A Norman Rockwell kind of day

We ended the month of October on a high note. It was a great day and I don't think it was possible to have more fun than we did.

Saturday, October 31st had gray, cloudy skies looming overhead the whole day. The threat of rain was a possibility at any point, but the weatherman had correctly predicted it wouldn't until the evening. We started the day off with Ian going to soccer first thing in the morning. I got to take him while Jeff stayed at home with Samantha. Ian really got into all the exercises/games the coach set up and before you knew it, the hour flew by.

When Ian and I returned back home, we gathered up the rest of the crew and headed out to Cox Farms. Knowing that Saturday was going to be the better weather of both weekend days and it also being the day of Halloween and one of the last chances to visit Cox Farms, I thought for sure it was going to be packed. However, to our delight, it was relatively empty and there was no wait or line for any of the activities.


We went on every slide more than a few times, played on the rope swings, kiddie area and even did the hay ride twice. Since it was Halloween, they offered trick-or-treating at each of the stops and our candy eating crusade began early in the day. We all had a great time and still had our evening activities of getting dressed up to look forward to. A bonus came when Samantha stayed awake the whole way home (a 30 minute drive) and instantly went down for a nap at 3:00pm the moment we put her in her crib.



For the past 3 years, we've had a tradition of going trick-or-treating with one of Ian's best pals, James. However, this year, James' mommy wasn't feeling that great and wanted to stay close to home. So we went with our back-up plan and got to go trick-or-treating with one of my best pals - Heather. Heather is one of 'the girls' and has 3 girls of her own all close to Ian and Samantha's age. Due to the impending rain, we started our trick or treating early and was finished just in the nick of time. Ian was intent on filling up his entire pumpkin bucket and got very close to fulfilling his goal. Even after a full day of running around and being outside, his enthusiasm for trick-or-treating was more than all the kids we were with combined. He kept count of how many bags of m&ms he was given (his favorite kind of candy) and proudly yelled, "I just got another one. I now have 8 bags of m&ms!"

We got back to our house still relatively early in the evening and Ian and Samantha helped hand out candy. We have a good system worked out where Bailey keeps an eye out and gives a little bark/squeal to let us know kids are approaching. Even as it was raining out, we still got a pretty good stream of traffic at our door.

The day was easy. There were no temper tantrums, meltdowns, or whining of any kind. It was refreshing to be out in public, having a great time and enjoying being a family. I didn't even carry a diaper bag! We figured everything we needed was in the car and could go back if necessary - which it wasn't. I was able to do all the slides with Samantha and traveling lightly was the way to go.

This was the kind of day I dreamt about when wanting to have a family, including the kettle corn.