This and That in October, Part 2!

We had a short but fun visit from John, Sara, Aubrey and Bethany!

Crafts were a hit:

Games were a hit too!

Apple Hill and shopping at the craft stores there was popular!

Getting there early was also a win.

This was the line for donuts when we left:

Visiting the Perrys was a great time!

We have been enjoying some BYU football games this season!

The Melanchuks discovered how popular the

 BYU-Utah game can become and decided to show their true colors!

Sarah and Elizabeth were at that game and joined

 a huge amount of fans on the field at the end.

Grandpa has been a loyal fan for a loooong time!

He still wears his "vintage" BYU sweatshirt

 which was given to him by Amanda and MaryAnn 

when they were students.

Aubrey loves being in the jazz band at school. 

 Here she is performing a solo in her recent concert.

Bethany was appointed Editor-in-Chief of her school's online "newspaper."

Nathaniel tried out for the school play.

Penny was called to be the ward choir director

 which will include the Christmas program.

Amelia was excited about the recent snowfall in Rexburg and called her Mom.

(Interesting, I did that as well in 1968!)

Sister Melanchuk was transferred to the mountainous region of the Dominican Republic to the town of Constanza.

This map shows approximately where she is.

She has a wonderful companion, Hna Lucas, from Guatemala.

Where the branch meets for church:

We made another trip to Apple Hill and saw these beautiful colors.

 

Grandpa made Apple Bread from some of the apples we got.

We hosted our Family Home Evening group with treats from Apple Hill 

and did a Reader's Theater melodrama which everyone enjoyed.

As part of his major, Peter dejays once a week at KBTL 88.1 The Grizz.

Here he is in action!

Thanks to an app, Grandpa and I can tune in and listen to the Jello Dragon!

Darryl finally got one of their bothersome trees down,

and had some professionals get the other one.

Trunk or Treat and Halloween time!

Brian and MaryAnn as Chips and Salsa

Brian was one of three judges of the Chili contest.

David as the Phantom of the Opera...

...helped them decide on a theme for their trunk!

Halloween night at the Perrys:

They had 18 trick or treaters.  They tried something they had heard of: Offer a potato instead of candy.  It was an exact split.  From MaryAnn: "9 picked candy and 9 picked potato. The potato kids all thought it was pretty exciting, and the other people thought it was weird!"

The M & M's:

Penny and her friend, Bailey, are Mabel and Dipper

 from the TV show, Gravity Falls.

From Facebook: Happy Halloween from your favorite condiments!

(Suzie works at the elementary school.)

Bethany dressed up as Link from the Legend of Zelda

They gave out candy outside with a fire to keep them warm

 and watching the Blue Jays in the World Series!

After Camille handed out all of their candy, she decorated her Christmas tree.

They listened to Christmas music while they handed out the candy!

Nathaniel dressed up as Darth Vadar:

He went trick or treating with his friend, Warren, who is a deacon in their ward and in Nathaniel's school class.  He was a wolf from the movie "Bad Guys."

And how did we celebrate Halloween?

We had Franks in Steins!

This and That in October, Part 1!

 Fall is here!

A home near the Melanchuks has over 450 carved wooden pumpkins on display!

For others it was the "Walmart Pumpkin Patch" to get a pumpkin to carve!

That's the back of Camille.

The Melanchuks went to a Fall Festival.

The Shafers had fun apple picking!

Caleb seems very happy about his apple...

...but Lilian not so much!

But of course, Grandma Heidi can supply adorable pictures of her!

Everyone is ready for the big game!

Caleb loves slides!

Meanwhile Daniel continues to do lots of running on the cross country team!

The Melanchuks have made one of their rooms into a board game room, putting all the games on shelves and getting a new used table.  The room also has their piano and the family computer.

We loved seeing most of the Perry family after the temple on a recent Tuesday:

MaryAnn came for lunch and visiting in the morning...

...and Brian and the three younger kids came for treats and visiting in the evening!

Nathaniel chose to walk around the grounds of the Bountiful Temple 

after his early out day.

Jacob and Lily visited their 6th grade teacher:

It was also General Conference and the Melanchuks had tickets

 for the Saturday morning session.

It was raining outside but they had a wonderful experience inside!

"Better early than on time."

Elizabeth got tickets to the Saturday afternoon session 

from her former mission president, Elder Farias.

He spoke in the Sunday afternoon session

 and told a story about a Sister Benson.  

Elizabeth was companions with her twice!

And for some General Conference is a time

 to relax at home!

Brian makes the most creative and fun pancakes for dinner

 on the last day of General Conference!

A Family Dinner was held on October 12th at the Melanchuk's home with a theme of celebrating Canadian Thanksgiving.  I heard that all of the food was excellent and that the company was excellent too!

Twenty-five people were there making family connections!

Aubrey and Bethany had a school choir concert on John's birthday.

This is Bethany's choir and she is second from the right on the bottom row.

This is Aubrey's choir and she is fourth from the left on the bottom row.

I love sharing pictures from Kathryn of the friends she is making

 in the Domincan Republic!

A beautiful sunset!

So Halloween is upon us and there is lots of outside decorating

 and some of it a little bit scary.

Amanda got this picture of these skeletons across the street from their church building when she went there to practice the organ.  

But this is the scariest sight at our home!

After over 30 years we finally had our dryer vent professionally cleaned.

The technician said it was not the worst he had seen but almost!

(Hard to tell in the picture but that is a large container

 and it took him over two hours to get it all out!)

Beware!  Lint can cause a fire and that would be really scary!!