Happy Halloween from the Guinns!

Halloween is one of my FAVORITE holidays! Okay, I know it's not actually considered a holiday but who doesn't treat it like one??? We've been doing themes every year since we got married and the kids love to be involved in brainstorming ideas. We've gone from extreme ideas like bugs, but when I consider the amount of money it takes or the sewing I always have the presidential executive order of "nope". Some ideas sound splendid but I've already learned my lesson a time or two of how long or how expensive homemade costumes can be! We went SUPER cheap this year and SUPER easy to pull off. I still think my kiddos look spectacular despite the only thing bought was Reina's wig, my squeezed-in big girl costume, and Paul's helicopter hat. We all had a good time trying the wig on and laughing til our bellies ached! The funny thing is when Reina first put the wig on (without all the old lady gear) I thought she looked like Dr. Laura Schlessinger! Okay, if you don't know who she is you gotta google search her. I grew up listening to her advice and do still hold some of the things she has said/written true. She can be quite brutal. Now you can only listen to her radio program on XM radio which we do not have.

Reina is a natural with writing. She just made this up one Saturday morning!

We went to my parents' ward's trunk or treat the weekend before, then our own trunk or treat, and finally Halloween night where cousin Karter joined us. Thank goodness it didn't rain on us despite having a lot of rain the month of October. The field behind our house where the corn crop used to grow is literally a lake! In fact, recently we saw little orange flags behind our house. This has worried us because this was an indication that they have something planned for the nice, open space we've enjoyed the last 4 years. We love watching people walk their dogs, ride bikes and motorcycles, camp, watch the fireworks display on the 4th, hear the coyotes howl like a bunch of hoodlums, hear the chorus of "ribbit" from the frogs, watch the various birds come and go in their fabulous synchronized waves. It's breathtaking the amount of birds we see! We have been fearful that they are going to build apartments or some shopping center there because it has been for sale for commercial real estate for over a year now and this means that someone is buying it!
We just got confirmation that they are keeping it as a natural habitat. I think they are going to do some tweaks here and there to make it even more conducive for the variety of birds. We are SO happy!

Paul and I were invited to check out an "escape room" with some friends of ours. We were the guinea pigs for a brand new one here in Vancouver. It was very difficult, pretty spooky, and totally fun! We felt like idiots when it took us 13 minutes (of our allotted 60) just to solve the first puzzle! But then we got rolling and made it pretty far. We didn't get out, though, which left an itch for us to try again. So we did at a different escape room, this time in Portland! This time there were six of us instead of four and we had a better idea of what to expect. Well, we mastered this one and got out with eight minutes to spare! Now I think Paul is hooked (the only thing I am hooked on is dancing and digging through other people's throw away stuff, I mean second hand shopping). We have another one paid for and now we just need to get on the schedule and try our luck a third time.