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Gratitude Month or I'm Grateful I Survivied another Sussessful Halloween

November is the month for expressing thanks. I am going to try very hard to write something I am thankful for on the blog each day this month. Many posts will be short, I am sure, but I am going for consistency.

To begin with I am grateful for the people who help me to enjoy Halloween. It truly is because of the people that I care about that I even care at all about Halloween. I have been known to be a bit of a bum bug, but when I get to make memories with people I love it makes it enjoyable for me.

I am grateful that the Halloween parade at the school was just for the "A" trackers, which means that there were half as many students in it. My kids love it and I love to see them and a few neighbor kids too.

I am grateful that I got to go to the temple right after the parade. I felt inspired, taught and uplifted.

This year I am grateful that my Mom, David, Jessica, and Malcolm joined us for a festive dinner (positioned plates of food in a holes cut into a pair of Destry's old pants and Spencer's old sweatshirt). Sarah was way too excited to eat much dinner, but I was forcing her to wait until everyone else was finished before she went out begging for candy. My mom came to her rescue and after she finished a few bites of dinner, she set out with Sarah a good half hour before the rest of us made it out the door. My mom told me that when she was 7, the age that Sarah is now, her mom made her eat breakfast and wait for everyone to be ready before she could open any Christmas gifts. My mom could hardly stand it so it gave her empathy for Sarah's plight. What a good grandma! It did mean that I didn't get a picture of her before she went out. It is a good thing I took a Halloween preview of the girls a month ago!

Spencer had fun at a Halloween party hosted by his friend. Because his party didn't start until 7 and the of us were out the door by 5:40 he got to hand out candy and clean up the kitchen. Very grateful for that! Emma had fun trick-or treating with a group of girls after she spent about an hour with us.

I'm grateful that Estelle encouraged me to dress up. I pulled together the same costume I wore last year. I'm fairly certain that my witch costume will become a tradition. I did purchase a new hat this year since the cheap one I bought last year turned out to be cheap and was unusable this year.

I am especially grateful that Taylor was well and in spite of his decision not to go trick-or-treating he ended up going and having a good time. He wanted to invite just one friend over to play a new video game. He asked a few kids, but they all had other plans. He was resigned to working on the Prestwich's basement with Destry until I ran into a couple of his friends who were out collecting candy. They were dressed in black suits and fedoras and were carrying suitcases. "Perfect!" I thought. He would be able to pull something like that together without any problem! I asked them to stop by the Prestwich's house to invite him to join them and he did!

I am grateful that my day ended with some of my kids watching "The Wizard of Oz", a film I have been wanting to show my children. Estelle and Sarah were the only ones home when we started it. Emma joined after about a half hour had passed and the boys never did come. The movie didn't end until 11:15 and we had to wake up the one remaining friend to send her home before putting my girls to bed. After I got them settled, I picked up Spencer at midnight.

Everyone enjoyed their day and all school teachers and moms are grateful that Halloween fell on a Friday this year. I wish that Halloween could be on the last Friday of every October rather than on the 31. That would be ideal.

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