Halloween in Northern CA

We had a busy week leading up to Halloween. Saturday morning Jeff had a ribon cutting ceremony for his Leadership Lodi community service project. Then we picked up Kara and Patrick and went to an area called Apple Hill. It is about half way between Sacramento and Tahoe on hwy 50 just past Placerville. It is a gorgeous area this time of year. Pumpkin patches, wineries, apple orchards and christmas tree farms. People from MN can imagine the places down around Stillwater MN and then multiple by 30 or 40 stops and get the idea. It is truly a fall spectacle.

The next couple of pictures don't do the area justice, but here they are anyway...

If the wine tickles the senses half as much as the grape vines did it will be amazing!!!

Pine Trees in training.

Naked on top.

After spending the day at Apple Hill we drove down to Catherine and Court's house to cut/carve the pumpkins. The pumpkin patches were pretty picked over so we had to get creative with what was leftover.

I give you Frosty and Leonardo!!

Tuesday Heidi and one of her hall directors, Cassie, ran the University of the Pacific's Safe Trick or Treat. All told there was over 1100 people there!! I borrowed the robot costume Patrick made for Kara at the General Mills Trick or Treat event. It doesn't look like much in the picture, but the remote controls the spinning blades and the lights...the kids went absolutely crazy for it. Jeff was mobbed the entire night by literally hundreds of kids. It was pretty amazing when they turned from crying to smiling, or came out of their shy shell, and occaisionally screamed and hid behind their parents upon the sight.

Heidi borrowed Kara's Raggedy Anne costume. She had a midterm right after the event and went to class dressed up. Around 8pm that night, we experienced our first earthquake in CA! It was a 5.6er in San Jose, so it wasn't real strong in Stockton, but the buildings still shook! It was pretty cool.

We stayed low-key on Wednesday and just hung out around campus. Heidi has been really busy with work and classes. We went to the Pacific men's basketball game tonight and watched the Tigers beat CSU-Stanislaus. Tomorrow we are going to the sensory appreciation evening for General Mills and we both leave on Saturday morning. Jeff will be going to MN for the week for a conference and Heidi is bringing a delegation of RAs to the NRAP conference in Reno for the day.

Hope everyone had a great Halloween!