Halloween!

It was weird not to have any kids at home this year. Heather was at college and Jenna went to a party. No more trick-or-treating for these girls. I was feeling the end of a season for sure. To be honest, we got many more trick-or-treating years than I thought we would. It's awesome to have my girls love Halloween like I do. I made muffins for Jenna's seminary friends. The morning forecast on the television cracked me up. They posted temperatures from Halloweenishly named towns--Death Valley, CA; Ghoul Creek, WA; Mummy Pass, CO; Devil's Lake, MO; Skull Creek, NE; Boos, IL; and Sleepy Hollow, NY to name a few.  Jenna wanted to do mermaid makeup for school, and she did a fantastic job. She woke up about 4:00 a.m. to do it and was a little late to 5:45 a.m. seminary. This was costume number two. I had no idea she had a third costume in mind for the evening party. She was a deceased girl who had hung herself. Kind of creepy especially with Jenna's make up skills off the rails again. Her wounds looked so real. I whipped up a batch of cupcakes for Sarah's party. I had forgotten that I'd said I'd make them. They came out of the oven just in time, and I got to use a lot of my cupcake Halloween decor today which was a happy bonus. The last picture posted here are the Holbrook's daughter, Hannah, her husband and their baby.  They are the Matlands and Lydia from the movie, Beetlejuice. Too clever. Hannah made their masks herself. We were so impressed, and this is one of our favorite movies.

October at College

Clearly some of the most sensational college experience stories thus far have revolved around weather simply because we Californians don't have weather.  Well we do, but it's normally beautiful or at least mild.  Heather has Instagrammed a couple of morning pictures from her apartment which I have included here.  I can't believe it's snowing in October! She surprises me with a cute photo now and then like the one with her soda. And I send her photos of funny things like this sweatshirt. Allison Boyack had a Stranger Things Season 2 premiere party, and Heather was invited. What a fun thing to do for a ST fan! I decided to make Halloween cards to send to her and the HB church girls which was fun. I don't know if the girls liked them, but it was fun to send them. Heather put together a casual costume that she could wear to school during the day from a Marvel comic movie called Donnie Darko.  She was excited about it. Heather and her two friends have really been in to the show "Riverdale," and they decided to dress up as Josie and The Pussy Cats for Halloween night.  They didn't go to any parties, but they did go to Soda Vine and hang out for a bit in their costumes. Heather isn't much for the social gatherings because she doesn't know anyone, and many of the gatherings are very crowded. She's having some claustrophobic symptoms and is a little panicky. But she is still finding some fun here and there. She bought some decorations for Halloween to put with the ones we bought when we first got to Utah. I love that she loves to dress up and to decorate like her momma does.

Trunk-or-Treat

At the LAST minute, Jenna wanted to dress up to help with Trunk-or-Treat at church. She did an amazing job of grouping her face up to be a ghostly woman for the night. Her make up skills continue to astound me. How did she know how to do this? She watched a Youtube video. We thought she had borrowed some of Heather's zombie make up, but nope. Jenna used cotton and glue to achieve the lovely gash on her face.  So talented this girl is! Sarah stopped by from the choir event she was at, and Sister Miller snapped a photo of Jenna and I before we left. I was a Hershey bar, as you can see.  Haha.

Decorating with Our New Tree

We bought a new tree this year. Nothing wrong with our old one, but Kelly liked the idea of having one with the lights already on it. The girls were okay to skip the real tree experience too.  The tree came in three pieces and was easy to assemble. Kelly was great to get it up right away with the girls helping (12•7). I didn't get the decorating done for another week, but when it was all done, it was very festive. I moved the nativity sets to the bookshelves and the Santa and Snowman displays to the mantel. It was a little crowded on the mantel, but I liked having the nativities displayed on the shelves were they can be seen from the entry way.

Decorating for Fall

As I packed up the Halloween things there wasn't enough room to keep everything. I decided that the girls' Kindergarten items probably needed to go since they were starting to disintegrate. Before tossing them, I took a photo so I could remember their cuteness.  The spiders were from Kindergarten in Mrs. Crandall's class, and the pumpkins were from Ms. Dillon's class (2nd grade for Jenna, 3rd grade for Heather). I then piled the Thanksgiving decor on the fireplace which looked quite festive. I'm getting slower at decorating, but not sure why. I used to love it, but now the getting boxes out and putting them away seems daunting. I'll probably be purging more in the season to come so that there isn't quite so much stuff to deal with.

New Room

After Jenna announced several months ago that she wanted her own room, we decided it was a good time.  Heather is nearing her pre-teen years and was nearing the time where a place to chill out was needed.  The problem was that although ready for separate rooms, they are still at an age where they aren't ready to give up toys.  Our solution was that Jenna's room would retain some of the toy storage after a massive playroom purge to downsize.

This process has taken quite some time mostly because the momma had to get her brain wrapped around the task, and then slowly make it happen.  After our stake show was over, I began to put the process into steps and take it one step at a time.  This weekend, the project was completed with some decorating touches that Jenna picked out.  Her only condition other than the toy storage was that she needed to keep the lavender walls.  She was okay with that because purple is her current favorite decorating color, and I was pleasantly surprised that she chose some ruffles with her purple.  Her new loft bed was a second-hand purchase from friends which was excellent timing because Jenna really wanted a loft bed and desk.  

Everything looks very cute.  Jenna has her own room, Heather has her own room (still under construction) and the playroom toys and books have homes.  Jenna's room is the only room in the house that is currently clutter free and inhabitable without stubbing your toe.  I still have much more organizing and cleaning to do, so those pictures are yet to come.  For now we present, Jenna's new room...