Halloween 2019
Greetings to all.
This year we did not make a big deal of Halloween. Xavier's costume choice was a Minecraft Creeper.
At first, Rebecca thought to make the costume, but we ran out of time. We bought it instead.
We tried going to a couple Trick-or-Trunk festivals earlier in the week, but failed to arrive in time.
We ended up going to a local mall hosting a Halloween mall crawl.
That, however, was not enough for Xavier. He had been looking forward to walking the neighborhood again this year. He talked about it all week.
It was a cold night, but Rebecca took Xavier out. He especially had to see the "Halloween House." The people living in this house the next block over really go all in for Halloween. They're like the Griswalds, only inventive and tactful.
Not many people went door to door this year, likely due to the unseasonably cold temperatures. When Xavier showed up at the Halloween House, they dumped handfuls of candy into his bag.
Xavier Solves the Mystery of the Corn Maze
Greetings to all.
Today, being the last day of Xavier's first Fall Break this school year, and the weather cooperating nicely (it was in the low twenties on Friday with snow and a hard, freeze, but in the mid seventies today), we took Xavier to visit his first corn maze.
We arrived, not expecting much from the maze, but as it turned out, the full maze was over 4 miles, with astronauts and other designs celebrating 50 years since the Apollo Moon Landing.
Not only an interesting maze, but one with a mystery. Seems a dog named Boots was grabbed by a monster and stashed away somewhere.
The goal of the maze, apart from finding all the punch stations, was to find Boots' location, identify the monster who snatched Boots and learn what weapon should be used to defeat the guilty monster.
Xavier engaged far better than Rebecca and I thought he would, especially after finding the first punch card station. He really liked punching his card with the hole punch.
He trooped along, racing ahead even, to get to the next station once Rebecca and I worked out from a map we had where to find it.
It was Rebecca who tired out before Xavier. We spent nearly two and a half hours in the maze. With Friday's high in the mid 20s and today's temperature reaching nearly 80, the heat got to her.
We decided not to hunt the punch stations 1 through 5, which were hidden in the longest part of the maze. We did get all the punches we needed to solve the mystery, however.
We wound our way out of the maze, got in the car and drove through the back pumpkin patches. The hard freeze did not do many of the pumpkins any favors, but several still looked good, at least from the road.
We got out and Xavier hunted the area for any decent survivors. We found four before needing to call it a day. (We a had swim lesson to make).
It was a wonderful afternoon spent with family. Oh, and Arnold grabbed Boots the dog and stashed him in the rain barrel. The Super Soaker defeats Arnold.
Mini Mustang Marathon
Greetings to all.
It's that time of the year. School is in full swing and your nephews and grandsons are calling to ask for sponsorship for their schools.
One of the fund raisers Addenbrooke has is the annual Mini Mustang Marathon. A track is set up and the students race, run and walk as many laps as they can in an allotted time. The first grade class had thirty minutes to run.
Why Mustang Marathon? Addenbrooke's mascot is a mustang. So running laps seems a natural event. The marathon is hosted and managed by the PTSA group, which is quite active within Addenbrooke. Next year we hope to run the marathon on the new soccer field the PTSA has raised the money for and moved to the construction phase.
This year, Xavier completed eighteen laps, which we estimate to be about a mile and a quarter. He did not run the whole time as he did last year, but still he broke a good sweat.
Rebecca went a few laps around with Xavier, as did Dad. We also stretched out our hands for Xavier to high-five as he passed the spots where we stood watching.
