Over the summer, there was talk about me starting up highland dance lessons. Well, it finally happened. There are four people looking for me to teach them highland. I had my first class a week and half ago. It started off a little rusty cause I’m not used to teaching. But it didn’t take long to get into the swing of it. It was a really good class. I felt smart, talented and competent. lol. And for the next week my calves were sore. 🙂

Halloween time:

We went on the Pumpkin Liner a few weeks ago in preparation for the holidays. Once again we drove down to Fillmore to ride a train. What a nice drive that is. We met a friend at IHOP for breakfast before preceding to get our tickets for the train. And while waiting for the train to arrive, why not sit at the candy store at the station to eat candy apples and chocolaty goodness. Mmmmm. The train ride was very nice. All decked out in streamers, screamers ghouls and ghosts. We passed beautiful mountains, pomegranate and orange trees, and a bit of traffic. When we arrived at the pumpkin patch, I realized that they put it right in the middle of an orange grove. Droooooool. When I got hungry or thirsty, I was able to just reach up and pick a nice fresh ripe orange for my eating pleasure. Mmmmm. I can’t believe there weren’t more orange peels lying on the ground. Anyway. Gavin was in heaven too. There was live music, a hay maze, bouncy castle, merry-go-round, and pumpkins lying all around, big and small. We spend about 20 minutes easy in the hay maze. It was quite large. And the dead ends were literally dead, all decorated out with scary monsters and dead people in shackles with mice gnawing on their legs. Fun fun. As it became time to go, we walked around and picked out some pumpkins to take back with us. We picked out two small ones, one for Gavin and one for Po, and one ginormous one for Holly and I. It was great. So great, in fact, that when we found a seat on the train for the ride back to the station, Gavin passed out cold on the table, ready for bed at 3 pm. lol. So cute.

As for Halloween itself? Pretty darn good. Gavin dressed up as Darth Vader, and I a vikingish character, after eating some fingers wrapped in puffy flesh (pigs in a blanket). Then as Holly stayed to hand out candy, Gavin and I ventured out into the dark night to beg for candy from the neighbors. Like they had a choice. lol. I think we staggered around among the other witches, ghouls, ghosts, power rangers, scarecrows, and spider-man’s for about an hour. There were some pretty cool costumes. The complex was mostly a child oriented trick-or-treat area which worked out perfect for us. After a little while, as Gavin’s bucket started to get heavy, he requested that I knock on the doors and say “trick-or-treat”. So why not. I put on his Darth Vader helmet along with my viking hat, turned on the light saber and held out the bucket. “TRICK-OR-TREEEEEAAAT!” hahahahaha. It was fun. Afterwards, we hauled our loot through the sprinklers of doom back to the house where Gavin trick-or-treated his mother. No luck though. She did not give us candy. lol. But no matter. Gavin dumped his loot out on the floor and immediately started finding candy to eat. The kid likes lolly pops a lot. He ate about 3 of them. This is the one night a year Gavin is aloud to eat as much candy as he wants. And he did. Not long after the trickle of trick-or-treaters came to a hault. We overstocked just a wee bit. YAAAAYYYY! hahahaha. Awesome.

Pumpkinliner:

Halloween:

Halloween @ the Library

Today I took a road trip. I hopped on my bike and headed west to Morro Bay. It was about 3 hours each way according to Google. It was more like 4 hours each way. Maybe 3 1/2. It was a really nice ride. The road in the mountains were very windy. Not like the weather. Like there were turns that were more than 90Ëš turns. But that was the first half of the trip. After that, it straightened out a bit. I got stung twice on the way. The first time, I hit a bee at about 60 mph. It must have been facing away from me, because when it hit my leg, it stung me. Ouch. The second time was about 20 minutes later. Again at about 60mph, something went flying up my right sleeve. I waited a minute to see if I could feel something crawling around (maybe it was just a leaf or something). And nothing moved, so I kept on riding. About 5 minutes later, I straightened my left arm to stretch it a bit and something stung my arm. I pulled off the road and took my jacket off, and there in my arm was a stinger and the innards of a butt. Uhg. I checked my jacket for more leftover bee parts, but found nothing. So I hopped back on my bike and rode away.

A while later, I arrived at a place called Santa Margarita. Very disappointing. It was a tiny town with no gas station or margaritas. 🙁 They had one wine store, but I didn’t buy any wine. Instead I got directions to the nearest gas station 8 miles away.

I arrived at Morro Bay to find a very cute Maind street, and a very busy pier. Loads of seafood restaurants and taffy stores. One place had a constant line of about 25 people all waiting for their fish & chips. If I only ate seafood. Instead I found the local brewery (which was not also a restaurant. Bah), the local library, and a yummy grill where I ordered half a chicken and ribs. MMmmmmm. So good. There were also seals everywhere. I stayed longer than I intended. It was really nice. But I had to leave before it got dark. I didn’t want to drive through those windy mountains in the dark. But it was too late. By the time I got to the mountains, it was pitch black out. But I made it alive. The front of my body and my helmet became a bug graveyard. Eeewwww. And when I pulled up to the local bakersfield gas station, they would not accept my card. This is the second time that my bank put a hold on my card because of suspicious activities. Because I have a bike, I buy gas more than a car, and that triggers the bank to hold my card. Oh well.

Here are a few things I saw on my trip (in order of appearance):

Yaaaaay!. I finally got my headboard. I have a real bed now. I’m so excited. Now I can return that airmattress I borrowed. 🙂

On Friday, I dropped Holly and Gavin off at the airport. They are off to Hawaii for a week to visit Granny. We explained to Gavin that I couldn’t go with them this trip. Yet, when it came time for him and Holly to go through security without me, he got so upset that I wasn’t going. He was crying and saying he missed me. I was so sad to see them go. But they will have a good time. And I will catch up on my movie watching. Also, I have spent some time setting up my Lake George pictures for sharing. Here are some highlights:

Right. Ok. I haven’t posted in a bit, and I’m tired and ready for bed. But I wanted to say a few things. NY was awesome. Everything about the trip went extremely well and we all had a great time. Beautiful waterfall, comfortable scrubs, corn hole, family, dinners, webkins, smores, parties, babies, meat, friends, swimming, softball, and on and on. It was just all fun. Unfortunately Holly forgets how to use cameras after a few drinks and we lost the video of the scrub fools jumping into Lake George. No worries though. We got a few pictures. Good times.

After returning, Gavin went to daycare and knocked his elbow on the floor after falling (jumping?) off the bed. We spent that night in the ER getting x-rays and a plaster splint. Mostly it was all waiting. They then told us to see an orthopedic surgeon. We did that on Friday. Turns out his elbow is not broken. And if it was nursemaids elbow, it had healed itself. So by the time the orthopedic surgeon took off the plaster splint, Gavin was able to wave his arms all over the place and rock out to “Girl With the Hazel Eyes”. Yay.

Today (Sunday) I finished my first real knitting project (the ipod case I knitted doesn’t count cause it wasn’t useful or great). I was so successfull at knitting this awesomely cute baby hat, that I have started the same hat again in a larger size for Gavin that I will perfect. This is so cool. After this, I’m going to buy some new needles and attempt to knit Hermione’s red hat from Harry Potter (thank you amazon).

Pictures of these events to come…