Fall Festival and Parties

Saturday may go on record as having been the busiest day ever for Team Danger!

We started at 7:45 a.m. taking pictures for Alex's soccer team.

Next, Aresenal played an incredible game, winning 3-2.Alex scored 2 of our 3 goals!

Then we were off to the YMCA's Fall Festival. Alex climbed up a 55 foot high tower to then to on the longest zip line we've ever seen.

He loved it!

He and Ryan also had fun in a giant boxing ring, got their faces painted as Iron Man and SpiderMan, and got balloon swords and scabbards.

Which popped pretty quickly... right before it started to pour on us.

So the $10 in face painting was money well, spent. Then it was home for a quick shower to get the face paint off Ryan which he had wiped off in the rain in a spectacular mess, before heading to Ayanna's 1st birthday party (my cousin Patrick's daughter). Mom and Auntie CherO had driven in from Houston for the day, so we got to visit with them, too, for a short while. Here is Ryan celebrating at the party. ;)

Then he and I had a "quick" drive from Ayanna's party on East 22nd Street to the My Gym in southwest Austin on 290.  When I RSVP'd to all these parties, I had googled my distances and it should have taken me about 10 minutes to make the drive between the two spots. But... we're not exactly football people, so it never even occurred to me that I needed to consider the fact that my 10 minute drive through around downtown needed to occur at 3:00 p.m., otherwise known as a few minutes after the UT game let out.

It was not a pretty scene in my car, let me tell you. If I hadn't had a semi-hysterical Ryan in the backseat, upset we were missing Ethan's party, I would have so bailed and just headed home. Might I suggest that one never, ever plan a driving tour through central Austin when UT is playing at home.

But we made it, only 35 minutes late. And Ryan had a blast with Ethan and his friends.

Then we drove back home to collect Alex and Carl, change into Halloween costumes, and head over to Dave and Staci's for our annual pre-Halloween party so all the cousins can play together.

This year Bailey was in on the Star Wars fun, dressed as Padme Amidala. Here she is having shot the evil bounty hunters, Boba Fett and Jango Fett (with an Iron Man face mask, nonetheless).

Brooke was a pink jaguar, and Connor was a skeleton. He's rebelling against most costumes right now, so Elaine considered it a success to get him in these jammies.

We had fun Halloween food to eat, and everyone had a great time!

 

Our contribution was the chocolate marshmallow pretzel spiders. They came out pretty good, although our first attempt Friday night was a disaster. But here is what Alex and Carl were doing while Ryan and I were driving through the UT crowds: