Backyard Fun

As I predicted, my kids picked all the activities for Backyard Fun.  I talked to them about it Monday morning;  I had barely finished speaking when they were out the door with paints in hand to make some yard art.  They decided to paint the stones that we have lining the driveway in the back.  They had a blast and the art turned out really good too.  

Everyone painting happily--except Maggie--she's giving me a dirty look.

Art is hard!  Gotta stick that tongue out.

Maggie's sun stone.

One of the many fantastic art works we now have lining our driveway.

Then Friday night we had a camp out in the backyard.  My aunt brought her grandson for the fun too.  We had hobo dinners and Hershey's Kisses for dinner.  Then we were going to play twilight games, but my aunt brought water guns for a water fight, and the kids ran around squirting each other with abandon.  My aunt and Aaron got in the fun too.  Probably the funniest thing was when Aaron got out our big water guns.  My aunt's grandson took two small guns over to him and wanted to trade.  He said, "How 'bout you give me that one and you can have these ones.  They're better."  We laughed and laughed.  Aaron, Hannah and my Dad put up the tent together.  My Dad did the directing and Aaron and Hannah the work.  The kids were so excited to sleep in the tent.  We usually have one or more kids come in in the middle of the night to sleep inside.  When I woke up in the morning and looked around, I didn't see any kids in their beds, so I figured they had all stayed outside.  Later Maggie told me that Caleb had woken up in the middle of the night and she had brought him in.  When I looked again, there he was, over in a corner of the bed, tangled in bed sheets.

My Aunt, her grandson, and Caleb fight it out in the water gun fight.

Aaron gets out the big guns.  He's pretty cut-throat in a water fight.  

Don't shoot Mom, Maggie!

Setting up the tent.

Grandpa teaching Hannah how to set up the tent.
I may have set up my last tent.  I can just have her do it from now on.  

The activity for next week's Badge of Fun, June 11-16, is Hit the Road.  Luckily, we are actually going on a road trip this week.  That's just one of life's happy coincidences.  Here's the suggested activities--1. Stock your car--a lap desk, backseat peacekeeper or car organizer.  2.  Make the miles go by--make surprise balls or car games.  3.  Pack easy-to-eat snacks--cookie and milk bars, homemade granola bars, or chocolate-drizzled trail mix.  Here's some suggestions if you don't happen to be going on a road trip this week--you could go on a day trip to some place fun in your area, or you could have an imaginary trip to somewhere else--get books or DVD's about a place you would like to visit, make food from there, or try a game or tradition.  I think I will print up Family Fun's On-the Go packet.  I already bought travel treats (Katrina talked me into the chocolate covered pretzels--yum!).  But, as we're going camping, I have to drag out all the camp equipment and make sure it works before we leave, not to mention all the stuff we normally do--that seems like enough fun for the two days I have before go time.  Maybe I'll put Hannah in charge of this badge of fun.  She'll do a great job.

Summer Plans

We have some exciting summer plans I wanted to share with you.  First off, last year as we were going to the last days of our season pass at This is the Place, Hannah asked if we could volunteer there.  I had never heard of such a thing, but checked into it.  Turns out you can. This is the Place is a state run park that has pioneer homes and demonstrations of pioneer activities.  It's a living history type site. The Smalleys and my parents have joined us in this adventure.  I took some pictures of the kids in their pioneer clothes.  They are all so cute.  My kids have had them on as much as possible since we got them.  In order to view the grown-ups, you will have to actually come to Utah and see us.  We're there Wednesday mornings all summer long.  The Smalleys are in a house where they will be demonstrating pioneer cooking.  My parents and I are in a house that has pioneer parlor games--pick up sticks and checkers.  My Dad's going to work at the fireman's hall, too.

All the kids in their pioneer clothes. 

You will also have to come to Utah to see the super cute pictures I took of the girls posing as fashionable pioneers and the guys pretending to smell cow poop.  Allison has threatened me not to post her picture on my blog.  Sorry, she knows where I will be every Wednesday.

I told the kids to give me their best pioneer faces.  I had no idea pioneers liked to stick their tongues out like that.

Our other big summer plans come from Family Fun magazine.  Those of you who get it know that this last year they have had a feature every month called Badges of Fun.  Each month there was a theme, a badge you could earn to put on your chart, and suggestions of three activities to do.  I thought it sounded like fun, but never had enough energy to do it.  When I was planning out this summer, I was trying to think of easy, fun, inexpensive things to do with the kids.  The badges of fun fit the bill perfectly.  I thought it would be fun to post them here and give you the opportunity to play along.  If you do decide to do something, let us know what you did.  Part of the fun of doing this will be hearing what everyone else decided to do.

The first badge of fun is scheduled for this coming week June 3-9.  It is Backyard Fun.   The suggested activities are a backyard camp out, yard art, and twilight games.  I'm sure there are specifics on Family Fun's website or you can just be creative.  Also, if you're interested, you may be able to download the chart and the badges from the Family Fun website, too.  I'm not sure which activity we're going to do, we'll decide tomorrow, but knowing my kids, we'll probably do all of them.  

So sweet! 

Mother's Day

I have to do a little bragging about my Mother's Day.  It was pretty awesome.  Aaron made me breakfast in bed--a Mother's Day tradition.  It was yummy.  Hannah made me a card.  On the back were coupons for a spa day.  When I finally made it downstairs (Aaron was bathing the kids, no way was I making an appearance until that was over.), Hannah had transformed the backyard into my own personal spa.  First she did an oatmeal face mask.  There was a lot of giggling as she put it on.  Nothing like Mom with breakfast on her face.  Then there was a foot soak with marbles in the bottom for massaging.  Next she gave me a manicure.  She had all the nail polish out and some new nail stickers.  I choose yellow nail polish to match my yellow and pink flower skirt.  Hannah recruited Maggie to do the pedicure.  I decided on a much more muted light pink for my toes.  After this was done, they had prepared me a delicious spa lunch of a cucumber sandwich and chocolate dipped strawberries.  I was really impressed with Hannah's forethought.  Apparently she planned this whole thing back in April.  She made a list of the spa activities, a shopping list for supplies, and even drew a diagram of how she was going to set up the spa outside.  Aaron took her shopping for nail polish for her Daddy date the day before Mother's Day, and she whipped out her spa shopping list so they could get that stuff too.  My day ended with a delicious chicken Caesar salad and strawberry shortcake.  It was a great day.

I Told You So

Last Saturday was a beautiful spring day--sunny, warm--gorgeous. So, I got out the bikes I had stored for the last few years in our shed. Our kids were pretty sure that riding bikes was scary, stupid, etc. But, I told them it was a skill they needed to have, whether they wanted it or not. I spent most of the day fixing up the bikes. This mostly entailed checking the tubes for leaks (none), my dad greasing up the chains, and adjusting the bikes to fit the various kids. When we were done, every kid had a working bike. Then we went out to the driveway for a little bike riding lesson. After a while, they seemed to be getting it, so we loaded up the bikes and headed over to the local elementary for a little larger biking area. Aaron had to ride his bike over as he and my brother Chris were busy trying to adjust the seat (it was frozen), and cutting off the lock which we couldn't find the key for. When we got to the school, I was prepared for tears, more running after kid's bikes holding them up, etc. But lo, and behold, all of them took off on their own. They rode around like old pros for about an hour. "Bike riding is fun!" they said, "This is great!" We went to Chuck-A-Rama for a delicious and well deserved buffet dinner afterwards. It's been great weather this week and every available minute they've been outside riding their bikes. The most exciting part of the day yesterday was PE. We went out to the trail at the park with our cousins and friends and the kids rode their bikes together. It was awesome.

Weird Science

A while ago, Hannah had to disect a chicken wing for science. She was supposed to observe the joint structure. I think a video would have been helpful here, because neither of us could figure out what we were supposed to do. Anyway, after she grossed herself out, barely touching the chicken at all, Maggie stepped in.

Maggie and Sophie dissecting.

Maggie had no problem touching, cutting and dissecting the chicken wing. She dissected and kept dissecting. Sophie wanted to get into the action too. They had a grand time cutting and moving parts. They must have been at it for more than half an hour.

Who knew you could be this excited about chicken?

Maggie's chicken wing. Note the neat piles of meat/fat and bones.

Sophie's looked the same.

After all the carnage was over, I threw away the carefully dissected parts and made stock from the left over chicken wings. The next day we had chicken noodle soup. Hannah wouldn't touch any of the chicken, though I assured her that none of the meat in the soup came from the dissecting melee.

Best Disneyland Picture Ever

The Best Disneyland Picture Ever

So, four years ago we went to Disneyland with my family. We convinced Hannah and Maggie to go on Splash Mountain. Hannah was 8 and Maggie was 6. Maggie rode with me and Hannah rode with my sister Amy. (Dad, did you ride with Sophie, or was she too little?) We told them how much fun it was going to be. They were willing, if a little nervous. They had fun through the first part of the ride, but Maggie was getting nervous when we started going up. As we crested the hill and headed down into the abyss, she started screaming and flew up out of the seat. I put my arm out to hold her in. The rest of the ride was marked by hysterical crying. After we got out, we took this picture. Notice me and my Dad--grinning like the Cheshire Cat. My sister Amy is sympathy crying. I think Caleb is too. He's got his head buried in my legs. Every time I look at this picture, I giggle. (It's the new wall paper on my computer. The kids want to change it. I can't imagine why. :) ) We're going to Disneyland in the fall. I wonder if we can get them to ride Splash Mountain again. I'm hoping for a similar picture with Caleb.

Singing

"I'm the Queen of Mars, I was invisible on earth, I only took the magic portal to Mars, to give me some self worth."

The girls have taken up singing in the car. It's pretty funny because they like to sing Phineas and Ferb songs. Some of their favorites are "You're Busted," "I've Got a Nemesis," and "Gitchie, Gitchie Goo." It's spilling over into other activities too. We went to the planetarium and were climbing around on the replica of a Mars landscape and they broke out into "I'm the Queen of Mars." Then the other evening we were pulling taffy. We were standing around in the kitchen pulling and the girls were complaining that their arms hurt. Unfortunately, we still had 5 more minutes to go. I suggested they sing a song. They started singing a Silly Song from Veggie Tales about Sport Utility Vehicles. They had such fun singing; they forgot their arms hurt. And the taffy was yummy.