Lion Dances and Fireworks and Food, Oh My!

Lunar New Year/Chinese New Year was February 17.

Jr. Jr., Jet, and I had already celebrated at the library earlier in the month but on the day, Jet and I went to the mall to see the Lion Dance parade.

Then we watched the fireworks there (usually when we watch them, we watch them from home because it's so close, but this was fun watching them by the fountain in the mall's courtyard). 

We went home and ate Chinese food and remembered to actually do fortune cookies this time. Woohoo.

It was National Cabbage Day on the 17th. Perfect.

 

It was also Random Acts of Kindness Day and the next day, my son found this clip on his backpack.

It says, "Ur Amazing." Awwww. 

Halloween 2024

October 30 was Haunted Refrigerated Night. We had leftovers for dinner then headed to the ward/neighborhood Trunk or Treat. Jeremy brought the sugar skulls and a balloon puppet home from Thanksgiving Point's Dia de Muertos Celebration and suggested I use those to decorate our trunk for the festivities. It worked well.

When I asked Jet a week or two before Halloween what he wanted to be for Halloween, he told me a dinosaur. Perfect. He had green clothes, pteranodon wings, and Jeremy the night before the Trunk or Treat made him a balloon pteranodon hat to wear on his head. Perfect. (Again, we are using the word dinosaur as a general term for prehistoric creatures, including flying reptiles)

So as we were getting ready for the Trunk or Treat, Jet told me he was a vampire bat. O.K. Great. He was a vampire bat that some people would mistake for a pteranodon (and a lot of other things as that is how costumes go).

 

Lucky was Flowey, a character from the video game, "Undertale."

Jr. Jr. went as himself but with an "inflated ego." Ha Ha Ha Ha. Jeremy's idea.

Jr.'s Halloween costume was Death from Terry Pratchett's "Discworld." He had a Rat Death on his shoulder. Loved it.

Jeremy put together most of the costumes for the boys. I used to be more helpful but not lately (at least with Halloween costumes).

Halloween, October 31, was also National Knock Knock Joke Day but I couldn't think of any knock knock jokes that day. Weird and sad.

Jet and I went to see Lucky in his Halloween Parade at the elementary school. Like last year, they had the band from the high school playing for them as they walked outside.

After the parade, Jet and I drove up to Bridal Veil Falls to say Goodbye for the next 6 months.

That evening, Jet, Lucky, Jr. Jr., and I went around the neighborhood trick or treating. Jr. stayed home to work on college applications. He stayed in the van at Trunk or Treat to do the same. Poor kid. Lots of stress for him lately.

After we trick or treated in our neighborhood, we went to trick or treat and visit my sister. Nice chatting and good end to the evening.

Halloween 2023

We don't have time to do a fun Halloween themed dinner on Halloween anymore so this year we had a Halloween themed dinner a few days before. October 29 was National Oatmeal Day. Jr. and Jeremy helped me to figure out what we should make and what the food should be called. Bonemeal muffins, Baba Yaga's chicken legs, alfraidy sauce worms (pastaaaaagh!), and shredded lettuce with a costume... I mean dressing, scream soda to drink and batberry cobbler (blackberry cobbler) for dessert.

Here's what happened on actual Halloween. 

Jr. Jr. hadn't decided what costume to wear as of the night before Halloween. Jeremy had made balloons for Dia de Muertos at Thanksgiving Point again so he suggested he could use one of the puppets that was still in good shape. 

Jr. Jr. liked that idea and managed to maneuver around his school like that. Of course I dropped him off and picked him up for there was no way he was going to fit that thing on the bus.

Jr. was the happy mask salesman from Majora's mask. We were up late the night before and got up early Halloween morning to work on his costume. He did the sewing that needed to be done by himself. 

Lucky was a dementor from Harry Potter. He likes to do costumes inspired by his teacher's classrooms if he can. 

 

Jet and I bundled up to watch Lucky in the elementary Halloween school parade. They did it outside this year. The marching band from the high school up the street walked over to provide music for the parade. They led the parade through the school then continued to play in one spot while the rest of the students walked around for everyone to see. That was fun.

 

Trick or treating around our neighborhood went well (except I slowed everyone down because I like to talk).

The next morning I felt like a genius. I emptied Jet's Halloween bucket and put all the toys and activity items back in it along with just a few pieces of candy. 

When he found the bucket, he did not go straight for the candy as it was not an overwhelming amount. He played with other items first. Woohoo.

Burns Supper

Robert Burns the Scottish poet was born on or around the 25th of January so in the UK it's popular to have a big celebration/supper on the 25th. The kids and I decided to celebrate and had a modified version for our purposes. We learned about suggested foods for a Burns Supper and ate what I made because it is not the time for me to go all out trying to figure out and make all these Scottish foods. 

And I definitely wasn't going to have us eat haggis. We did talk about "piping in the haggis," where a haggis is paraded in with bagpipe music. We put on some bagpipe music and paraded around ourselves. 

Notice Lucky's shirt is backwards because January 25 was also Opposite Day.

 

We talked about how after the haggis is brought in at a traditional Burns Supper, someone recites the Robert Burns poem, "Address tae the Haggis," with lots of gestures and enthusiasm. We watched a YouTube video of someone doing that and the kids thought it was both fun and disgusting with the squeezing out the innards of the haggis.

Another common part of a Burns Supper is a lot of toasts. So we put bread in our toaster oven and had "toast."

It was fun to learn something new and perhaps someday I'll try to make Scottish food. It's just not the season right now.

Pioneer Day and Pioneer Day Observed

Happy Pioneer Day!

We celebrated Pioneer Day on the 24th of July and the 25th of July this year.
On the 24th we went for a hike (and scooter ride) as a family. We hadn't been very long on the trail when Jr. made the comment, "There's a beaver."
"Where?" I asked as I turned toward the river not thinking there was actually a beaver there. "Oh, there really is a beaver." There it was climbing down the bank into the water.
Jr. was surprised as he had said it kind of jokingly not thinking it was actually a beaver. We see a lot of muskrats around Utah. There was no mistaking that tail, though, and it was bigger than a muskrat.
Jeremy handed the camera to Nichole so she could get some pictures for us as I pointed it out to the younger boys. Jet was asleep in the stroller.

That was cool and a first time beaver sighting for me in Utah. Now I've seen beavers in three states and none of them The Beaver State. Ha Ha.
Nichole kept hold of the camera to take more pictures of wildlife- a squirrel eating an apple, a wasp nest with wasps, and an American dipper.

Since it was Pioneer Day, on the drive to the trail, Jeremy and I thought of some alternate lyrics to some Pioneer songs to reflect current situations. "Pandemic children sang as they walked and walked and walked and walked." "In Our Lovely Deseret" was given lyrics such as "Whenever they should meet, they stay a distance of six feet, while the coughing and the sneezing they despise."

Lucky had some fun with his scooter. He held on to the stroller so he wouldn't have to kick off from the ground and just be pulled along. We asked Jr. to take pictures and this is what he got.

As we got back to the van, we talked about how the pioneers wore face coverings, bandanas and such, and wearing face coverings is like wearing a scarf over your face and mouth in the Winter.
We also had some fun taking pictures of ourselves and the beautiful clouds and evening lighting on the hills. Nichole had a lot of fun.

Mom: Everybody say, "Happy Pioneer Day."
Most of us: Happy Pioneer Day.
Nichole: Happy Pioneer Day Observed.

On the 25th, our ward had a Pioneer Day Parade for the Primary children and their families, driving around the neighborhood waving American flags out the windows, dressing in Pioneer garb and having decorated vehicles if desired. It was fun to see how many ward members came outside their houses to wave and cheer us on.

Lucky was unhappy that he wasn't by a window that opened during the parade so when we got home I got pictures of our kids with their flags.

We didn't give Jet a flag during the parade but he was asleep by the time we got home and his hand was in such a position that I just had to stage this picture. So cute.

For participating, the kids also got a little snack- salt water taffy and a bag of microwave popcorn each. They ate their taffy soon after we got home and ate their popcorn while watching the movie, 17 Miracles.
There is a part in that movie where one of the pioneer women is given food to take back to the group by a "traveler." As she left, she remembered that she forgot to say thank you to the man so turned back but couldn't find him or the cave that had just been there. While watching that part, Lucky made the comment, "What if she said, 'Marco?' He would have said, 'Polo,'" Ha Ha Ha Ha. I guess that would have been a way for her to find him again.
That evening we played the video game, Oregon Trail, which is also about pioneers, just not pioneers for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In the game, we made sure to get to Independence Rock before the 4th of July after traveling to Independence Rock in real life and learning about it last year.

Lots of celebrating for Pioneer Day and Pioneer Day Observed. But no big fireworks show at the mall this year.