First Annual Witchapalooza!!!

 My very talented Mother just celebrated her 60th birthday this past week!!!  She has always amazed me with her ability to decorate and make her home look beautiful.  I wish I could say I had half of her talent!  Honestly, I have no confidence whatsoever when it comes to decorating and I am too cheap to spend money on decorations, unless of course I spend pennies on them at a yard sale.  So, my family loves the special times when we are invited to spend time with my mom and visit her beautiful home.  This year we started what we hope will be a tradition of having a luncheon (I forgot to include the picture of the cute "uncrustable" ghost and pumpkin sandwiches that Mom and Nicole made) and going to Gardner Village's Witchapalooza.  It was SO much fun.  We just wish all the girls in our family lived close and could have joined us!!!

My first big scare of the day was ringing the doorbell and hearing Nicole (my beautiful, dramatic sister pictured below) scream out of the intercom.  She knows how jumpy I am - I never fail to entertain her with my reaction.

 On our way to join the witches at Gardner Village!  The next pictures are of us on the "Ride to a Witch Haride" which the girls both agreed was their favorite part of the festival.  My mom said she was handing me our "tickets" to get on the hayride and anyone that knows me could guess my response when I look down right as she drops them in my hand and they are HUGE COCKROACHES!!!  Ha ha.  I screamed and jerked away and sadly probably scared a few people around us - not sure if they were scared of my scream or scared of the crazy lady who would be riding with them!  I scare myself sometimes!

 We visited "Cricket Hollow Swamp" where one witch gave us a tour of her home and shared all of the disgusting details of her life with us.  All of the witches had stories about boogers and the kids thought it was hilarious.  I just hope they didn't get any ideas :)!

 This last witches were all SO funny!  This last witch told us all about her night spa and then had the kids visit the cockroach graveyard :)?!?  She was the 3rd person to make me practically scream!  She was attempting to get the kids to give their best witches cackle.  They weren't quite doing it the way she thought they should, so she demonstrated without my realizing what a demonstration it would be.  She was LOUD and GOOD and it SCARED us!!!  Ha ha.  It was pretty funny.

 And, here are a few more pictures from the fun filled time at Gardner Village:

Stacy and two of her cute girlies.

Two more cute young girls!!!

Three of the five "McConkie Sisters"!  Nicole loves the movie Hocus Pocus, so she thinks we should be called the "Sanderson Sisters" which has been my Mom's last name the last few years :).

 If you can't read the sign, this is the "Witchy Poo".  Too funny.  Anyway, we hope this really will be a yearly tradition and look forward to next year!!!  On our way home from our outing my Mom of course sent the kids home with a bag of candy and out of the blue, when were were just about home, Kassi loudly exclaims, "I don't want to go home!  Grandma's house is so much fun.  She has LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS of candy!!!"  Thank you, Mom, for all that you do and for taking the time to make this fun new tradition with us.  We love you with all of our hearts!  Happy Halloween and Happy Belated 60th Birthday!!!