Pre-Gaming Halloween and other Tidbits of Life

I'm wonderfully close to getting caught up on this blog.  Huzzah!  But as promised, I am going to keep up real-time along the way.

So Annika.  This girl cracks me up.  Early this morning she crawled into bed with Jason and me--a highly unusual occurrence since we almost always have to wake her up.  She starts talking about how when she grows up she wants to have 40 skunks, 20 bats, 10 dogs, 3 horses, and a cat when she grows up.  Then she asks Jason, "Do you love dogs?" To which he responds, "Well, it depends, does a tree love a sardine?"  And she replies, "It does if it is a mangrove tree."  Meanwhile I am lying in bed highly confused contemplating how very strange my family.

But hey, I love how my family keeps it interesting!  Here's what's been going on in our life recently.  On Friday afternoon I got off work a little early so that I could join Annika at the Make-a-Wish Trick or Treat event.  I absolutely love how Make-a-Wish continues to welcome their Wish Kids, even after the wishes have been granted.  This sense of community means so very much!  Plus, I'm blown away by the sheer number of kids they help.

This year featured a fantastic Monsters Inc. theme.

Roz, you're rockin' it!

Some of the other fun treat stations.

Alice in Wonderland was my favorite.

You may have noticed that Annika was sporting a wolf tail but no mask.  That's because our naughty pup did this.  Argh.

As soon as Annika was done with Make-a-Wish, she went to a stake Young Women spa-themed retreat where they did hair and nails and who knows what else.  Meanwhile, Jason and I went to a viewing for our neighbor's mother, then came home and played Splendor with Eli.

Saturday morning I went to watch Eila play in an Ultimate Frisbee tourney (she was great!), then headed over to my parents where Jason and Adam were helping to install some overhead storage.

From there, Jason took Annika and Atticus and Olive to the planetarium to explore/play hide-n-go-seek.  My hero!  Cute kids, but the energy level gets a bit much for me...  As for Eli, he was studying particle physics up at the University of Utah as part of an International Beamline for Schools CERN competition.  As one does on a Saturday afternoon.

Afterward, the Halloween festivities continued as we went to the Trunk or Treat for the Wilhoits ward.  This year there's actually a theme for our family costumes, but I don't want to give it away quite yet.  

Now as for Anders, he is positively the cutest hot dog around.

Only Annika would have a spare fox mask lying around the house!  She made this one herself at play therapy.

The Wilhoits had the BEST trunk.  Pick or Treat!

Better watch out though!  You might get candy or you might get slime.

There's one tired dog.  Maybe it would be help if he quit the cannibalism.

Moving onto Sunday, after many years serving in Primary (I think we tallied seventeen in total since Illinois), I got called into Young Women as the secretary.  While I absolutely loved being Primary pianist, I am delighted about this new calling.  The youth in our congregation are amazing!  I know that Jason misses hanging out with them each week so very much.  He misses the leaders too!  He had a busy Sunday, including speaking in the Emigration Single Adults Ward.  But when he was done, he headed up to Millcreek Canyon for a get together with the "old" (former) youth leaders and a few of their kids.  I imagine it was great company, but since Shige cooked, I am certain that the food was delicious.

As for the rest of us, we had great food too at Justin and Brianna's house where we celebrated Uncle Justin's birthday.  Grandma Susie and Grandpa Charles came down, plus Ben and Christy came up bringing Talia with them!  Hooray!  Best day ever.  Just wish I'd taken pictures! 

But hey, I'm hoping to drive down to Provo tomorrow to see Talia again so I'll make it up soon.  Ta ta for now.