Trick or Treat

It was a fun Halloween this year!  Calum hadn't fully decided what he wanted to be and Emry changed her mind back and forth between two different costumes.  The day before Halloween I took Calum to Arren's to pick a costume out of Gilbert's dress up box.  He picked Batman!  That night we carved our pumpkins, and as tradition would have it Armin was terrified!  While Jared was scooping out the guts of the pumpkin he pretended his hand was stuck, Armin screamed and was really concerned!  Like the horrible parents we are we would keep scaring him!  The pumpkins turned out really cute, the kids picked out what they wanted carved and Emry and Armin even helped scoop out the inside while Jared did the carving.

After being absolutely terrified, Armin finally decided to give it a try!

Halloween day the kids had a carnival at school so Armin and I went in to take part!  I took Calum around to all the stations while Emry let Armin tag along with her and her friends!  Armin was so scared of Lily, she was dressed up as a Vampire, he wouldn't even go near her.  And he was very leery of Gilbert, who was dressed up as The Joker.  Emry decided to be a bat again since her best friend wasn't able to see her in it last year.  Grandma Debbie had given her a beautiful witch costume (can a witch costume be beautiful?!), but she decided she would be a witch next year, that makes it much easier for us!  Once Jared came home we had a quick supper and got ready to go trick or treating!  The kids were beyond excited, they hadn't even had any candy yet and they were already bouncing off the walls!  Armin was such a trooper going door to door with Emry and Calum.  At each door he would say "Happy Hoween!"  All three kids were so polite and said thank you with very little prompting, and they took turns at each house ringing the doorbell!

 They came home with so much candy, Jared and I decided to keep their candy in our room and lock the door so the only way they can get some is if they ask!  Hopefully we can prevent some tummy aches and extreme sugar highs!  It was lots of fun and the weather wasn't too bad either, nippy but not snow pant weather!

This morning Jared needed my help to get the rest of the bales off the field where the cows are now.  They have started to get into the bales and Jared wasn't wanting to start feeding them quite yet.  It was taking him so long by himself, he would have to drive the tractor and trailer out to a section in the field, park it, unhook the tractor from the trailer to load 15 bales onto the trailer, hook back up to the trailer, drive the trailer home, park it in the field, unhook the trailer from the tractor, unload the 15 bales, hook back up to the trailer, drive back to the sand to load 15 more bales and start again!  This process took him about 2 hours, so in a good day he could really only make 4 round trips, which would make approximately 60 bales out of around 320 bales home in one day!  I think Jared estimated it would take about 10 full days to do this by himself!  10 days he didn't really have!  So today I didn't have to work so I helped him!  To save some time Jared hooked up the John Deere tractor to the trailer, which I drove around the field.  We would go to a section and he would use the other tractor with the bale forks to load up the bales.  Once loaded I would drive to the edge of the field where Jared would stack the bales on the other side of the fence until the ground freezes good and hard so he can bring them home without the fear of getting stuck in the mud.  Helping him finish up today only took us 4 hours instead of several days!  Jared was really feeling quite stressed, and maybe still is with all that still has to be done before winter really sets in!  He has to get the water here at home winter ready so when we bring the bulls home they will have water to drink.  He has to fix the fence around the main hub in the sand so he can bring home the metal panels he uses in the corrals.  He needs to bring the bulls home and set up moveable fences to be able to bale graze the cows once they too come home!  I was hoping to get our decks done if we had a few days of warm fall weather but I think Jared's time will be devoted to getting the farm winter ready for the cows!  Maybe in the spring?!!  While I was out helping Jared we left Emry in charge of the boys, we had no other choice and she really does do well when this responsibility is placed on her!  I only got one phone call from her telling me that the library called and what could they eat!  When I came in the house I noticed something was different, looking closer I noticed there were no toys upstairs, the dishes had been put away, the entry room was tidy and investigating further, even through the tears in my eyes I could see very clearly that the basement was spotless, all the toys were put away and all three kids were sitting huddled together on the couch watching Puss in Boots!!  No one was injured or missing!  I was so proud of my girl!  She is truly a blessing in our home, her brothers adore her and look up to her!  She is an example to me and I love her so much!  Even though her and I can fight like teenage girls, I still admire her strength, her diverse personality, her tender heart and her helpful spirit!