Halloween and Sisters Weekend

We finally made it to the pumpkin farm after Nutcracker rehearsal on Oct 26. My kids are getting too old apparently and Lily was going to a party that night so we didn't stay long; plus they had no doughnuts which was very disappointing. Brandon played, Josh and the other kids did the corn maze while Lily and I chatted, we did the hayride and got our pumpkins and got home. Then Monday for FHE we carved our pumpkins and it was fun. 


 

   

 Halloween is finally over; hallelujah! My neighbors decorated in early September with some gruesome decorations and they are finally gone. I think after the Halloween party I was just over Halloween so even though Michelle very kindly invited us over for a potluck, we stayed home and kept it very low key. Emma wasn't feeling great so we didn't even do our whole neighborhood and both her and Brandon just wore old costumes. Lily stayed home and passed out candy and had fun. Curtis was running up in Annapolis for regionals and his team qualified for states! I feel a little badly that the state race is while we are gone so he won't get to run but he's only a freshman so three more shots. I didn't even know he would be doing XC when I planned our trip so bummer. But we had to go pick him up about 8:30 on Halloween from school. He is going to do indoor track so we are just keeping on with his practice schedule but at least now baseball is done.

 

The morning after Halloween I woke up at 3:30 with a terrible headache. I got up and took some medicine but that I had to get up at 5 to get to the airport. This weekend was our annual sisters weekend and this year we did a destination and went to Charleston. None of us had ever been there and it was a nice place. We got in Monday mid morning and two of my sisters were on my flight so that was fun. Then we met up with Debbie and Cindy and headed downtown to our food tour. It was not my favorite; we had she-crab soup which had a weird pumpkin/nutty sweet flavor. Then we had chicken bog which Is this rice thing that was pretty good and then we had BBQ with collard greens and cornbread. It is safe to now say that I do not love southern food. Cindy loves it but it just doesn't do much for me. Also my sisters were much better at taking pictures than I was and I haven't downloaded theirs yet so maybe more to come later. 

 

Anyway, then we walked around this market area and went to Publix to grab some subs since we weren't super hungry and then we played games are our sketch little air bnb. The house itself was nice enough but the neighborhood was interesting; however we were safe and the neighbors were friendly so it all worked out. Saturday we went to Boone Plantation which was used to film a favorite mini series of ours called North and South with Patrick Swayze. We used to watch it a lot when I was a kid so it was cool to see the beautiful plantation and they had some good presentations acknowledging the sad history of slavery and then celebrating the Gichee culture. We took a tour of the gardens, the house, the whole property (acres and acres!) and we got ice cream. We saw the stables and took lots of pictures and geeked out over all the spots where the movie was filmed. They also used the plantation as Ally's parents's house in the Notebook so that was fun too. Then we went to see a 400-year-old living oak that is huge! It is the largest tree east of the Mississippi and some of its limbs are 89 feet long. It was cool. Then we went and had dinner (I tried shrimp and grits=okay) and then we did an escape room. I don't love escape rooms; I tend to find them stressful but we worked well together and I actually contributed and we got out with three minutes left. I was an 80s one and it was fun. Then we went home and watched the beginning of North and South but I had not really been feeling super so I crashed and went to bed quite shivery and feverish. 

 

Sunday was rough for me. I felt awful but we went to church and then I loaded up on medicine and we went to explore the big beautiful homes in Charleston and we even found two that they had also used in the movie. Then we took a ferry ride out to Ft. Sumter and while it is actually not much to look at because it was pretty much destroyed with all of the bombing, it was interesting to be there and learn. Plus the ferry ride was nice and the meds helped me feel better for a few hours. Then we got lunch and took Debbie and Cindy to the airport. We went and walked around an outlet mall just to kill some time before our flight and then KayLee, Kristi and I all flew to Baltimore. KayLee had to fly to Rochester but with my long drive I only got home about 10 minutes before her and I was so glad to make it because I felt shivery and so tired and I just took some meds and went to sleep downstairs so I wouldn't disturb Josh. He was so considerate and did all the driving around this morning so I could sleep. 

 

 

We are getting our new roof today so it pretty noisy and instead of cleaning up my house and getting ready to go I am sitting and resting and going to the doctor soon. Here's hoping there is some miracle drug that is going to make me feel better quick. 

While I was gone things were busy busy and Josh was amazing handling it all. There was dance and both Curtis and Brandon had their last baseball games, Lily took the SATs and she and Emma both had Nutcracker rehearsal, Lily and Curris when to a church homecoming dance that Lily enjoyed more than he did, Curtis prayed in sacrament meeting, Brandon gave a talk in Primary and Lily had a stake meeting in the afternoon and Josh and Emma had a stake primary event to go to where Emma led the music. They are such good kids and I love them and Josh is so amazing and considerate and I'm just a blessed, blessed lady.