Nevada Day Weekend

Our Nevada Day weekend was full of fall activities.  Sadi spent the night at a Halloween party with her cheer team, Chase went to his first haunted house with friends, we went to the most haunted town around (Virginia City), and we finally made it to a pumpkin patch!  We drove to Andelin Family Farms in Sparks, and it was well worth the drive.  We started the day in their corn maze.

This year their maze game was even more fun than in years past.  We were split into teams and had to find different clues throughout the maze and had scratch cards that gave you points at different locations.  Sadi and Daddy were teammates.

And Chase was my maze buddy.   Matt and Sadi won at the very last location by only 10 points!

We did go to the pumpkin "patch" however just as I suspected it was slim pickings.

I mean really slim....

I knew we probably wouldn't find pumpkins so late in the month so I had bought some a few days before that had been sitting on our porch so, we weren't too disappointed.  Plus, there were lots of other things to do.  We raced ducks,

had fun playing on this human hamster wheel,

and fed all the cute little farm animals.

This little guy was too cute!  He was so fluffy his eyes were completely covered.

Sadi enjoyed feeding all those cute critters.  Chase was too grossed out at all that slobber and took a complete pass on feeding animals this year.

After a hot day at the farm we grabbed some lunch, did a little shopping, then headed home to carve some pumpkins.

Some of us really got into it this year...

Chase's finished pumpkin...Pikachu!

And Sadi's had a heart cheek, two wiggly teeth, and a pig nose.  Can't wait to light these jack's up in a few days!

Court of Honor

Tuesday night we attended Chase's first Scout court of honor.  He received two awards, his Scout and  Tenderfoot badge.  He also received special recognition by the board for being the only Scout they had ever had recite the Scout law and oath word for word correctly...they joked to the Eagle scouts that maybe he could teach them something :)  So proud of him and all his hard work to get here.

Football Season Ends

This past weekend our football season ended.....cheer however is ramping up for competition in a few weeks which means MORE practises.  Our season started back in July when the weather was warm.

This year Sadi's team was huge!  25 girls on the Freshman squad.  We had more cheerleaders than football players which meant we cheered for multiple teams.

Sadi loves going to practice and games and being with her friends.  

This year Sadi is a back spot for stunts which she doesn't really enjoy and would much rather go back to being a flyer.  She is however front and center for her team, often leading the cheers.

 

 

October is a pink explosion on and off the field for Cancer awareness month.  This year our team had pink poms and bows.

 

 

These girls are in love with this sport, and we love watching them.

UNR Homecoming

The tickets we had bought for Sadi's birthday was for the University of Nevada Wolf Pack homecoming game this past weekend.  Kelsey really wanted to sit with us rather than in the student section so I went online and purchased an additional ticket and we picked her up at her dorm and headed over to the game.  Before the game started they had some falcons and other birds on display you could go pet/ask questions.  Kelsey had a major nerd out moment.

The game started out guns blazing...

It was a cold night and we all tried to bundle up and stay warm.

 

Part of Sadi's tickets included a meet and greet just before halftime with the Wolf Pack cheerleaders.

We loved watching the stunt team throw the girls up and do some ridiculously amazing stunts.

She was a bit shy when it was her turn to actually meet them.

But, she LOVED watching them.  Pretty sure she has some new college dreams :)

It was a fun night and a good game even though they lost in the last few minutes to Air Force 45-42. 

Fall Beginning

This past weekend we were finally able to find some time to get out of town.  I had been wanting to go to the salmon run that we have missed the peak the past few years.

As much as I enjoy seeing the changing colors in the fall, I wish we could see it when it was still summer temperatures.

We set out on some beautiful color blazed trails.

The creek was so high the last time we were here the trail was underwater, making it a little less impressive this trip as the water had receded so much.  We saw very few salmon which apparently I neglected to even get a picture of the few still alive that we did see.

We hiked around for a few miles and the kids had fun making their own trails.

Sadi found the best resting spot on the trail.

We didn't see many fish, but we did get to see some pretty blue birds, and some cute little critters.

Although we missed seeing the big spawning time again, I will never get tired of these gorgeous views. 

Escape Party

The day after Chase's official birthday I had a super fun party planned for him.  We sent out invites a week before to his friends.  We were going to Breakthrough Reno (an escape room).  The idea is to escape the room you are locked in within 60 minutes by finding clues.  I chose a fun game for them, The Mask.  The story line was they were FBI agents on the case of a serial killer.  

When they arrived at our house they were given a FBI shirt I had made for each of them, and had to go through some training before earning their official badges.

I had set up a few different training stations for them.  The first station I had set up was a fingerprinting station.  They had to practice fingerprinting so they would be able to process a suspect.

They practiced fingerprinting each other.

Next was a mission to test their agility skills.  I had set up a long hallway with lasers.  The goal was to maneuver through the hallway without tripping one of the beams.  Not sure any of them made it through without a little body lasering.

The next task they had was evidence collection.  

I told them before we moved into this new house a serial killer used to live here.  He had cut off body parts and disposed of them throughout the house.  It was their job to collect the evidence and piece it together.

They searched all over the house for evidence.

Once all the evidence had been collected from a room, it was cleared and taped off.

They each collected 12 pieces of evidence (gummy candy body parts).

Their final training was apprehending a suspect.  We used Nerf guns to practice shooting at suspects when they refused to freeze.

After training it was time to take a break for pizza in the academy cafeteria.

They all passed their FBI training and earned their official badges.  Then we headed off to Reno to the escape room.

Once we arrived they were escorted into a back briefing room to learn about their mission and watch a short movie clip about the "mask".  They were all a little terrified.

Then they were locked up in the killers "apartment" and had 60 minutes to find the clues to escape before he returned home.  The video controllers let Matt, Sadi, and I into their surveillance room to watch part of it.  It was pretty funny watching them decipher clues together.  They did make it out...given a little extra time for the special birthday boy :)  Once they escaped, we had a little party in the back room complete with a donut tower I had ordered.  This was a BIG hit!

They had a blast, and talked non-stop the rest of the night about how cool it was.

After they devoured almost the entire tower we headed back home to open cards/gifts from friends.  

When their parents picked them up they were sent home with an explosive party favor.  I made bombs out of balloons and pipe cleaners.  They had to diffuse the bomb to retrieve the chocolate candy bars hidden inside.

Chase's friend Nathan spent the night and they stayed up playing his new video games.   This party definitely ranks up there as one of our best!