I had a couple nice layouts, and event got to try catching it for the first time.  No luck, but it was fun to try!  I also think flying in Halloween costumes makes it even more exciting.  We should really do it more often.

These girls are awesome….I love my new trapeze friends!  I am so glad I found them and this amazing sport. 

It’s Halloween Circus time!

Lion King, the Broadway production

The main reason that Grandma Jean is out here right now is to take us all to the Broadway production of The Lion King.  After she saw a few Broadway shows in NYC, she decided it’d be fun to share that with us too.  I saw that Lion King was coming to ASU Gammage Theater in Oct/Nov, so we booked some tickets and then she booked a flight.  It was going to be a great time for her to be here because she’d be able to share Halloween with us, and be here for the ROC race Dave and I are doing.  Little did she know when she bought that plane ticket that she’d also be getting to see her new condo and start getting it ready to live in.  The condo opportunity was an added bonus of this trip!

When booking the tickets, I called my friend KT who is a volunteer usher at Gammage.  She’s seen Lion King more times than she can count, and knew what the best seats were for seeing the show.  We got seats close to the aisle where the animals all come walking down towards the stage.  It was amazing to see them so close! Thanks for the recommendation KT! We weren’t able to use cameras inside, so you’ll just have to take my word for it.  This is a fantastic production.  The costumes are beautiful and so lifelike that sometimes you forget that there are people underneath them.  If you ever get a get a chance to go, I highly recommend it.  Dave and I saw it several years ago, but our seats were way up in the second level and it was a much different show that far away.  You really need to be up close so you can appreciate the creative costumes.

It was recommended that we get there early to get parking.  We picked up Subway on the way there and once we parked, we had a picnic in the back of the van.  It was a fun way to pass the time before we went in to find our seats. Tyler enjoyed the show very much.  Ava thought it was a little too loud, and ended up falling asleep during the second act.  I think she still liked it though…even if she didn’t want to show it at the time.  When Dave and the kids watched the movie a few nights later, she kept making references to the play “remember when he said that in the play too?” Tyler was on his feet clapping with everyone else during the standing ovation.  It was a late night for everyone, but it was well worth it.  Thanks for taking us all to see this great show mom!  The kids will remember this for a long time.

My friend, Sammy, from trapeze is a videographer for ASU.  She got to go behind the scenes of the production and posted this video. It’s a great, close up look at the show.  Sammy even got to try on some of the masks.  I’m jealous!  Check out the video here.

Date night at the ZBB concert

Dave and I went to the Zac Brown Band concert tonight.  They are the country band that got me liking country music again, and I have wanted to see them perform live for awhile.  At the last Jimmy Buffett concert I went to, he played a song called Knee Deep in the Water, which is a song he sings with ZBB.  After that concert, I listened to that song over and over, and then discovered ZBB.  They are awesome!  I got tickets for Dave and I to go, and we ended up meeting Sadie and her husband there.  They put on a great show!  I didn’t take many pictures, and this one of Dave is terrible, but since it’s only one of two, I have to share. No, he hadn’t had more than a half a beer, although his eyes show otherwise.  It was a great time! I’m setting myself up for a busy week thought—concert tonight, Lion King Tuesday, trapeze on Wednesday, huge Halloween event at work (and hours and hours of set up) on Thursday, dinner and lecture with work friends on Friday, and our ROC 5K on Saturday.  Yikes, I’m tired just typing all of that.  I hope we make it through the week!

So, I’ve started running a bit…

I’ve always said I’m not a runner.  I think I’ve even said that if I’m running, I must be getting chased.  But, since I’ve changed my work out routine to include a lot more cardio, running has gotten much easier.  It really started when I signed up to do the ROC 5K with my trapeople.  I decided I needed to train on the actual roads (rather than on the treadmill), and I found that I didn’t hate it nearly as much as I thought.  I started slowly, with weekly runs with Jen, Ashley and April after trapeze on Wednesdays, and then started running in my neighborhood a couple mornings a week.  I found a route that is about 3.25 miles and takes me about 30 minutes.  It’s great to get out there when it’s quiet and the sun is just coming up.  The weather has been perfect for a morning run, but I’m not sure how much I’ll like it this winter.  On Sunday morning, I decided to run over to mom’s condo.  I’ve never lived close enough to my parents that I could just walk or run to their house (other than when I lived there).  Since I moved away in 1997, I’ve lived in Arizona, Fargo, or Washington DC…none of which are walking distance.  Since I can run that far now, I decided it’d be fun to say that I “ran over to mom’s house” for the first time ever.  It was 2.35 miles there, which I ran at a pretty good pace.  I stopped and chatted for a few minutes (she was on her way to the hot tub when I ran through the gate), and then ran back home again.  I thought I might walk a bit on the way home, but I felt great, so kept running.  I was pretty impressed with my mile times too…so much so that I had to take a screen shot of my runkeeper app so I could remember it!  I love that my mom is close enough that I can get there on my own two feet—and pretty quickly too!

Who would have ever thought I’d be running?  Certainly  not me.  I guess there are all kinds of new routines in my life these days.  I am sure enjoying it!

Tyler’s fall Mercado

Tyler’s school has an event around Halloween each year called Mercado. The older kids all run different activities, and the children all get to use their pretend money to pay for the various activities.  It’s a lesson in budgeting their money, bargaining, and selling their products.  They get to dress up in their Halloween costumes, and parents can come too.  Grandma Jean was here for Mercado, so she joined me for the fun.  No, this is not last year’s Mercado—Tyler is wearing the same costume he did for the previous two years.  We did order him a newer, better fitting astronaut costume this year, but it hadn’t arrived in time for Mercado.  He had to make do with the too-small costume, which he didn’t seem to mind. 

We all tried the balloon popping activity and won pencils.

Bobbing for apples proved to be a bit challenging for Tyler.  We hadn’t thought of the fact that it would be helpful to have all 4 of your front teeth in order to pick up the floating apples.  He finally just used his hands.

Just before we left, he got his snow cone and then went off to run his booth, the movie theater in his classroom.  He had a fun day, and it was great to be able to share it with Grandma Jean.

Seeing her condo for the first time

Mom flew in today, and I was so excited to be able to hand her the keys to her new condo and watch as she unlocked the door for the first time.  I just knew she was going to love it.  It’s everything she’s been waiting for all these years. Congratulations Mom!  We’re so excited for  you and dad to have a place here with us.  It’s going to be so much fun!

Sitting on her patio for the first time…..

I stopped over before picking her up at the airport to drop off a little welcome present—flowers, wine, a fruit bowl, chocolate and an AZ coffee mug.  Welcome home!

After getting some lunch, we picked up the kids and then headed to Bahama Bucks for a shaved ice treat to celebrate grandma’s visit.

There was no furniture, yet grandma insisted on sleeping at her new condo.  To make it somewhat livable, we brought over our air bed, patio table and chair, and a couple camping chairs.  What more do you need? Well, maybe some dishes, a couch…internet…..

Let the shopping and decorating begin!