School
Jacob is enjoying 1st Grade and being "BIG." He still gets to go to Library and to Choir and now gets to go to PE and to Garden and to Computer too. He is excited about continuing to work on Science projects. He asks me each morning (and sometimes wakes me up in the middle of the night) to casually ask me, "which day is it?" to which I respond by saying the day of the week. "Noooo! Which DAY is it?" he asks again. At this point I say the date or some other "non-useful" information and to which he frustratedly pleads, "Nooooooooo!" as if his very survival depends on the answer and I, his mean mommy, am NOT helping at all. "WHICH DAY IS IT? Is it school day or church day or stay home day?" "Stay home day" is the one that immediately gets a happy grin (but almost none of our Saturdays are "stay home days" anyway). If it is a "church day," he is happy as soon as I remind him about Primary or singing or taking scriptures to class or having Family Night later. If it is a "school day," he's happy as soon as we figure out which special thing(s) he gets to do there - especially recess. He has only had 2 indoor recess days so far, one rainy day and one day with smokey air from a controlled burn. All the rest of the days, he's been able to burn off some of his enormous energy supply running and climbing and swinging outside 3 recesses a day. The weather is changing though. His poor teacher.
Jessica couldn't wait to get back to school and MATH! This year we got a new program which has LOTS of word problems though. This is good, it makes math more real, more useful in everyday life, but is frustrating for those who struggle with reading. Jessica has been working really hard (to the point of tears sometimes, poor girl). Once she knows all the words though, she's really good at picky out what info she needs and if there is any extra info, just thrown in to trick you, and she's great at the actual math. Her best friends are in GATE math and she has a goal of getting there too. As a mature 3rd Grader, I noticed Jessica has been playing ball on the black top more than playing on the playground this year. She is also in the choir and gets to take an official Art class. One of the other 3rd Grade teachers is an awesome artist and gives each 3rd Grade class a lesson once a week on techniques which they practice. She also talks to them about Art History and different famous artists. Jessica is our SLOW POKE in the morning this year, to the great frustration of her brothers as she stretches and yawns and chooses her clothes and brushes her hair and changes her mind about her clothes and gathers her stuff and changes her mind about her hair and yawns and stretches and goes back in the bathroom.
Nathan (who is the least sympathetic to Jessica) surprised me by asking if he could go to the school dances. My basic rule is when they are 14 but they get to go to the Valentine Banquet and the Graduation Dance their 8th Grade year even if they aren't 14 yet (there are TONS of parents and teachers at those and behavior is better). Nathan is doing awesome in school and made Honor Roll and CJSF. As a 7th Grader, he moves from room to room for every subject now, the four basics each morning, Math, Language Arts, Science and History, and PE every afternoon and for 6th period he alternates between Reading, Computer and GATE. He is with a really good group of kids, there is a lot of parent involvement and the teachers have said things like, "wow, this group actually says please and thank you, on their own." Nathan and his friends are a creative and ROWDY bunch but they are more Dennis the Menace-ish than Calvin-ish, most days.
Michael likes Seminary. He must because he actually gets up in the morning without any stubbornness (Michael is NOT a morning person, even on Christmas) and he's dressed and ready and outside waiting for his ride sometimes 20 minutes early. The difference is amazing. I love it. He gets right up the first time I tell him it's time with NO grumbling. His other classes are a different matter. He only has a few more years left of "have to school" (any school between the ages of 6 and 18 years old when he is required by law to attend) and the "dungeon existence" I force him to have. Then he will be free to use his incredible creativity and brainpower how he wants to. He came with me to a couple of my college classes and since then has actually, for the first time in YEARS, talked about going to college. He saw how a room full of adults could sit and work and learn together with an instructor and each other, and accomplish tasks and share ideas, because the teacher didn't have to stop every few seconds to deal with childish behavior and to give state required tests. AND college classes are offered at night, when Michael is actually conscience. AND he'd get to pick which classes he wants. I've tried many times to tell him that if he was in the advanced and college prep classes in high school, he'd get to have classmates and instructors like that now. His testing scores (the tests he stays awake for) are amazing, but his daily work, and therefore his semester grades, show his attitude about "have to school" instead of reflecting his true brainpower. I forced a little school/team spirit on him - we all went to the Homecoming game and I made everyone wear a blue shirt. Nathan wandered around with his friends and saw bits and pieces of the game. At the top and back of the bleachers (cement steps on a hill) Michael and Jacob played their own game with a water bottle as the football. Jessica sat behind me and played with my hair while I watched the game and cheered on our team. Our varsity won!
I try to sign up for several classes for the Fall semester because I don't know what my schedule will be until school starts. It's easier to drop ones which won't fit in my schedule than it is to try add some which will fit once school has started. I'm down to 2 classes for this semester and struggling to finish assignments for just these 2. I really like both teachers and am learning a lot. I try to take classes from the same field during a semester so my brain doesn't have to "switch gears." But even if they're not, I still try to coordinate assignments and research so I can accomplish multiple assignments in one task. For instance, the last several months especially, I have been reading and learning about gifted kids who struggle, fail and sometimes even drop out of school. And last year I volunteered in the GATE classroom for 6th/7th/8th Grade, talked with the teacher and worked with the students. I attended Site Council and PTO meetings and saw how people who don't work with these students, don't understand the NEED for these programs or for these instructors when budgets are so tight. GATE and electives are often dropped unless enough parents and staff work to keep them and teachers are willing to take them on. Our GATE teacher and some of the other specialists are only hired part time but they put in a lot of extra time working with kids, having lunch clubs, finding supplies they often have no budget for, filling out and keeping track of mounds of paperwork and they are the ones who understand and bond with these kids. This semester for part of my field experience in my "Introduction to Elementary School Teaching..." class I am working in the GATE classroom again with 3rd/4th Grade (and I'm with the 7th Grade too but that only counts as "work experience" not "field experience" - complicated). For the major research paper in my Composition class I am researching and writing about "Unrecognized At-Risk Students - Gifted Students" and interviewing our GATE teacher. For my field experience hours, I am also in Jacob's and Jessica's classes.
Sports and Work-outs
Nathan was on the Flag Football team this year. He was so excited when he found out he made the team. (He was just starting PE and I was on the playground with the Kindergartners and he came running over with a HUGE grin to tell me.) The junior highs in our area do not have bleachers or score boards for the football/soccer fields so we just watch from the edges, often sitting on blankets. I have decided to blame my ignorance of flag football on this fact. How am I supposed to understand and keep up with a game where there is no posted score and all I see are a bunch of cleats and socks running back and forth in front of me. Nathan's Big Brother came to his games and understood what was going on though so I asked him and other parents a lot of questions. Nathan was the "right guard" (I had to ask him when anyone asked me because I never could remember his title). He was next to the guy in the middle who passes the ball back to the quarterback and Nathan and a few other guys would rush at the opposing team and not let them get at our guy with the ball. It was flag and not tackle but it still got pretty rough sometimes. When Michael played, the opposing team's players seemed the same size or smaller, but this year, some of the opposing teams had enormous players. Our team got pretty banged up but they made it to the tournament and made third.
Nathan and Jessica were on the Cross Country Team again. With us spread apart on different campuses now and with different schedules, this is the first year we weren't all at every race cheering each other on. I even missed seeing my Jessica run twice because I couldn't get there, find parking and get to where I could see her on time. She worked really hard this year. There was a big difference between the little girl last year who would chat with her friends while racing and almost stop as she'd wave at me as they past by, to the long legged girl who ran with her might this year. By the end of this season, Jessica got "Most Improved Runner" in her group. Jacob is very excited about being old enough to be on the team next year. Sometimes, I took him to their practices so he could run with them. My goal each day is to insure that Jacob and Nathan have used up their energy BEFORE bedtime. Being on both teams at the same time, Nathan definitely did.
Michael also gets quite the workout between high school level PE (100 minute periods) and splitting, hauling and stacking firewood. I should add in hauling his backpack back and forth across a bigger campus and walking much longer distances from high school bus stops. And he's still nice enough (and somehow has strength enough) to give Jacob a ride on his shoulders. Michael is always carrying things for me, quietly taking things from my arms and adding them to his own load. I draw the line when he tries to carry a ton of awkward heavy things, plus Jacob on his shoulders, AND he's barefoot. (Michael hates wearing shoes more than he hates school assignments.)
Apple Hill
Apples, pears, pumpkins, cider, yummy smells, tourists driving up the freeway, preparing for the Harvest Run. Jacob's class went on a field "to" Apple Hill. It took longer to load them on the bus than it did to drive over to Rainbow Orchards and the O'Halloran's pumpkin patch. They had a great time. The Garden teacher and the owners gave them tours and history lessons and told them folk stories and taught them about the life cycle of the apple trees right IN the apple orchard. They did lots of "observations" and recorded their day in their Garden Journals. They got to peel apples, choose their own pumpkins, watch apple donuts being made (and eat them!), watch geese and bugs and hike enough to make almost all of them tired.
Nathalie and Rod brought the kids up to pick apples one day. My kids got to be their "tour guides," showing their cousins around, telling them which ones were good apples and which weren't and to stay clear of the bee hives. They had fun playing together "in the country." Peter and Lorianne came to see Apple Hill in the Fall too. We had a fun visit, a mini concert and assembly line haircuts by Peter.
Birthday
Jacob is enjoying 1st Grade and being "BIG." He still gets to go to Library and to Choir and now gets to go to PE and to Garden and to Computer too. He is excited about continuing to work on Science projects. He asks me each morning (and sometimes wakes me up in the middle of the night) to casually ask me, "which day is it?" to which I respond by saying the day of the week. "Noooo! Which DAY is it?" he asks again. At this point I say the date or some other "non-useful" information and to which he frustratedly pleads, "Nooooooooo!" as if his very survival depends on the answer and I, his mean mommy, am NOT helping at all. "WHICH DAY IS IT? Is it school day or church day or stay home day?" "Stay home day" is the one that immediately gets a happy grin (but almost none of our Saturdays are "stay home days" anyway). If it is a "church day," he is happy as soon as I remind him about Primary or singing or taking scriptures to class or having Family Night later. If it is a "school day," he's happy as soon as we figure out which special thing(s) he gets to do there - especially recess. He has only had 2 indoor recess days so far, one rainy day and one day with smokey air from a controlled burn. All the rest of the days, he's been able to burn off some of his enormous energy supply running and climbing and swinging outside 3 recesses a day. The weather is changing though. His poor teacher.
Jessica couldn't wait to get back to school and MATH! This year we got a new program which has LOTS of word problems though. This is good, it makes math more real, more useful in everyday life, but is frustrating for those who struggle with reading. Jessica has been working really hard (to the point of tears sometimes, poor girl). Once she knows all the words though, she's really good at picky out what info she needs and if there is any extra info, just thrown in to trick you, and she's great at the actual math. Her best friends are in GATE math and she has a goal of getting there too. As a mature 3rd Grader, I noticed Jessica has been playing ball on the black top more than playing on the playground this year. She is also in the choir and gets to take an official Art class. One of the other 3rd Grade teachers is an awesome artist and gives each 3rd Grade class a lesson once a week on techniques which they practice. She also talks to them about Art History and different famous artists. Jessica is our SLOW POKE in the morning this year, to the great frustration of her brothers as she stretches and yawns and chooses her clothes and brushes her hair and changes her mind about her clothes and gathers her stuff and changes her mind about her hair and yawns and stretches and goes back in the bathroom.
Nathan (who is the least sympathetic to Jessica) surprised me by asking if he could go to the school dances. My basic rule is when they are 14 but they get to go to the Valentine Banquet and the Graduation Dance their 8th Grade year even if they aren't 14 yet (there are TONS of parents and teachers at those and behavior is better). Nathan is doing awesome in school and made Honor Roll and CJSF. As a 7th Grader, he moves from room to room for every subject now, the four basics each morning, Math, Language Arts, Science and History, and PE every afternoon and for 6th period he alternates between Reading, Computer and GATE. He is with a really good group of kids, there is a lot of parent involvement and the teachers have said things like, "wow, this group actually says please and thank you, on their own." Nathan and his friends are a creative and ROWDY bunch but they are more Dennis the Menace-ish than Calvin-ish, most days.
Michael likes Seminary. He must because he actually gets up in the morning without any stubbornness (Michael is NOT a morning person, even on Christmas) and he's dressed and ready and outside waiting for his ride sometimes 20 minutes early. The difference is amazing. I love it. He gets right up the first time I tell him it's time with NO grumbling. His other classes are a different matter. He only has a few more years left of "have to school" (any school between the ages of 6 and 18 years old when he is required by law to attend) and the "dungeon existence" I force him to have. Then he will be free to use his incredible creativity and brainpower how he wants to. He came with me to a couple of my college classes and since then has actually, for the first time in YEARS, talked about going to college. He saw how a room full of adults could sit and work and learn together with an instructor and each other, and accomplish tasks and share ideas, because the teacher didn't have to stop every few seconds to deal with childish behavior and to give state required tests. AND college classes are offered at night, when Michael is actually conscience. AND he'd get to pick which classes he wants. I've tried many times to tell him that if he was in the advanced and college prep classes in high school, he'd get to have classmates and instructors like that now. His testing scores (the tests he stays awake for) are amazing, but his daily work, and therefore his semester grades, show his attitude about "have to school" instead of reflecting his true brainpower. I forced a little school/team spirit on him - we all went to the Homecoming game and I made everyone wear a blue shirt. Nathan wandered around with his friends and saw bits and pieces of the game. At the top and back of the bleachers (cement steps on a hill) Michael and Jacob played their own game with a water bottle as the football. Jessica sat behind me and played with my hair while I watched the game and cheered on our team. Our varsity won!
I try to sign up for several classes for the Fall semester because I don't know what my schedule will be until school starts. It's easier to drop ones which won't fit in my schedule than it is to try add some which will fit once school has started. I'm down to 2 classes for this semester and struggling to finish assignments for just these 2. I really like both teachers and am learning a lot. I try to take classes from the same field during a semester so my brain doesn't have to "switch gears." But even if they're not, I still try to coordinate assignments and research so I can accomplish multiple assignments in one task. For instance, the last several months especially, I have been reading and learning about gifted kids who struggle, fail and sometimes even drop out of school. And last year I volunteered in the GATE classroom for 6th/7th/8th Grade, talked with the teacher and worked with the students. I attended Site Council and PTO meetings and saw how people who don't work with these students, don't understand the NEED for these programs or for these instructors when budgets are so tight. GATE and electives are often dropped unless enough parents and staff work to keep them and teachers are willing to take them on. Our GATE teacher and some of the other specialists are only hired part time but they put in a lot of extra time working with kids, having lunch clubs, finding supplies they often have no budget for, filling out and keeping track of mounds of paperwork and they are the ones who understand and bond with these kids. This semester for part of my field experience in my "Introduction to Elementary School Teaching..." class I am working in the GATE classroom again with 3rd/4th Grade (and I'm with the 7th Grade too but that only counts as "work experience" not "field experience" - complicated). For the major research paper in my Composition class I am researching and writing about "Unrecognized At-Risk Students - Gifted Students" and interviewing our GATE teacher. For my field experience hours, I am also in Jacob's and Jessica's classes.
Sports and Work-outs
Nathan was on the Flag Football team this year. He was so excited when he found out he made the team. (He was just starting PE and I was on the playground with the Kindergartners and he came running over with a HUGE grin to tell me.) The junior highs in our area do not have bleachers or score boards for the football/soccer fields so we just watch from the edges, often sitting on blankets. I have decided to blame my ignorance of flag football on this fact. How am I supposed to understand and keep up with a game where there is no posted score and all I see are a bunch of cleats and socks running back and forth in front of me. Nathan's Big Brother came to his games and understood what was going on though so I asked him and other parents a lot of questions. Nathan was the "right guard" (I had to ask him when anyone asked me because I never could remember his title). He was next to the guy in the middle who passes the ball back to the quarterback and Nathan and a few other guys would rush at the opposing team and not let them get at our guy with the ball. It was flag and not tackle but it still got pretty rough sometimes. When Michael played, the opposing team's players seemed the same size or smaller, but this year, some of the opposing teams had enormous players. Our team got pretty banged up but they made it to the tournament and made third.
Nathan and Jessica were on the Cross Country Team again. With us spread apart on different campuses now and with different schedules, this is the first year we weren't all at every race cheering each other on. I even missed seeing my Jessica run twice because I couldn't get there, find parking and get to where I could see her on time. She worked really hard this year. There was a big difference between the little girl last year who would chat with her friends while racing and almost stop as she'd wave at me as they past by, to the long legged girl who ran with her might this year. By the end of this season, Jessica got "Most Improved Runner" in her group. Jacob is very excited about being old enough to be on the team next year. Sometimes, I took him to their practices so he could run with them. My goal each day is to insure that Jacob and Nathan have used up their energy BEFORE bedtime. Being on both teams at the same time, Nathan definitely did.
Michael also gets quite the workout between high school level PE (100 minute periods) and splitting, hauling and stacking firewood. I should add in hauling his backpack back and forth across a bigger campus and walking much longer distances from high school bus stops. And he's still nice enough (and somehow has strength enough) to give Jacob a ride on his shoulders. Michael is always carrying things for me, quietly taking things from my arms and adding them to his own load. I draw the line when he tries to carry a ton of awkward heavy things, plus Jacob on his shoulders, AND he's barefoot. (Michael hates wearing shoes more than he hates school assignments.)
Apple Hill
Apples, pears, pumpkins, cider, yummy smells, tourists driving up the freeway, preparing for the Harvest Run. Jacob's class went on a field "to" Apple Hill. It took longer to load them on the bus than it did to drive over to Rainbow Orchards and the O'Halloran's pumpkin patch. They had a great time. The Garden teacher and the owners gave them tours and history lessons and told them folk stories and taught them about the life cycle of the apple trees right IN the apple orchard. They did lots of "observations" and recorded their day in their Garden Journals. They got to peel apples, choose their own pumpkins, watch apple donuts being made (and eat them!), watch geese and bugs and hike enough to make almost all of them tired.
Nathalie and Rod brought the kids up to pick apples one day. My kids got to be their "tour guides," showing their cousins around, telling them which ones were good apples and which weren't and to stay clear of the bee hives. They had fun playing together "in the country." Peter and Lorianne came to see Apple Hill in the Fall too. We had a fun visit, a mini concert and assembly line haircuts by Peter.
Birthday
Nathan turned 13! teenagehood. growing, HUGE feet, agressive hormones kicking in (great for sports - not so great in other areas of life), sudden interest in dances.
Halloween
Both the elementary school and the high school had a "superhero day" as part of their spirit weeks earlier in October plus other opportunities to dress-up during the week. So we had a lot of chances to be silly and/or wear costumes. We had a Harvest Party/Chili Cook-off at church and class parties and a costume parade at school plus trick-or-treating Halloween night. The silliness, the sugar.
Mrs. Tombs let Michael take one of the pumpkins he'd planted and tended from her garden (she has kept us supplied with lots of fresh veggies which Michael has been helping her with all summer, AND her home canned jams and pickles). Each of us designed and carved our own Jack-o-lanterns outside by the orchard, even the missionaries (our neighbors). They came out really cute, or in Michael's case - really gross which was the effect he was going for. Jacob's had spiky hair and a long skinny grin with lots of teeth (he drew and cut everything himself with a butter knife except I had to help with some of the teeth and zigzag pattern around the top with the skinny sharp knife). Jessica's had a big grin with just one tooth - she said it was Gwen with her first tooth. Nathan's was Larry from Veggie Tales and he came up with really clever ideas for the eyes and nose (in drawings of Larry, they are right next to each other and very difficult to carve as a pumpkin without looking like a cyclops who's eye sockets and nose cavity have all caved in together. Nathan cut very thin strips of pumpkin shell and used straightened and curved paperclips to hold them in place and to suspend the 2 pupils in place.) Michael cut the opening on top but didn't clean it out, carved a face and then pulled some of it's "guts" spilling out the openings (times like this, when my first thoughts are, "where did I go wrong in raising my children?" I remind myself that my brother Todd, who used to doodle disgusting horrific things in the margins of his school papers and seemed fascinated with human innards, was a nice person who studied medicine, is now a nurse, a wonderful husband, father and uncle, and a good upstanding citizen who creates his own superhero comics). I had a very round pumpkin and made mine into Cinderella's coach, complete with cut pumpkin pieces for bench seats for herself and her driver (held in place with straightened paperclips) and chopsticks for axels and dried stiff waffles for wheels (the pumpkin sat on a covered tuna can - the waffles did not support it). The Elders carved a collar and a striped tie in the front of their pumkin and a name tag and taped a picture of one of their faces above the collar. This was for the church party the week before Halloween. Within just a couple days, some had mold starting and bugs were gathering. Nathan and I thought we could line them up in front of the burn pile and visit them if need be but they couldn't be in or next to the house anymore. Jess and Jacob were pleading to keep them but I told them we could sill visit them so they dutifully carried their creations over to their final resting place. Instead of setting them carefully down, they threw them and enjoyed watching them bust apart - demented. Anyway, we never even got any pictures of them lit up.
The night before and Halloween morning we had strong gusts of wind and buckets of rain which let up in perfect time for the school costume parade and trick-or-treating and started up again about an hour after dark. I brought along cheap folding umbrellas and flashlights for each of the kids. They also had some glow sticks and I also put strips of shiny metalic tape on their backs and the back of their shoes. We also got little flashing detectors at the second place we went to which helped us keep track of Jacob. We ate a rushed quick fairly healthy dinner, then went downtown to show Mrs. Tombs their costumes and then on to some serious trick-or-treating. Jacob was Spiderman (with some warm blue sweats under his thin costume). Jessica was a doctor with lab coat and stethoscope, her doll had a child size hospital gown on. Nathan wore a big hat and the shiny metalic fake leather raincoat I found at the thrift store and had a lightsaber and a bright colored nerf gun. Michael wore the (clean) mop head "wig" I keep in the costume bin (I told him, "No costume, no candy") and he brought Jessica's play hair dryer and curling iron and said he was a hair dresser. I was a clown, wearing the big ruffly collar I made for my costume back when I was pregnant with Michael and a few years later made matching ones for Micheal and Nathan to wear over their sleepers one Halloween. I parked in Rick and Krissy's neighborhood and Nathan went trick-or-treating with a group of friends and Michael took Jessica and Jacob around. Actually, Jacob drug Michael and Jessica around. I stood out by the road as they went up and down the driveways and grabbed Jacob if he ran back to the road ahead of Michael. It started dizzling with a few brief down pours that were over by the time we got the umbrellas open. Jacob used the red and blue umbrella which matched his costume and wanted it OPEN, rain or not.
Later, the kids had their "candy exchange." They trade and barter with each until they have the types of candy they like and have gotten rid of the types they don't want.
Both the elementary school and the high school had a "superhero day" as part of their spirit weeks earlier in October plus other opportunities to dress-up during the week. So we had a lot of chances to be silly and/or wear costumes. We had a Harvest Party/Chili Cook-off at church and class parties and a costume parade at school plus trick-or-treating Halloween night. The silliness, the sugar.
Mrs. Tombs let Michael take one of the pumpkins he'd planted and tended from her garden (she has kept us supplied with lots of fresh veggies which Michael has been helping her with all summer, AND her home canned jams and pickles). Each of us designed and carved our own Jack-o-lanterns outside by the orchard, even the missionaries (our neighbors). They came out really cute, or in Michael's case - really gross which was the effect he was going for. Jacob's had spiky hair and a long skinny grin with lots of teeth (he drew and cut everything himself with a butter knife except I had to help with some of the teeth and zigzag pattern around the top with the skinny sharp knife). Jessica's had a big grin with just one tooth - she said it was Gwen with her first tooth. Nathan's was Larry from Veggie Tales and he came up with really clever ideas for the eyes and nose (in drawings of Larry, they are right next to each other and very difficult to carve as a pumpkin without looking like a cyclops who's eye sockets and nose cavity have all caved in together. Nathan cut very thin strips of pumpkin shell and used straightened and curved paperclips to hold them in place and to suspend the 2 pupils in place.) Michael cut the opening on top but didn't clean it out, carved a face and then pulled some of it's "guts" spilling out the openings (times like this, when my first thoughts are, "where did I go wrong in raising my children?" I remind myself that my brother Todd, who used to doodle disgusting horrific things in the margins of his school papers and seemed fascinated with human innards, was a nice person who studied medicine, is now a nurse, a wonderful husband, father and uncle, and a good upstanding citizen who creates his own superhero comics). I had a very round pumpkin and made mine into Cinderella's coach, complete with cut pumpkin pieces for bench seats for herself and her driver (held in place with straightened paperclips) and chopsticks for axels and dried stiff waffles for wheels (the pumpkin sat on a covered tuna can - the waffles did not support it). The Elders carved a collar and a striped tie in the front of their pumkin and a name tag and taped a picture of one of their faces above the collar. This was for the church party the week before Halloween. Within just a couple days, some had mold starting and bugs were gathering. Nathan and I thought we could line them up in front of the burn pile and visit them if need be but they couldn't be in or next to the house anymore. Jess and Jacob were pleading to keep them but I told them we could sill visit them so they dutifully carried their creations over to their final resting place. Instead of setting them carefully down, they threw them and enjoyed watching them bust apart - demented. Anyway, we never even got any pictures of them lit up.
The night before and Halloween morning we had strong gusts of wind and buckets of rain which let up in perfect time for the school costume parade and trick-or-treating and started up again about an hour after dark. I brought along cheap folding umbrellas and flashlights for each of the kids. They also had some glow sticks and I also put strips of shiny metalic tape on their backs and the back of their shoes. We also got little flashing detectors at the second place we went to which helped us keep track of Jacob. We ate a rushed quick fairly healthy dinner, then went downtown to show Mrs. Tombs their costumes and then on to some serious trick-or-treating. Jacob was Spiderman (with some warm blue sweats under his thin costume). Jessica was a doctor with lab coat and stethoscope, her doll had a child size hospital gown on. Nathan wore a big hat and the shiny metalic fake leather raincoat I found at the thrift store and had a lightsaber and a bright colored nerf gun. Michael wore the (clean) mop head "wig" I keep in the costume bin (I told him, "No costume, no candy") and he brought Jessica's play hair dryer and curling iron and said he was a hair dresser. I was a clown, wearing the big ruffly collar I made for my costume back when I was pregnant with Michael and a few years later made matching ones for Micheal and Nathan to wear over their sleepers one Halloween. I parked in Rick and Krissy's neighborhood and Nathan went trick-or-treating with a group of friends and Michael took Jessica and Jacob around. Actually, Jacob drug Michael and Jessica around. I stood out by the road as they went up and down the driveways and grabbed Jacob if he ran back to the road ahead of Michael. It started dizzling with a few brief down pours that were over by the time we got the umbrellas open. Jacob used the red and blue umbrella which matched his costume and wanted it OPEN, rain or not.
Later, the kids had their "candy exchange." They trade and barter with each until they have the types of candy they like and have gotten rid of the types they don't want.
