Scary Stuff!

Last night, the YM and YW threw our ward's Halloween Party. Travis and Doug were asked to help out with the Haunted House part. Trav was a crazy dentist and Doug was a butcher.

He was sooo excited to wear his nasty teeth and hold a power drill.

Doug donned his mullet wig again, and had fun using his bone kit to make the effect more real.

Needless to say, they really freaked out the kids, and actually most of the adults too!

The party itself was really chaotic and busy. I helped out with the fish pond...

bobbing for apples....

and face painting. Unfortunately, some kids ended up with colorful blobs on their faces by the time I was done with them :(

Well, the scary post continues with today's incident. A fire truck pulls up in front of our house (not such an unusual thing we are finding out) and is quickly followed by three ambulances, several cop cars, and another fire truck. Turns out, a school bus hit a car, about two houses down from us. We're not really sure how it happened or whose fault it was, but I made sure to drag Trav outside to participate as a "nosy neighbor". The place was swarming with paramedics, cops, and school personnel  Several kids were put on stretchers and taken away and it was pretty scary as we saw frantic parents rush up to see if their kids were all right.

This is the aftermath (notice the caution tape keeping us out of the way :) while the tow truck came to take the bus away.

As I said, emergency vehicles have been rather common around here. After many incidents, I finally started taking pictures to document all the times our neighborhood was invaded with flashing lights. This was one night when our street was ambushed. We're still not really sure what caused it, but they went into our neighbor's house.

This is what we usually see. Not a panic, but just cop cars going next door. That's probably all I should say.... if you want details, just ask me... :) It's really a safe neighborhood, I promise! Just a lot of drama and your occasional tragedy. Nothin' too unusual for New York :)

Halloween Par-tay!

So the past few days have been so fun/busy, getting ready for our Halloween Party! Rach and I weren't too stressed..... any excuse to make yummy food and go shopping, right?! Thursday night Rach and Tiff came over and we made caramel and chocolate dipped apples as the prizes for the costume contest.

The sprinkles were a nice touch!

The caramel stage...

Don't they look snazzy?!

Just a little taste...

The finished product!

These pics seem a little out of place, but I have to introduce you to Maddie! She is Tiff and Creed's daughter and I now have the pleasure of watching her M,W,F for a few hours in the afternoon while Tiff is at school. Check out those leggings!!! So cute!

Self- portrait! She is the best baby and so fun to watch!

So back to the party... Saturday morning comes and I can't even sleep in, I was too excited to get things ready! Of course, project #1 of the day was to finish hemming those d@#* scrubs!! Then I could finally put the contraption away, and clean the living room. Well, the machine must have sensed my determination, because I had no more than sat down to hem, when the needle broke!! GRRRRR! I thought all was lost, but low and behold, there were three more needles in the case. I wasn't sure if I was happy or mad. "Needle"less to say (hahah) the scrubs got hemmed and I was able to move on to more pleasant chores. :)

So our costume this year was Trav's idea. Pretty creative, huh? Well, I had a lot of fun covering him in flour at least. We got the hat at Wegman's for free, and painstakingly covered a left over box in tin-foil, so it turned out to be pretty inexpensive! (Oh, and his stomach is stuffed with a pillow for those of you wondering if he's trying to keep up with my expanding waistline :)

We thought the door was cool :) Just 4 months and 4 days until this bun is done!

What a spread! Everything from cheeseball to cheesecake! Don't forget the cider!

Unfortunately, someone lost a hand while mixing the punch!

We had a Halloween CD playing that included Monster Mash and Thriller...

People getting their mingle on...

Doug (aka, white trash man) taking pics and simultaneously making some people very uncomfortable, haha



We had to play the "eat the donut off the string game". We had three rounds: first boys, then girls, then boys. (By the third round I don't think there was a girl in the room you could have paid to do this!) I think Trav ended up winning this round, but Ryan swallowed his last bite right with him! He wasn't giving up!


The girl round was funny because if the donuts got close to eachother, they still went after it- the guys on the other hand weren't having any of that! They backed off the second it got close to another guys mouth. :)

Rachel and Doug were HiLarIouS as the trailor trash couple! They won for Best Couple outfit. They even found cigarettes that blew smoke!

The Smith's came and made sure we were keeping things under control, as the nun and priest! Fred and Betty graced our presence and the Finlinson's won for Scariest Costume!

I wish I had gotten pics of everyone's costume, but I missed Cleopatra (Natalie Dayton), who won for Most Creative Costume, and a few others. I was thrilled to have Harry and Hermine, and the burglers invaded later in the night (Abby and Jeff)! Our cowboy couple brought their newest member (Lily)- so cute! And Tiff and Creed stole the show! (Gotta love the "guyliner")! Thanks to everyone that came- we had a ton of fun and hope to do it again next year!

Is swearing a normal habit to pick up while sewing?

So I got myself a sewing machine. Don't let my smile deceive you. It is a Kenmore 1930's Disaster model. I bought it from a girl who was moving. She told me she's never had any problems with it. . . . Yeah, right! It's built into the table and has plagued my living room for at least two weeks. Everyday I write "hem Travis's scrubs" on my "to do" list and everyday it doesn't get crossed off. At first the needle wouldn't go up and down, then the thread jammed, and now it won't pick up the thread from the bobbin. I've bought oil for it, caressed it, and sang it a song, and it still won't put out! I actually got through three pairs of scrubs today when it decided to quit on me again. My finger tips smell of machine parts from all the "fixing" I've tried to do. When it's working, sewing is fun... it's just too bad that that statement is contigent on "when it's working!" And so I beg the question, "is swearing a normal habit to pick up while sewing?" :D

SIDE NOTE: After Travis read this post, he went looking on the sewing machine to see where it said "Kenmore Disaster"!!!! Hahaha! I love my husband! It's usually ME pulling the blonde moments! :)

A bad day to forget deoderant.....

Yesterday morning I decided to be productive and get a run in before my YW meeting at 10am. I grabbed the spare keys, locked the door, threw them in the mailbox and started jogging. After my three miles were up, I fish the keys out of the mailbox and discover that the house key is not on it! I resort to the garage, looking through tools to see if I can somehow break in. Funny how the lock companies don't put screws on the outside of locks to dismantle them. It was freezing cold, and I didn't have my phone or many options. So I walked to Tiffany's house to see if she can give me a ride to the school, where I can get a key from Trav. Just my luck, Tiff's not home. I can't think of anyone else that would be home in the middle of the morning. I was going to just wait for her, but it's below 40 degrees, and I'm slowly turning to a popcicle. It was a matter of survival. So I started jogging to Natalie's house (She is about 2 1/2 miles away and the YW President, so our meeting was going to be at her house). I figured I might see Tiff's car drive by on the way to the meeting, and I could flag her down. After about a mile and half, I do see Tiff's car and I start jumping up and down, waving my arms wildly to try and get her attention. No luck. At this point it's starting to drizzle, I'm praying that it doesn't snow, and I deliriously start laughing my head off. I'm sure all the other cars that saw me spazzing out, were a little confused and probably very wary of me. I eventually made it to Natalie's house just in time for our meeting to start (albeit, stinky, sweaty, and exhausted). I apologized profusely and everyone else was nice enough to assure me that they had not yet showered, brushed their teeth, etc. , but I just couldn't bring myself to tell them I had also forgotten deoderant that morning ( I guess they know now!! :) Afterward, Tiff was nice enough to drive me to UB to get a key from Travis.
I've never in my life jogged that far (sad, I know) and I will be generously giving myself the next week off! :) Fortunately for me, it didn't start snowing until later that evening. Yep, snowing. Snowing in October. What have we gotten ourselves into?!!!

Heart attacks and Heating bills

Tuesday night we had the Spanish speaking Elders over for some Cafe Rio dinner! Afterward they wanted to teach us a discussion in Spanish for practice. We pretended to be a Catholic couple and Trav helped them with their language as I strained my brain to remember smidgeons of my high school Spanish training. Not much came through. I guess I could have answered when they asked how we were doing. =)

So after they left I just didn't have the energy to go running. I went to bed early promising myself that I would wake up early and run before work the next day. Amazingly, I did get up at 6am. I dressed in long pants, long sleeved shirt, jacket, ear warmers, and mittens. My nose still froze. As I stepped outside, my heart sank. I thought the sun would at least be trying to come up! Instead it looked and felt like 2am. No one else was up, no lights were on, no cars were out. I got my mace cocked and ready. I decided to stay close to home, and started down Woodridge. I hadn't gotten 10 houses down, when my searching eyes saw a man, standing still, next to his door in the shadows! I literally had a heart attack- I was going to die!!! This guy looked BIG and creepy! Good thing it only took my slow, paranoid brain a few seconds to realize it was a Frankenstein. Darn those real- life Halloween decorations!

Next topic! So starting a couple of weeks ago, I noticed on my runs, that the squirrels were out with a vengence! I couldn't count how many I saw scurrying around and climbing the trees. It was the weirdest thing.... why would so many of them be out, I wondered?

Well, apparently its a sign of the times! I should have thought of the cliche saying- gathering nuts for the winter! We had a warm weekend last week, but things are back to normal. I got up at 4am to go to the bathroom and FROZE when I got out of bed. It was like worse then getting out of your sleeping bag when camping. I seriously thought I would be able to see my breath. Once back in bed, I realized it was best to stay in one spot, because if you moved around, you left the warmth you had just created.

I thought to look at our thermostat aroung 10am. A house should never be this cold! So today was a momentous occasion....we officially turned the heat on! :) Now its just a waiting game for those $300 gas bills :(

Don't ya just love warm clothes straight from the dryer? There's nothin' better!

Where I Sit

So I told Trav that I was going to go blog, and he asked what I had to blog about. I said, "I took a picture of where I sit." After his laughter stopped, he pointed out the humor of my statement. "You mean, where you work?" Oh, right. I guess that sounds better, but if I'm going to be politically correct, it's where I sit.

You see, I landed a job as a receptionist... Yea, right! Not so fast, it's just for a week. I'm filling in, while the regular lady is on vacation. I answer the phone and transfer the calls. I sort, disperse, and open the mail. I forward faxes when they come in. I joke around with the guys in Purchasing. Yeah..... not that hard. The supervisor told me I could read, surf the net, whatever. My dad always taught me to be honest on the job and never be idle. Well, this job is a different story. I have now finished two books, written a letter, a card, mastered Spider Solitaire, and learned online the processes of milking a cow (long story!).

My grandma recommended this book and it was very sweet. I think it could be made into a Lifetime movie overnight. I had to stifle the tears behind my big, impersonal desk.

I'm a bit embarrassed to say that this is the second time I've read this book. No, my marriage isn't in trouble! I was just weird and read it way before I even got married. Don't laugh please. I HIGHLY recommend it to EVERYONE. It's a quick read, but so useful and I love the quizes at the back. I will lend it to anyone who has an interest.

Here are some more I recently finished...

This one's been on my bookcase for a while. I probably read 10 John Grisham books on the beaches of Hawaii a few years back, and tired myself out of his writing. It was good, the law lingo kinda goes over my head, and I probably wouldn't read it again, so....

This one got me through my nanny week! I really liked it, though it had a few too many swear words, and there was one part I wished I had never read. Travis didn't like the title too much, but it made me appreciate him infinitely more after reading it. It is about some women who get together and form a book club, and are friends for the rest of their lives. It was tragic, funny, sad, happy, etc. etc. , I think I feel another Lifetime movie coming on... :)

The Great Pumpkin Festival!

So after slaving away the Jewish holiday on Thurs., Trav and I decided to get some fresh air Saturday afternoon. It started with our jog (that almost did Travis in) and ended with the Clarence Pumpkin Festival. It was a beautiful 77 degrees and the festival was calling our name.... along with a few thousand other people. (at least it felt that way!) We did Schneff Farms last year with Shelley, Casey, and Lane and had a blast, so we had to keep things going....

They had some beautiful pumpkins to choose from, but we decided to just take a picture and get ours from WalMart. We are sellouts, we know.

We started with the cornmaze. Trav was revvin' to go! I couldn't hold him back!

They gave us punchcards, and along the maze were checkpoints with various hole punches, so you knew you were on the right path. We took turns leading to the next checkpoint, and only go lost once! We won't say WHO got us lost, cough cough, Travis. :)

Next, we watched this amazing cannon that shot pumpkins into the forest, but for some reason my pics didn't turn out! On to the horse pulled wagon, and we see our friends Pace and Carly with their munchkins! (Side note, this was totally a kid oriented place to go and we felt a little sheepish being there by ourselves. So we were grateful to run into someone that actually HAD children that we could tag along with!)

More of the wagon ride...

Our grease fest.... One should only consume an Awesome Blossom once every ten years to live their life expectancy!

This is the Boo Barn! Haha. See the terror on Trav's face.

After surviving the Boo Barn we saw more friends, the Goodes and the Mayberry's, and snagged a hay ride with them. Upon getting off, we saw the Marchants and Fox's waiting in line and visited for a minute. Again, all people with kids. We just pretend that the kid inside me knows what's going on and cares what we're doing! We'll show him all the cool things we did with him before he was born, anytime he complains that we're no fun! :)