October

October was another busy month full of the kids soccer and band schedules. Marching band is no joke at the high school! From practices during school hours to more intensive 3 hour ordeals on Monday nights to hours long performances in the stands and a pretty amazing half time show on the football field, these kids have to be dedicated! We enjoyed watching a few of the shows (and games too), especially one that was played at Albion College and brought out crowds of people from both towns. 

In all the busy-ness of the month, I didn't managed to get a whole lot of pictures of all the happenings including any of the kids soccer games. All of them had a great fall season. I appreciated that the weather wasn't as horrific as some fall seasons have had! It was still chilly but we managed.

This year for Halloween, we cheated again and borrowed costumes from the Bramhall's. We went with a Peter Pan theme and it was so much fun! The only costume I had to buy was one for Kendall to be Peter. There was a kid size Peter costume and Spencer went back and forth before deciding he would rather be the Tick Tock Croc so he wound up wearing the Peter costume for his school celebration since it was a lot lighter weight and there was less chance of totally overheating indoors. But then for trick or treating, Kendall went as Peter. It was raining (of course!) but we still had fun. We went to the college festivities first and the kids got to trick or treat to various sites around campus followed by a fun performance of Michael Jackson's Thriller to wrap up the party. Then we went to a few of the houses of people who like to see what we come up with from one year to the next. There was no Trunk or Treat at the church this year which was a little sad. They instead wound up doing a Harvest Festival the following week which wound up being really fun but had really low attendance so they may bring back the Trunk or Treat next year but incorporate the activities of the Harvest Festival.

In the meantime, Taylor was doing great and enjoying his mission. His new companion Elder Bright was brand new so Taylor got to be a trainer at the same time that he was called to be District Leader. He had a few stressful experiences but did great through it all and couldn't have been happier with his companion--especially after the struggle he'd had with his previous companion.