Halloween Wrap Up

Our Halloween setup
Originally uploaded by stepol

Our family always celebrates Halloween in a big way. We have four bins of decorations and two big bags full of pumpkins. We carve elaborate pumpkins and polMom puts together treat bags that combine candy and toys and have our name and address on them. It's usually a big event and this year was no exception.

Of course, this was yet another item on the ever-growing list of "first without CollegeGirl" entries. Our enthusiasm is tempered a little by her absence and we note little things like we don't have a pumpkin out carved by her. We miss her and would like to think she misses us a little too ... that is until we read her Facebook entries like "IT'S HALLLLLLOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEENNNNNNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YYYYYYYYAAAAAAAYYYYYYYY!!!!!!! :) PS: The statues are da bomb!" and we realize we'll be lucky if she remembers she even has parents or siblings.

Well, enough melancholy. On with the Halloween recap. First let's talk about the pumpkins. In a previous post I talked about how last year we purchased foam pumpkins so we could reuse them year after year instead of trying to carve six or seven fresh pumpkins in the two hours before trick or treaters arrive. This worked remarkably well this year as we reused the five pumpkins we carved last year and added two more that YoungerSon and I carved this year. First time in a dozen years I haven't had to carve the very intricate Cavalier. We got the normal oohs and aahs from the neighbors which is always nice. Lots more UVa fans out this year it seemed.

The picture at the top gives you a little idea of our setup. We put up a shelter that we string with lights, ghosts, and spider webs. We setup a table and chairs underneath along with a stereo playing the Halloween mix CD we made (I'll include that in another post). This is "Halloween Central" for us and is where we meet and greet all the kids and neighbors.

It's also where we have "Frankie" which is just about the oldest Halloween prop we have and polMom's favorite. It's a battery-operated Frankenstein that dips a blower into bubble stuff and really blows bubbles. We gave him a place of honor this year in front of the shelter and rigged a flashlight up as a spotlight. Definitely the biggest hit with the kids both young and old.

Whoever had the house long ago when they were putting in the curbs opted out so we have a shallow ditch between the road and the yard and we always worry about kids tripping in it in the dark so this year we strung pumpkin and slime lights along the street to direct everyone to the driveway. It worked (mostly) and looked really cool from the street. That's something we'll have to add to the tradition list.

YoungerSon and OlderSon were dressed up as a playing card and a superhero. polMom had made two cards, and Ace of spades and a Ten of diamonds, so they could go together as Blackjack but OlderSon would have no part of it. He went upstairs and made aletter for his chest, found a cape-like substance, and put on fuzzy socks and flip flops. I have to say, howver, that it was better than a lot of the costumes we saw on older kids that night. A lot weren't even wearing a costume ... just regular street clothes. Oh well.

Tally for the end of the night was just over 200 kids which is a new record for us. I even had to run out to Walmart after one wave of about 40 kids in a five minute span. polMom had made 180 bags which we thought would see us through but it was not to be.

Now we're putting away all of the Halloween gear into its bins and will soon drive back to the storage place for another year.

CollegeGirl Update: Dining with polMom in Richmond!

While the boys and I were out camping, CollegeGirl paid a surprise visit to Richmond!

Her way-cool Saturday history class had traveled up to historic Saint Mary's City, Maryland which was the site of the fourth permanent settlement in British North America as well Maryland's first capital. It has a living history center with costumed interpreters similar to Colonial Williamsburg.

After spending the day attending court, being put in the stockade, learning about tobacco farming, and climbing aboard the replica square-rigged ship Maryland Dove, the class headed back to Williamsburg and decided to stop in Richmond for dinner at Five Guys Burgers and Fries. In an act of daughterly devotion that earned many, many brownie points, she phoned her mother at home to ask if she would like to join them. polMom was so excited that she called us out at camp to let us know she was going to see her.

Her visit was brief but she did fill in some of the holes that her Facebook account didn't provide. She's still has major love for William & Mary, enjoys her classes, and is apparently still doing well. She didn't miss a beat from high school and is still quite the social butterfly, participating in lots of clubs and activities ... some of them of questionable legality. She's very proud of completing the traditional Triathlon, a set of three tasks to be completed by each student prior to graduation. I won't post the tasks here but feel free to check out this Wikipedia article on W&M traditions and see what you think of our saintly daughter.

She hangs out a lot with her fellow Dinwiddie Hall dorm residents in which have really seemed to bond into a great social and support unit. Dinwiddie is the smallest of the freshman dorms and is also the furthest away from the academic campus tucked back in the woods by Lake Matoaka. With only 44 students in the dorm, the setting is almost familial and the residents do a lot of activities together, recently forming the Flying Lemurs intramural team.

Apparently, the local WaWa on Richmond Road is something akin to a religious site and has even prompted the creation of a "Cult of the WaWa" group on Facebook. CollegeGirl and her hoard wait until the wee hours of the morning and creep across campus in the dark of night on their pilgrimage for late-night (actually early morning) snacks. If you're thinking of sending something to her, one of these would be a welcome gift.

Apparently there was blackout last night in Williamsburg which triggered a crisis amongst the many Wawa fanatics. CollegeGirl posted this at 1:08am this morning:

Was anyone else part of the 50 or so people waiting in front of WaWa after the blackout? Wawa closed?? I about died...

Hopefully we'll hear more from her in the days ahead but were very grateful for even the brief time she was able to spend with her mom.

Nothing could be finer ...

Getting ready to leave the beach
Originally uploaded by stepol

... then to be in Carolina. As long as we're at Sunset Beach, that is! We made our annual Labor Day pilgrimage down to Soft Days, my parents' beach house and now their retirement home from September to May. We're always happy to be there but our happiness was slightly tempered this year by the absence of CollegeGirl who just started at William and Mary and had classes ... even on Saturday! I think this is the first Labor Day weekend in her life that she hasn't been here and her absence was felt.

However, it is Sunset Beach so we did manage to have an excellent time. We had a couple of overcast days but mostly the weather cooperated to provide some quality beach time. The boys covered the four Bs: beach digging, boogie boarding (is that two Bs?), body surfing, and even boating. OlderSon found an inflatable two-man boat in the attic and rigged up a bicycle pump to get it inflated. They gleefully paddled around in the surf, first with a paddle and a shovel and then with two brand new paddles we found up at the new Waves shop just over the bridge.

We thought the parents wouldn't be down until Friday but were pleasantly surprised to see them on Thursday night where they joined us for quiche night. YoungerSon has been asking to have quiche for weeks so we took the opportunity to make it at the beach. We actually had three quiches: a spinach and artichoke quiche that YoungerSon made, a Quiche Lorraine that I threw together, and a single-serve ham & cheese, egg white-only quiche that OlderSon made. We served them up with grapes and some great strawberries we found at the world's most upscale Food Lion.

Dinners are always a big event at the beach and this weekend was no exception. Friday night was our big spaghetti and meatball dinner. Sissy and Peter from next door joined us on Saturday night for gourmet pizzas. We had four to choose from: a BLT pizza, a Margharetta pizza with fresh mozzarella, olive oil, basil, and tomatoes, a taco pizza, and finally a pizza with brie, herbs, onions, and olives. Sunday night finished the weekend up with grilled sirloin and roasted cauliflower. On Saturday night, Peter also brought over his new ice cream maker so the boys could try their hand at homemade ice cream. Unfortunately, we didn't let the chiller chill long enough and we had to settle for (very tasty) milkshakes.

We were particularly pleased to see the old pontoon bridge still in operation. The plans for installing the mammoth 65-foot McDonald's arch bridge that will make Sunset Beach just like EveryOtherBeach are currently on hold because even after two rounds of bidding, the prices quoted are still way too high. NC's transportation department estimate is now at about $26M and the lowest bid came in around $32M and they are bound by law to keep the price no greater than 10% over the estimate. So not only is it back to the drawing board but, because of the bridge collapse in Minneapolis, the cost of bridge materials is going up and the state is looking at more critical bridges that should take precedent over this one.

On Monday morning we managed to get up early enough to make a final trip to the beach and it turned out to be the best weather we had all weekend. After soaking up those final rays and getting the last breath of sweet salt air we went back up, got lunch and headed home. It's always sad to leave but we'll look forward to returning in the winter.

$70 for crayons?!?

No, not really ... but close.

polMom was being a nice sister and trying to take advantage of a sale from OfficeMax that offered boxes of crayons for a penny a piece which is a great deal because they're normally 99 cents a box. She thought she'd get a bunch for her sister the teacher to use but she didn't inform me until we got in that it was limited to three boxes per person. She handed three each to both of the boys and handed three to me but I balked. I said it felt like we were cheating the system (everyone reading this already knows this will come back to haunt me). She just rolled her eyes, took the three boxes herself, and headed to the checkout.

I proceeded to wander around the store with the warm cloak of self-righteousness tightly wrapped around me. I grabbed some padded CD mailers I thought I might be able to use which looked like they were a good price. After wandering around for a bit, OlderSon came up with an HP DVD840i Lightscribe DVD+RW drive in his hands that had been marked down to $40. I knew we had to have it.

We had just sent CollegeGirl off to school with a brand new laptop that had a Lightscribe DVD burner. For the brief period it sat in the house I thought of all the creative things we could do with it (none of which I will actually follow through on) like making DVDs for family members.

So, we bought the DVD drive for $40. Of course we had to get the expensive Lightscribe CD-Rs or what was the point of the drive. A set of ten (with jewel cases) was another $12. And the mailers that looked like they were $5 turned out to be actually $7.50.

And I forgot to get the three boxes of crayons when I checked out. Bad move.

polMom totaled up the costs on the way home. Cost for my stuff that we didn't come for: $70. Cost for her and the boys for what they did come for: 9 cents.

But the DVD drive is very cool!

Emotional doughnuts

After the movie last night, we also had to stop at Krispy Kreme on the way home so the boys could watch the doughnuts being made. I don't think we'd ever have to buy any except we'd feel guilty standing in the store for 40 minutes and not actually get any. The boys would happily watch the process for an hour and walk out empty-handed.

The only problem is that I think I have the only kids (and wife) that become emotionally attached to pieces of fried dough. They'll watch the newly extruded pieces of dough enter the proofing chamber and proceed to adopt them as they work their way through the doughnut life cycle. They watch them ride their little shelves up and down as they rise to the proper dimensions. They cheer as the shelf tips the rings of dough into the hot oil. They get down low so they can watch the important flipping process. They experience deep anxiety as the cooked pastries have to travel under the eye of the Krispy Kreme worker who checks to ensure there are no defects. We have seen many a doughnut, even those with just the slightest imperfections, quickly snatched off the line, crushed, and mercilessly tossed onto the end of the conveyor belt where they slowly drop off into the doughy abyss of a plastic garbage bin. However, for those lucky enough to survive, they are treated to a coating of hot glaze and a home in an official Krispy Kreme box.

It doesn't seem to bother them that even the ones that are saved will just be eaten by someone. OlderSon told me "that's their job" so I guess it's more a matter of allowing the doughnut to achieve its life's goal. The only rule is that we can't eat one of the adopted doughnuts because that would be cannibalism or something. It's all very strange but I end up with doughnuts at the end of the evening so it's all worth it.

Evan Almighty at the Byrd

The Byrd
Originally uploaded by moonshinerr

After attending an Eagle ceremony for one of the Scouts in our troop we decided to spend part of our evening last night at one of favorite Richmond landmarks: the Byrd Theatre. The theater opened in 1928 and has amazingly managed to survive practically unaltered for almost 80 years. Today, it shows second-run movies for only $1.99 so we try and go down whenever a family-friendly movie is playing during the 7:15 slot.

Normally we'd try and go on Saturday night because that's when Bob Gulledge plays the mighty Wurlitzer organ that rises up out of the orchestra pit. I think we'd pay $2 a piece just to watch Bob play even without the movie. There's many a time we got polMom to go see a movie she was ambivalent about because of that Wurlitzer. However, we were at the Braves game Saturday night with the troop so we came to the organless Sunday showing instead.

Both of the boys thought the movie was funny and polMom liked the family-firendly message (she said it even redeemed Steve Carell in her mind a bit). I thought it was worth $2 ... everything is better when played at the Byrd. I think the movie could have been a lot funnier as what few jokes there were fell pretty flat. The kids loved the slapstick stuff that went on during the ark construction but I really wanted something more substantial to happen. But again, a nice evening out for about 20 bucks.