Happy Halloween

We only had three days of seminary this week because the teens were off for teacher's convention. I did a couple of games during the lessons this week. One game I used this week was Uno. I divided the class into two teams. When it was their teams turn to go they picked an Uno card from their pile whatever number card they picked they got that many points if they answered the questions right, if they got a draw 2, reverse or skip they got 5 points and if they picked a wild card they got 10 points. My son John sure knows how to get the class excited about these games. He's so competitive and he really makes it fun for the rest of the class. He was bummed out though because the other team kept picking high numbered cards while his team kept getting 2's and 3's. His team lost due to low scores. We also did a Go fish game this week because we were talking about Peter, James and John being fishermen and how Christ asked them to go back out fishing after an evening of catching no fish. I loved Peter's response. He told the lord they hadn't caught anything all night but if he said to go out and cast their nets they would. It must have boisted the lords spirit to have Peter be so willing to do as he asked especially after he was cast out of Nazareth by thouse he grew up with.

For the game I didn't have teams I just let them go around the class and fish. I made about 20 fish and put numbers on one side and that was the numbered question they would get, I put a picture of a tire, tin can, boot, and an anchor on a few of the fish and if they got that they had to skip a turn. I worried about whether this would go over because it seemed so juvenile but they really got into it especially when John realized how powerful the magnet was on the fishing pole. Once again he made it more competivie by trying to pick up all the fish with one try and then of course the other guys felt they had to meet the challenge too. I told them the fish the magnet was actually on would be the one for the question. It was a much bigger success then I ever dreamed it would be.

Julaine and Jason came in on Monday (he gets two days in a row off from Friday through Monday routated during the month) They came in about 9 am. and left me their laundry for me to do while they played. Julaine took Jason on our annual fall tradition which was more then just seeing pretty leaves. They went to Whitefish Bay to see their annual pumpkin festival. They carve hundreds of pumpkins and have them displayed in this cute little park. They are all so creatively done it's amazing. Then they went up to Harrington beach, a state park on the lake that also has a quarry and a pretty hiking trail around it. When they got back they decided to stay for dinner. It was our evening for the Warren halloween party which we have the last Monday in October. We had our annual spookey dinner. This year I served Ghoulish sauce, Mummy veins, Frankendough, Hobgoblin Greens, pumkin patch, Bewitching brew, Pumpkin ooze (it was Beef stroganoff over noodles, cresent rolls, salad with avocados, pumpkin shaped jello, orange julius's to drink and this pumkin icecream dessert that I made) When we sit down we have a toast with our orange julius and we each take turns guessing what each item on the menu is. We all had fun watching Jason trying to figure out the menu.

It is such a joy to me to see Julaine sharing our family traditions with Jason and starting them in her family. After dinner we had a our halloween game night with a bean bag toss, ring toss, pin the nose on the witch, clothes pin drop, a penny pitch, and a pumpkin hunt is always the last game we play. We all had such a good time.

When Jason went home to work on tuesday Julaine stayed because Jason is going to school for his masters and she doesn't see him much with his second shift job and there is really nothing for her to do in her small town. She's finished scrapbooking her wedding pages so now she is pretty bored. Anyway she is going to come in once a week to help me clean my basement and get it reorganized. We made alot of headway on Wednesday. It felt so good to get something done. Thursday I took down the Halloween decorations (even Halloween is today because we already had the trick or treaters and our family party) After I tooke the down Julaine ordered out for Pizza and breadsticks and we had a nice lunch. My mom came over for our weekly day together a little latter this week because her cousin Joan fell down and she went over to help her out for a few hours. We watched a movie together (Head OVer Heals) cute love story. Then we chit chatted and had dinner. Don had a temple assignment last night so I decide to put up the Thanksgiving decorations when my mom left about 6 pm. It was a full day. And I was glad to get so much done. Days off are a good thing!!!!

a drive in the country

Like I mentioned in my last blog I love Fall and the changing of the leaves and every year Donald and I take drive to look at the leaves. This year for our drive we went down to see Julaine and Jason in there apartment. We haven't been to see it since they got married and thought we better do it now. The drive was beautiful of course. Once we got to Julaine's she had a nice lunch prepared. It was a cooler day so we all enjoyed chili together with cheese cake for dessert--YUM YUM! It was a short trip because jason had to leave for work after lunch and Donald also had a camp out trip with the boy scotts that he still needed to get ready for. Julaine always said she lives in the "boonies" but I guess we didn't really believe her until we drove the route ourselves! Julaine's not much of a country girl, or so we thought, so when I saw her apartment I understood how she gets bored easily. Looking out her window all I could see was beautiful countryside...Julaine's abyss.

Seminary...ah we just won't talk about it this week. I still love it but I'm just tired, tired, tired.

Intro to the current life of Georgia

I am so lucky to have a great daughter who was willing to help me set up this blog. Now I can blog all about my excitment in becoming a Grandma and the adventures that come with it! So where do I begin...
Besides hearing about the little baby on the way I will be writing alot about seminary. This is my first time teaching seminary and the last month and a half have been very rewarding. Depite the long hours of study in preparation for each days class, and the lack of sleep I get most nights, my class is wonderful and I am very grateful to have such bright students who are so eager to learn about the scriptures even though it's early for them too! As much as seminary is for the students it has given me a new way to study and learn from the scriptures and I feel very blessed to be able to studying and teach from them. This year we are studying the New Testament, and our class theme is "Journey to the light". So to help with this theme I created a poster board with a light house and each students name on a boat leading to the light house, just like the light house guides a boat to safety, Christ guides each of our lives. And if we look to the light we can manage through the storms.
Oh I can't forget...now is the season of holidays!! I have all my halloween decorations up and am enjoying every minute of it. I love the colors of the season: red, orange, rust and brown. My decorations give me a feeling a comfort, despite Julaine's view of them as being cluttery. This is my favorite time of the year, I just love it, the cool temps, the changing of the leaves, the smells, pumpkins, cinnamon, wood burning. It's just a special time of year.