It was well into November before I stopped feeling traumatized by how hot the summer had been. Even as weather was clearly cooling off into a very pleasant fall, I still kept thinking to myself, "but I was just soooo hot!" Though it's clearly winter now I'm still far away from longing for those warm temperatures to come this way again. The cooler fall air was very very welcome and almost enough to help me feel better.
Several years ago my dear friend Becca and I started an annual tradition of our Christmas Date, which happens early in December. We get food and visit several of our favorite destinations and then go do a craft and watch a movie. It's lovely. Well, neither of us have been big fans of Halloween until we saw our friend Tawnee post pictures of her decorations. She has this awesome style and Becca and I both realized that there was a certain Halloween vibe that we could both embrace. That was last year, and Becca and I both decorated for the holiday last year like we never had before. I even gave Becca a Christmas gift of brass candlesticks specifically for her Halloween decoration collection. This year we both commented to each other about how we were actually excited for Halloween and decided to have a Halloween date!
We got dinner, of course, because it's us. I think we might have stopped by Jolley's Drugstore, which has amazing decorations for every holiday, but I didn't get anything. Then we went to Becca's house to sip delicious drinks (massive sodas this time instead of hot cocoa like we do for Christmas). She had bought these large wooden spheres and we painted eyes onto them. Mine ended up a little weirder than I thought. Becca's were cool - sort of mystic and magician-looking. I added clay eyelids to mine and they looked....creepy. I still had fun adding them to our Halloween decorations, though I might try to veer closer to the mystic than the creepy next year.
Also in October came our fall break. Emma was of course very eager to go visit her best friend/cousin/near-siamese-twin, Cara, in St. George. I was game to take her down and the rest of my family was equally game to stay home and enjoy a quieter, emptier house. I try to not feel bad but when I take Emma away, the big kids emerge from their rooms and hang out with their dad in a way I never see. I'm actually so happy it happens. I will endeavor to not take it personally, but I'm also not going to share with Emma what happens when we leave.
Not much happened in St. George except some lovely walks and watching shows and I worked on knitting some pumpkins from a fun new pattern I got. It makes the cutest little pumpkins. I know Sam liked them anyway! I will laugh forever when I think of him picking up a pumpkin, giving it a few squishy squeezes and then whispering slyly to his mom, "MOM. We could just, like, KEEP this." Obviously Sam won himself a pumpkin that day.
Another delightful day in the month came when the bride of my last post hosted a lunch for all the girls who helped out at her wedding. She took us to a charming little spot in Gardner Village, which is a charming little shopping village that is always decked out for every holiday. Because it was close to Halloween, we were there on a day they were hosting called Witches' Day Out - basically gangs of women-buddies came, all dressed as witches, and enjoying shopping and lunch and treats and witch displays together. Many an instagram post was made that day, I tell you! Our gang chose to NOT dress up but that didn't stop us from being accosted at the table by a Gardner Village Witch in full regalia, Romanian accent, and a total lack of reservation about having a long conversation with us during which she attempted to get us all to cackle with her.
After a lunch that was mostly really fun (I could have done without the witch visit) we joined the throngs and walked around and watched Emily hunt for Halloween gnomes. (She loves Christmas gnomes and when she saw there was a Halloween variety as well, she got excited.) I myself was more drawn to the early-Christmas decorations and bought a little gift for Sheri. We got in a few photo ops that also made their way to social media.
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