Happy Halloween

I think Halloween in a fun holiday, especially for kids. I like the fun festivities as long as it's not too scary or gory. Even though I don't like to be scared, I think a good startle is fun every once in while. Actually, I like to jump out and scare Jason any chance I get, and he returns the favor.

This weekend Jason's brother Steve and his wife Kirsten and their two kids were here from New York City. We enjoyed talking to them for a few hours on Friday night in Alpine where I finally got to meet little miss Brook who was born about 4 months ago. Even though Brook was tired, Kirsten was nice enough to let me hold her a long time.

Saturday Jason played football in the morning, we did sealings at the temple in the afternoon. Then we headed to Provo for another Burningham family get-together. The nieces and nephews all dressed up in their adorable costumes and Jason and I went around to a few houses while they trick-or-treated. That area is a great one for trick-or-treating. After trick-or-treating for about an hour they brought home a LOT of candy, and fortunately for me, Claire didn't like about half of the candy she got. :)

Today after church Jason and I went home teaching to his family and then to choir practice. I love singing Christmas music! We also went over to my parents’ house for a birthday dinner for my sister that was delicious as always.

My little niece Brook

The trick-or-treaters -- Truman, Dallin, Claire, and Ben

Kirsten, Ben, Steve, Jason, and Julie

A Cake-Walk to Remember

Saturday was our ward Trunk or Treat activity. Since Jason and I are on the committee we spent a good portion of our day getting ready for it. This involved making and frosting cupcakes, finding Halloween music, cutting out bats and ghosts, and setting up chairs, table, and decorations.

At 6:00 the adults and costumed kids came running in the door for dinner, games, and CANDY. It almost seemed like there were more kids than adults--I'm estimating at least 50 kids or so. After dinner we hosted a few rounds of a cakewalk for different age groups. The first group we called up were children under 5. Big mistake! We suddenly had 20 small children who didn't know how to do a cakewalk and didn't know how to read numbers either. We quickly adjusted and called out the shapes they were standing on instead of numbers-- such as bats, pumpkins, or ghosts. That way, 1/3 of the kids could win at the same time. Our cakewalk adventure only got better after that, but out numbered shapes got TRASHED by the many children after the first 10 minutes. Note to self: laminate the shapes and TAPE them to the ground!

Well, we eventually got them all through with a cupcake of their choice. Some kids liked it so much that they stayed in the circle just to walk around again and again as they ate their cupcake. What they didn't know was that I rarely read the actual number on the slip of paper I drew from the bag. Just to speed things up, I called out my own numbers to make sure the people without cupcakes would win sooner rather than later. What a chaotic game! We only had one injury for the night though. As we were cleaning up the game so the kids could go outside for the trunk or treat, a 4-yr.-old boy was trying to get off the stage and lost his balance. I only saw his feet as they went over his head off the stage. He landed on his head and went home with a big goose-egg to show for it. I was just glad that it was the son of the activities chair and not someone else.

After most people went outside for the trunk or treat, Jason and I took a quick walk around the parking lot to see people's trunks and then headed back inside to assess the damage done to the church. The cultural hall was a disaster! I told Jason the bad thing about kids in costumes is that they tend to act like they're dressed, and when you have costumes like Thing 1 and Thing 2, Avatar, Batman, the Grinch, and such, it makes for a disaster, one that takes a long time to clean up.

I'm just grateful for those who pitched in to put away tables, chairs, wash dishes, and vacuum. I think you may be able to acquire saint-hood just for staying after church activities to put the church back together again. Needless to say that when we got home that night, we were EXHAUSTED!

Tis the Season for Cornbelly's

Jason had Fall Break this last week and enjoyed a couple days off of school. Since I still had to work he didn’t really do anything exciting, especially since he got pretty sick with a cold on Friday. Fortunately, he listened to his in-house doctor--me--and took some Tylenol. Lo and behold he felt much better a little over an hour later. Unfortunately he didn’t have enough energy to do much so we canceled our plans for the night and made pumpkin chocolate chip cookies instead—another good anecdote for any illness.

Saturday morning we went over to my sister’s house to help them build a shed in their backyard. Well, at least the husbands did. Jason was feeling a lot better so he, along with my dad and brother, all helped my brother-in-law for most of the day. And can I just say is that the weather was BEAUTIFUL. They couldn’t have picked a better day to do it. I came over to hang out with the women and helped shop, cook, and talk. The guys weren’t able to finish the shed by the time we had to leave, but they did get all four walls put together and put up.

That night we went to Cornbelly’s Corn Maize in Lehi with Jason’s parents. It was so much fun! We went last year and enjoyed it, so we decided to go back this year and bring some friends. Jason’s mom had never been in a corn maize, and I doubt his dad had either, but his dad didn’t last very long before he just wanted to get out by any means possible. Jason on the other hand was all about doing it the right way and so they bantered back and forth for most of the time. We also tried a few problem solving mazes, played tether-ball, went down a long slide a couple of times, and jumped on a giant pillow trampoline thing. The scariest part was going through the “monster,” a big blow-up monster that had a maze inside of it. It was dark and kind of scary. Well actually, the scariest person in there was Jason’s dad who kept making me jump while we were inside! Afterward we went to JCW’s for thick shakes and a rousing political conversation.

Ramblings about a business trip

Such a fun date deems it necessary to write so the date will always be recorded. :)

I never wrote about my trip to Dallas last week. It was a fun little trip, but I take it as a learning experience more than a trip of leisure. I flew there alone and met up with two women, one from my office, and the other a client from California. It was probably a typical business trip as far as eating out every meal, sleeping in a nice hotel, and attending to the required meetings, but it was different in the sense that I had never been alone as the only member of the LDS church for such an extended period. Even on my mission I always had my companion, so this was an experience of learning what other people's lives outside the church are about. What I found so different is that what is most important to me, and what I generally talk about to build relationships, is different for these women and for most of the people I met with. For example I found coffee and iced tea instead of water; expensive tailored clothing from the malls instead of practical reasonably-priced clothing, pets instead of children, careers instead of family, pleasures of the world instead of God.

On a lighter side, I did enjoy the beautiful weather in Dallas, a chance to go swimming, delicious meals without cooking or cleaning, a comfortable bed and room with a great view and room service to provide bedding and towels, and I had plenty of time to read a novel during the plane rides and before going to bed.

Besides the business trip, my life lately has been composed of work, dinner, dishes, laundry, grocery shopping, and reading. I enjoyed General Conference last week and look forward to rereading those messages. This weekend Jason and I watched Forever Strong, hung up pictures in our apartment, and had dinner and games with my parents. The day after we hung the pictures our landlord said, "I forgot to tell you that for every picture you hang, you have to stay here another year." I'm taking that as a good sign that we're good with our landlords.