We had a wonderful brunch with our friends Kristin and Mac. We had scrambled eggs, tater tots, and lots of yummy bacon. For desert we had cherry turnovers. After the meal I played ghost for a bit with the kids as they ran around until the screaming was too much for our ears. Then we cleared the table and had ourselves a pumpkin carving. The adults did most of the work while the kids “supervised” and provided the final touches such as popping out the pre-carved sections.
We went to our first Halloween event of the season at our favorite Parks & Rec Center. Jasmine made her grand debut as the Pirate Princess. We arrived to the festival just in time to see the zombie dancers give a great performance on stage. And yes, they were playing Michael Jackson’s song Thriller. Jasmine was enthralled. We then wandered around admiring the great costumes and trying out some the activities such as putting your hand into some scary boxes to feel what was inside.
Soon enough Jasmine grew bored and excitedly asked to go the haunted house. So after standing in line for many minutes, we went inside whereupon Jasmine immediately yelled to get the heck out upon hearing all the scary noises. So dad picked her up and carried her the rest of the way through the maze. Afterwords, at the crayon coloring table, Jasmine shared her haunted house experiences with the other kids saying “A zombie chased me and my dad.” The other girl said “A zombie chased us too. When I grow up and have kids, I will make sure they never go to a haunted house.” Jasmine replied “me too.”
It was my turn for birthday party duty. The event was at Pump it Up Jr. which is an indoor playground full of inflatable slides, bounces, and obstacle courses. The kids had lots of fun but the enclosed space made the noise deafening – my ears were definitely hurting afterwords. Even so, it was quieter than my Chucky Cheese experience.
After playing, we ate homemade and very tasty cupcakes. Then there was a wild frenzy of present opening as each kid competed to have their present opened first by birthday girl Ella.
We had a wonderful visit with Destiny’s new parents Brian and Patty. We met at a pizza parlor with an indoor play structure. So the kids did lots of playing while the adults did lots of talking. Patty is a grade school teacher, so we selfishly asked her lots of questions, and she very graciously gave us some great tips.
We also got to meet two of Brian and Patty’s daughters who are cheerleaders which immediately got a thumbs up from Jasmine. Destiny is getting to know all about football going to all the games with the family to assist in cheering.
We took Jasmine to her first Renaissance Fair. The prior week we told her to expect a surprise event with the hint that she had to dress up as a princess. She was excited and wore her princess crown a couple times during the week to get ready.
Jasmine was quite impressed with the fair. She enjoyed all the people in costumes and especially liked the joust. And I must admit, the joust was one of the best ones I’ve seen as well. The melee combat was as good as any movie I’ve seen. Our champion to root for was the nefarious Black Knight. Even though he gave despicable taunts to his opponents, he was quite gracious to the kids on our side of the arena giving out high fives to the boys and touches to the girls for luck. I lifted up Jasmine to get her kudos from the Knight and Jasmine seemed thrilled. I think the luck paid off, since our Black Knight won.
