Halloween!

The annual Halloween party tradition with our friends that I have to drag Ryan home from each year...hoping it stays this way a few more years!

For the first time, I can sense that I no longer have a child. More like a tween. He informed me this year that we wouldn't need to carve a pumpkin, that all the traditional decorations we had were a little too babyish and could get tossed (Ms. Declutter was fine with this one), that he wasn't sure if we would go to the annual Halloween party next year, and that he wasn't even really excited about trick or treating (other than getting to spend time with friends). :-(

Thankfully, we still had a pretty fun Halloween this year. I have my fingers crossed for just a few more before he throws in the towel completely and we sit at home, scowling at each other instead.

I'm thrilled he ended up carving pumpkins with his friend...they got him one, and I thought they did a great job! My best work with a pumpkin (even as an adult) involved carving a very boring, misshapen triangle-shaped eyes and a nose and some semblance of a mouth (which took me five minutes, tops). So those boys outdid me by a long shot.

His costume pick for 2018! People think it's not real, but that's definitely a real T-rex (because it cost as much as one).

Hey hey hey...the gangs all here! And only one Scrooge didn't have a costume!* Plus, we had two visiting exchange students join our group this year since our school was hosting our sister school from Japan that week.

*In my defense- That day, I was hosting an exchange student, and I had a son and two nephews to chauffeur around that night, all going in different directions (with no husband). The husband was on a week-long trip on a cruise in the Caribbean, but that is another story for another day. (And I'm not allowed to tell you that it was a wrestling cruise for fans put on by Chris Jericho, so don't tell anyone.) However, if I HAD dressed up, I was going to be a unicorn, since I bought a costume online from Amazon and paid extra to get it shipped here quickly for an event Rich had. But when I took it out of the box, the tulle skirt smelled funny. And everyone knows you can't be a unicorn with just a unicorn wig/horn and not a tulle skirt. So why bother?

Our exchange student was a lot like Ryan, a little reserved. But he was also sweet, polite and I hope he had a good time!

It was also the week before Ryan's karate tournament, we were short staffed at work, and everything seemed a little crazy. But this was a pretty cool thing that happened that week:

Ry earned his second degree blue belt this month!

And Keni finally earned his black belt!!! It took about 7 years of year round practice, four days a week, almost 2 hours a day...but he stuck with it, and did it. SUPER proud of him for this achievement, and for being a great role model for Ryan.

So proud of this guy!