The famous, well-beloved, and long awaited for harvest party arrived last night. It was a dandy time, with many a strange person attending, often unrecognizable. And this is the account.
First I will start with the list of attendees. Tin tin reclined in her chair next to her grandmother, with a large blue sweater, tucked in khaki culottes, and peculiar topknot on her head. Believe me, I can only imagine the problems Megan had with getting that glue out of her hair. Next a very white and elegant bust statue stood on its Greek pedestal, with ivy gracing Katherine's hair very authentically. A sober Shannon and Bria perched on their seats as I entered, with the former wearing glasses and a swimming cap to be bald, and the latter dressed very obviously as a serious farmer's wife. The pitchfork and black frame gave it all away, labeling them definitely as Norman Rockwell's American Gothic couple. Next a very scary TJ lounged next to Uncle Tim and Aunt Sharon, with a hideous, contorted pink face (he was wearing a mask today), a furry shirt, and red leather pants. Then sitting around appeared to be a hairy headed, shoeless super hero Andrew (or that's what he said he was), then a brown faced Adam in farmer's gear, with a long bit of grass in his mouth, and using one of his many amazing voices to tell us squeakily about his skunk Fluffy Face that he was holding. Andy was helmeted out as a cave explorer, and a crooked horned Davie also sat as an absurd version of the Beast, with Kerry as the Beauty, in her own lovely purple gown. Van Lora apparently was a Lady Fall of sorts, with leaves in her hair and a medieval green dress. Brandon and Mary's family were the Peter Pan troupe, with Brandon as John, Mary as Wendy, James as Peter Pan, Rachel as Tinker Bell, Jonathan as Captain Hook, and little Jeff with a purposefully too small shirt on as Smea. I myself was a version of GI-Jane, with my camouflage outfit, Craig's humongous boots, and a brown and green painted face. The third year girls came in last as a surprise to the music of Pirates of the Caribbean. Sara Lee came swaggering in as Jack Sparrow, Sarah Ann dashingly defensive as a perfect Will Turner (she would have made Orlando Bloom jealous), Elizabeth beautiful as the Miss Swan herself, the bald-topped Bethany as the poppet pirate, and Kimberly leering with her eyeball on a fork, proudly displaying her ability to cross one eye.
A white-faced Diane led us, posing as Homestar Runner. We began with a game that each of us played within our teams. Organized in groups of six or seven, everyone would sit in a circle and each person would have a chance to roll the dice. Whenever one of us got the number four, we would shout, "Four!" then grab a pair of slippery gloves and proceed to open the present in the center, layer by layer. The problem was that it was taped very well, and with the gloves on it made it very un maneuverable. Then often by the time you got the gloves on someone else would be crying out the terrible number and clawing for the gloves to get an opportunity. Our team took forever, so we were the last one done, but it was discovered to be a candy bar inside the many layers of wrappings.
The next game involved listening to music. Each team would bid, say five seconds, meaning they thought they could hear the song for five seconds and be able to know what it was. We'd have five seconds to listen, five seconds to discuss, then we would provide the correct answer, and receive points. If we failed to provide the correct answer, we would get negative points. Horror of horrors! Some of the songs were easy, but sometimes when all you heard was an introduction, it made it very difficult.
After this we had a relay race. Four chairs were set up near the center of the room with balloons scattered about them. We were supposed to run up, sit and pop a balloon, eat what we would find inside, then run back for the next person to do it. I went twice, and started first, so I frantically dashed up, and had some problems popping the balloon. Finally managing, I saw the flash of an eyeball rolling on the floor, so I scooped it up and popped it in my mouth. Chewing, then swallowing, I rushed back. Someone mentioned something about a wrapper, and I realized to my shock that I had forgotten the wrapper and had eaten it, wrapper and all! No, wait, I still had a tiny wad of tin foil in my mouth. After that Aunt Sharon had hilarious trouble of not being able to make her balloon pop, for try as she might, she had difficulty because she was laughing so hard. Luckily, she succeeded. My team lost, but someone suggested that we be an honorary team because I ate the wrapper. haha
Next we went into the kitchen. "Ooh good, I like games in the kitchen," Mr. H. said, recalling last year's shaving cream and cheese curl incident. Diane assured him that this game wouldn't be messy. This activity was a puzzle. We had a lot of ripped up pieces of a calendar picture and we had to fit them together and glue them on construction paper. The calendar was a Norman Rockwell calendar, and our team got the picture of the cheer leaders. We labored away, though it wasn't an easy job for seven people to work on at once, and managed to gain honor by coming in second.
Finally we had an ABC scavenger hunt, having to find an item for every letter of the alphabet. The game was over in a flash, though we had some problems with the letter X, but once again we managed second place, just squeezing behind the first placing team.
The games were followed by picture taking and many refreshments. Practically everything we ate was a fruit dipped in chocolate: including strawberries, kiwis, bananas, and apples. But of course we managed to eat other goodies too, chicken being one of them. The picture taking was also an interesting time, with Nate threatening to taking crooked pictures and laughing when Kimberly screamed at him. Also that time was featured by James getting terrified out of his wits when TJ began to crouch on the ground and approach him. It's bad enough for him to do it without the mask, but with it produced disastrous results, and I could hardly blame James for turning bright red and screaming. A valiant pirate rebuked the offender for giving him nightmares, and with assuring words that she would take care of him, Kimberly whipped out her fake sword and began to beat her cousin most appreciatively. But the damage was done. James crawled up on the couch behind me and sat there shaking, and it was all Bria and I could do to soothe him and tell him it wasn't real and he was just pretending. Still, if he hadn't be so frightened it would have been just too funny.
