HallmarcDotNet

Mon, 01 Nov 2010

I said in my last entry that we've had beautiful weather in October.When Bryan found out that he got a discount as a YMCA employee, we booked a weekend at YMCA of the Ozarks, or Trout Lodge, about a two hour drive south of here.

Halloween sounded like a lot of fun since they were having a haunted house and a haunted hayride along with the regular activities. I hardly dared to hope that the beautiful warm weather would hold until the last of October, but it did! We had weather in the 70s over the weekend, which was just about perfect for celebrating this autumn holiday.

We arrived on Friday night just in time to eat dinner and check in to our loft room, before heading out for the haunted hayride. The employees had gone all out to set up a fun and spooky atmosphere. They used fire, sound, lights, fake blood, a zip-line, tossed spaghetti, all for great effect. We started with the story of the three little pigs, and traveled through Little Miss Muffet, Beauty and the Beast,  The Wizard of Oz, Cinderella (with a chainsaw to cut off the toes to fit the slipper), Alice in Wonderland…all very creepy. Saturday's Haunted Village was very well done also, but it was only a few minutes long instead of a full hour.

During daylight hours, we took various boats out onto the water (canoes, kayaks, rowboat, pontoon boat),

we mini-golfed, geo-cached, tossed horseshoes, ate meals we didn't have to cook, scavenger hunted…

Thomas made and launched a rocket.

All three kids rode the odd collection of bicycles available, but Thomas made the most spectacular crash when he skidded on gravel at the bottom of the hill. His knee was worthy of a scene in the haunted house. 

Melody and Thomas did a zip-line.It was early in the morning and COLD while we were waiting for this activity. Here we are trying to stay warm while we wait for Melody to finish her turn.

We all climbed the "Alpine Tower," a climbing structure that is a lot harder than it looks from below. 

  We were tired from all this activity, but we had lots of fun. We even arrived home in time to go trick or treating and hand out candy to all the ghosts and goblins. Actually, we noticed that vampires were real big this year…

  Bryan had two costumes this year. He changed after getting tired of explaining the last one. Thomas and Melody were the same as two weeks ago. Thomas got struck by lightening AGAIN (what are the chances of that?) Coincidentally, the same knee that got struck by lightening is the same one that has a giant band-aid from his bicycling accident.

Melody wore jeans under her skirt to keep warm.

And Bryan was plenty warm in his made-for-a-colder-climate costume. He chaperoned as usual while Marc and I passed out candy.

Melody and Thomas got plenty of treats, especially since the orthodontist tells Melody she's not supposed to eat candy (yeah, right). How many things on the "forbidden list" do you see?

Back to school this morning came early. Hope everyone is having a good time.