The Whitelaws: October 2019

Thursday, October 31, 2019

Halloween

Friday, October 25th - Our Bible class Halloween party - such clever costumes! And our hosts graciously loaned me a wig when I was too tired to think of a costume for myself.

Saturday, October 26th - This crew ran the Creepy Crawl 5K.

Meanwhile, Kellen and I went to Trunk or Treat at church. He's abMario cow vampire this year.

He had a blast with two of his favorite buddies!

After Trunk or Treat, we all went over to Papa and Mima's house for our annual family Halloween party. The kids always love this party!

Carving pumpkins! Horse, heart, spikes, hamster, and sick!

Bobbing for apples - quite competitive this year with challenges for fastest time!

Pinata!

And, peanut races! First by nose, then by blowing. Also, quite competitive with times! The party was complete just in time for the Michigan game which Papa, Kevin, and I enjoyed watching. And while we were watching, the Grant, Jenna, Madilyn, & Kellen had a blast making up a haunted house in the garage!

Thursday, October 31st - Halloween was a beautiful, crisp morning. Everything was still frosty and snow covered after our snow days.

We braved the cold!

So fun to have great friends that live in our neighborhood and other great friends willing to drive to our neighborhood to trick or treat with us! This is our third year to go around together - I love this tradition!

Wednesday, October 30, 2019

Snow Days!

Sunday, October 27th - After a beautifully warm day on Saturday, it was quite a shock to have a 20 degree day and a winter storm advisory from 4 pm Sunday to 6 pm Monday with 4-10 inches predicted and 20 degree temperatures! This made for our fourth time to get snow this season - October 10th was the first snow, then another on October 24th that gave us a 2 hour delay.

Monday, October 29th - We woke to quite a bit of snow and a SNOW DAY!

We all pitched in together to clean the house and I started on the laundry. Then, Kevin set to work doing more painting in the basement. The kids practiced their instruments while I did my Bible study. Then, the kids and I watched the original When Calls the Heart movie. Kellen and I made pumpkin bread. Then, I made one of our favorites for dinner - One pot chicken and rice. To round out the day, we all enjoyed watching Chariots of Fire (Jenna has wanted to watch it since she started running) together. So thankful for the good timing of those movies coming available at the library. And so very thankful for a snow day!!

Tuesday, October 29th - No delay or snow day this time, but another round of winter weather advisory with 6 to 10 inches of snow possible and more 20 degree temperatures. Brrr!

Wednesday, October 30th - Another snow day!! Most likely because it was 0 degrees with negative wind chill. But, we did get a few more inches during the night as well.

Jenna made us her delicious cinnamon buttermilk pancakes and I made eggs and bacon. We love having a big breakfast on snow days!

The sun came out and we could see the mountains for the first time since Saturday. It was beautiful!

The kids enjoyed some crafting! And Papa came over to work on the basement with Kevin.

Kellen was the only one who braved the cold to play in the snow. He found an icicle to use as a sword and had the best time! We enjoyed hot chocolate with a peppermint stick when he came inside. So very thankful for these snow days, that I didn't have to work, and that we could have some family time after not having much of that since August!

Friday, October 25, 2019

Roman Day

When Kellen found out that Roman Day was approaching, he was inspired to add a chariot to his costume. Thanks to our finishing the basement project, we had the perfect sized box. And, thanks to Super Dad, Kevin who had the energy after work on Tuesday to help Kellen. The chariot became a reality! He was beside himself with excitement!

It was so fun that it turned out so great!

They learned about Roman culture, mythology, art, foods, and warfare!

Perhaps the most fun was the warfare!!

I love that the school and teachers put so much into these special curriculum days. And this one is extra special because the senior Latin classes did most of the teaching!

Thursday, October 24, 2019

New Chapter

Thursday, October 24th - My first day in my new position in the NICU at St. Francis.

And, Wednesday night, we had a crazy snow storm - up to 8 inches predicted. It started with rain, so we were concerned about morning road conditions. Because I wanted to make sure I didn't miss the first day of my new chapter, I decided to sleep at the hospital Wednesday night. It was not great sleep.

Schools ended up having a 2 hour delay (morning picture taken by a neighbor), so perhaps I made the right choice. Who knows?! For sure, it was interesting!

Sunday, October 20, 2019

Fall (No)Break

Thursday, October 10th - First day of "Fall Break" which we are calling "Fall (No)Break" at our house. This post will explain why. We went from a beautiful fall high 70s day on Wednesday to 20 degrees and snowing on Thursday!

Kevin was able to stay home in the morning. I went to BSF and then we met for Kellen's parent teacher conference at noon. Kids spent the night with Papa and Mima, so I had a nice quiet, cozy, snowy afternoon to myself while Kevin had conferences from 1-7pm.

Brrrr! First snow of the season!

Friday, October 11th - Kevin had parent/teacher conferences in the morning and marching band rehearsal in the afternoon. Kids had piano lessons, then we made a quick trip to the library, then off to Jenna's cross country meet (nice that all of these things were in Monument).

Moments before the race, Jenna and her friend were invited by the coach to run with the A team because one girl was sick, others were absent, and they didn't have the 7 runners to make a full team. It was a fun race (running through snow!), Jenna was excited to run with the A team, and she got a good time - 13:38 for about a mile and a half. Her best time yet. After the race, Kevin was done with marching band rehearsal, so we met at our favorite restaurant (El Padrino). We enjoyed our meal together - the first meal all together all week! Then we enjoyed the first episode of "When Hope Calls."

Saturday, October 12th - Harrison Marching Festival. Papa, Mima, Heather, the kids, and I went to see TCA perform in the preliminaries. Then, Papa, Mima, the kids, and I went to lunch. Then, I went back to the competition to watch some more bands with Kevin in the afternoon. TCA ranked 1st in 2A and 6th overall in preliminaries, went on to perform in the finals at 8:00 pm, and ranked 6th place again. Kevin didn't get home until around midnight.

Sunday, October 13th - Kellen had a solo with kids choir at church - all 4 services. So proud of his growth in confidence. (See video in "Kidz Choir" folder.)

Monday, October 14th - Kevin had an inservice day. We did some laundry, got some groceries, then went to the zoo. It was a gorgeous day, perfect temperature. We had fun riding the carousel and the sky ride.

It was fun to see the lions up in the top of their habitat - up by the beginning of the elephant area.

And the wallabies are always a favorite of ours. We made it home just in time to get Jenna to cross country practice 2:30-4:00pm and then back to see Kevin as he was leaving for marching band 5:00-9:00pm.

Tuesday, October 15th - Kevin had another teacher inservice. We dropped our Toyota off to get new tires, dropped Kevin off at school, and then dropped Jenna off at cross country practice. We picked Jenna up at cross country at 10:30, then grabbed some lunch and went to Focus on the Family.

Then, we went to Papa & Mima's house for a little while before picking Kevin up from school and our car up from the tire place. Jenna was in heaven with two dogs in her lap and a good magazine to read!

Wednesday, October 16th - Jenna went with Kevin to the band competition day. TCA performance time wasn't until 2:30pm, so Kellen and I went to the Mining museum. We saw some really cool machines on the tour (see video in "Fall/Halloween '19" folder) and Kellen added a pressed penny to his collection. We enjoyed lunch together and then went to the Air Force Academy visitor center to add another couple pressed pennies to his collection.

Next stop, the Regional Marching Band competition. We arrived around 1:30 and saw a few bands before TCA at 2:30. Then, we found Jenna and we were off again to get her to cross country practice at 3:30pm. TCA earned 1st place in 2A with 73 points, their highest points of the season. The kids and I ate dinner together, then watched When Hope Calls. Kevin arrived home around 7pm and joined us.

Thursday, October 17th - Kevin's first free day of fall (no)break. Papa and Kevin worked on the basement while waiting for inspectors to come make final inspections. Jenna had cross country practice noon -1:30pm at a new-to-us park - Monument Valley Park. Kellen and I really liked the playground and the big trees there.

Really cool park that we want to visit again!

After the park, we went to the Money Museum that is nearby. Kellen added another pressed penny to his collection and we enjoyed looking at all the money and the cool coin presses.

I was amazed that this slab was worth 10 "dalers" in Sweden in 1644. It weighs 44 pounds!

Friday, October 18th - We had a bit of a lazy morning, then went to pick out carpet for the basement. Our plan was to hike after that, but by the time we finished, we were hungry for lunch. So, we went to lunch at Chuy's and then hiked in the Mt. Herman area.

We really liked the areas of the trail that were covered in leaves that we could crunch.

And this cave was really cool.

We got home in time to get Jenna to her cross country party, and after that she was off to have a game night with another friend.

Meanwhile Kevin, Kellen, and I went to the last home football game.

Saturday, October 19th - State Cross Country meet in Denver. Hundreds of runners! (See videos in "Jenna 7th Grade 2019-2020" folder.)

Jenna and her good friend Ali were able to run together for some of the race.

It was fun to see Jenna put on speed at the end . . .

and pass several girls! She finished 180 out of 287 runners. So proud of Jenna for her commitment and improvement in cross country!

Ali and Jenna - great run, girls!

Thanks to a parent that's a great photographer for these last two running pictures.

The girls team and the shirts they made at the party.

We had a few hours to relax at home and then Jenna was off to an Escape Room birthday party.

Meanwhile, Kevin did some basement work and watched football; and Kellen and I watched some shows together, did some experiments in restoring the shininess to his pressed pennies (a google search provided some really interesting methods!), and played Bananagrams.

Sunday, October 20th - We enjoyed church and lunch together. Then, some time at home for regrouping chores to get ready to start school again the next day. Then, we enjoyed a movie for one last hurrah for fall (no)break. We did get to sleep later most mornings, enjoyed a little more down time, and a few fun things - maybe it was a break after all.

The Whitelaws