Happy Halloween

When I was growing up, Halloween had officially arrived when my parents brought down the Halloween box from the attic.  It was an extra large cardboard box filled with Halloween costumes and decorations that we could keep out for the whole month of October.  It was always fun to try on old costumes and play dress up with what we could find.  I remember it had a distinct smell, a good smell that reminded me of a craft store.  It must have been stored near a good smelling candle up in the attic.  

I have since made a Halloween box for our family and the boys were very excited when I pulled it out.  We actually keep most of their old costumes in a box in their room.  They get it down almost every single day to dress up and fight bad guys.  So this Halloween box doesn't have many costumes, just decorations, pumpkin carving supplies, etc.  The boys enjoyed helping me set up the decorations and insisted on using their Halloween plates and cups at almost every meal.

The Monday before the big day we had our Halloween Family Home Evening, with a spooky themed dinner and pumpkin carving.  The boys did a pretty good job cleaning out their pumpkins and Ryan used his sweet hand skills to carve some pretty cool faces.

 Grant wanted a Wolverine pumpkin just like his costume.  As a side note, Grant and Tate have both taken to going shirtless as often as possible. 

 We were not short on the treats this year.  The Ward had a trunk or treat at the church on Tuesday and then we did some trick or treating in our neighborhood on Wed.  Above, Ryan went as an orthodontist vampire (he got home from work with only enough time to put on his cape and get in the car).   Below, you can see the real vampire outfit he wore to work (along with the fierce scream and red eyes).

 Here is our mismatched, but scary, super-strong, cute family.

 

 Those are my bat wings on my head.  Really creative, I know.  But Luke makes a pretty darling skunk, doesn't he?

 Our loving vampire and adorable skunk.

I had to include this so you could see the skunk tail in it's full glory.  With each kid sporting the skunk costume for their first Halloween, that has to be the best costume we have ever purchased.

Tough Mudder!!

   At the end of September we participated in the long awaited Tough Mudder race in Seattle (~11.3 miles long).  We had been training throughout the summer and were excited and slightly nervous to participate.  The nervousness for me came mostly because I came down with a random ear infection a few days before the race.  I developed a pretty decent cold the week before the race and then one night, all of a sudden I got extremely nauseous and dizzy.  I called a member of our ward who is an ENT and he sent in an antibiotic and steroid (to help with the dizziness) prescription (figuring it was an ear infection).  I started the antibiotics and started to feel better (no more dizzy spells), but still felt a little feverish and tired the day before the race.  Luckily, I felt okay enough to run on race day and only got a few strange looks from people as I had the occasional coughing spell during the race.

 

 We ran the race with Rick (one of Ryan's coworkers), two of Rick's brothers, and another friend from our ward.  Niki (Rick's wife) took a few pictures of us during the race so we are glad to have a few action shots. 

 These two pictures are from the ring obstacle.  Ryan and I both fell in the water on this one.  I actually didn't mind falling in this water because it helped wash some of the mud off.  In the distant background of this picture you can see runners climbing up a big, steep hill in another part of the race.  There were tons of places on the course where you climbed up and down muddy hills and crevices.  Most of the down hills were so steep I would just slid down them.  They were really more like drop-offs than down-hills.  Another obstacle similar to these rings was a set of monkey bars that was about 30 rungs long, 15 going slightly uphill, then 15 going downhill to get across a big pool of water.  The general sense of fun is heightened by the fact that the rungs spin freely in your hands and some of the bars are also greased.  It not only takes a ton of upper body strength to do but some pretty serious grip strength to keep the rungs from spinning out of your hands.  I just fell in the water again after a bar or two but Ryan made all the way across! The nice part was that, again, I got some of the mud cleaned off as I swam to the other side.

Me on the course looking relatively clean.  Those two extra muddy guys next to me are Rick's brothers. 

 

 This is the Mount Everest obstacle.  I was somewhat nervous about this one.  It was the second to last in the race and I was pretty spent by that time.  You have to run up a greased half-pipe and jump as hard as you can in hopes that your teammates can grab your hands and pull you over.  Most of the fellows made it up in one try but it took me three.  I was really glad to have a bunch of strong guys on my team to help me get over some of the obstacles.

 Still smiling after the race.  The last obstacle was one of the craziest for me.  It's called Electroshock Therapy.  Basically, it's a big framework of 2x4's that has wires hanging from it about every 6 inches and some of the wires are live with electricity.  The framework is over the top of a big mud pit (maybe 80 feet long?) that has a row of hay bales in the middle.  You have to run through the electrical wire-covered mud pit, jump over the row of hay bales, and get to the other side.  If you can make it through that obstacle without falling down, like Ryan did,  you'll only get shocked a few times.  Being a true maverick, I decided to not follow protocol but tripped over the hay bales in the middle of the obstacle.  Once you are down and getting shocked, it's pretty difficult to get back up.  I think I got shocked about 10 times (up to 10,000 volts is not fun, let me tell you)!  Once we finished I felt like I had electricity flowing through me (I'm sure it was mental).  

Check out the two videos on my Facebook page (I couldn't figure out how to put them here).  The first is the official Tough Mudder video of the Seattle race.  You can see Ryan at around 22 seconds in the video coming out of the obstacle called Arctic Enema (a 4 foot deep ice-bath in which you have to dive underwater to go under a wall to get to the other side of the obstacle).  The second video is of the Electroshock Therapy.  One of Rick's brothers got the worst of the shocks, falling down and getting knocked out cold several times.  If you like things that are truly unsettling, it's worth a watch.

With the team post-race, just missing one.  The shirtless gentleman has that haunted look in his eyes that comes from having just danced with Death in the Electroshock Therapy obstacle.  He was not nearly as amused as the rest of the team by his performance in that obstacle.  If you haven't watched the video yet, you should.

They had cold outdoor showers we could clean off in after the race, but I was already freezing and didn't shower off too well.  But I was proud to wear my headband for the ride back to the hotel.

Ryan, looking particularly tough, earned that headband.  He took an extensive shower in the cold open-air showers after the race so he's more Tough than Mudder in this photo.

There are a bunch of other photos at
http://www2.brightroom.com/email/101664/44823/150343574
and
http://www2.brightroom.com/email/101664/44817/150343569

They were taken by Tough Mudder photographers so we were unable to paste them onto our post. 

Good times!!

Fair and Family

 At the end of September we went to the Central WA State Fair held right here in Yakima.  In the last three states we have lived in, we have been near the State Fair grounds so we've made it a yearly tradition.  After having gone to the Central WA State Fair, I'm not sure if we will be continuing that tradition here in Yakima.  It wasn't that the fair was very bad, it just wasn't very good.  Plus, it cost much more than any of the other fairs we've gone to in NC and OH.  The combo of high price and low quality helped us decide that it was definitely not worth the price, but the kids did enjoy themselves while we were there.

 We were pretty darn cheap and let the kids each pick one ride to go on.  Tate picked the pony ride and rode that tired little pony right into the mulch it was walking on. 

 Luke's only ride was in the BOB stroller, but he seemed pretty content with that.

 We kind of wished Grant had picked the pony ride as well, so we could have headed on home after that but Grant had other plans in mind. 

 He wanted to race around a tight curve in a little blue corvette.  Unfortunately, only the back seat was available, but at least he could steer with two steering wheels!  He was in heaven!

 We have been fortunate to be able to spend some time with family over the past few months.  Here, my mom got to read her lucky grandchildren a fun Halloween book.  My mom was at Christine and Sam's house while Ryan and I ran the Tough Mudder (post to come), so we were glad the kids could spend some time with her and their cousins!

I love this picture of Luke and Nana

 In early September, we headed down to Utah for Ryan's family reunion.  We also visited Nana for a few days, which is always a nice time.  Nana will be 90 next March and is still living on her own and getting around well (and always attempts to make sure I don't do the dishes at her house so I can rest--don't worry, I sneak and do the dishes anyway :). 

 I was a bad photographer at the Wood family reunion and only got pictures of the cookie decorating contest put together by Wendy.  It was so fun to be with the family and the kids had an absolute blast with their cousins.

The family rented a huge cabin in Heber complete with game room, movie room,  bunk bed room for the kids, hot tub and tons and tons of space for playing.  The boys ran around with their cousins all day long (and well into the night) and the adults enjoyed catching up.  I actually spent a good portion of each day following Luke up and down the three flights of stairs.  Ryan and I are in charge of finding the rental home for next year and we are hoping to head to the beach.  We'll see if we can find a good deal!