Mixed Up

My Thanksgiving/Christmas cactus is blooming in March, but notice that only one side of it is blooming. Don't understand it at all!

Neither rain nor snow nor cold, wet weather shall keep a gardener from planting his onion starts!

Saben's Birthday Party - Part 2

One of the challenges was to see who could hit the other team's flag with water balloons. This is the water balloon launcher that they used.

Some of the kids were able to hit the flags, which were on the fence at the opposite end of the yard. A lot of tries were near misses...

...while others sailed way over the fence and across the road. I think the shot that result from this boy was the longest one of all of them.

The next challenge involved taking a taste of a mixture of several items. Kari put some juice, peanut butter, ketchup, rice, jello, corn chips, mustard, lettuce, and a few other things in the blender and mixed it up.

Everyone, but one boy, was willing to taste the mixture...

...although, you can see from some of the expressions on their faces that it didn't taste very good. They were each given some of the mixture on a spoon. They got 1 point for tasting it and 2 points if they ate the whole spoonful. Only 2 didn't eat the whole thing. They did better than I would have!

The last challenge of the day was a treasure hunt. They had clues that led them to puzzle pieces that they had to assemble to discover where the treasure chests were located. Each team had their own treasure chest, that they shared with the other team.

The pirates treasure had bags of gold covered chocolate coins and the soldiers treasure was the goblets, everyone is holding in the picture.

Even though it was sunny, it was a little windy, so Kari had to light the birthday candles in the porch and let Saben blow them out by the door.

After some of the kids left, those that hadn't been picked up had a tug of war. I think everyone had a great time, it was a fun party!

Saben's Birthday Party - Part 1

Saturday was Saben's birthday party. For a change, it was a sunny day, so they were able to have his party outside. Kari divided the kids into 2 teams, the soldiers and the pirates. Saben was on the soldiers team.

Annika was on the pirate team.The first thing they did was get their bandanas on...

...make a team flag...

...put eye patches and mustaches on the pirates, (which didn't stay on much longer than it took to take the picture)...

...or put camouflage paint on the soldiers.

One of the team challenges was to see who could balance on a log piece the longest. Everyone was doing it so well that Kari had them do other things while staying balanced on their logs, like raising their hands in the air, etc.

Then they had an obstacle course race. They are practicing running over the logs.

To start the obstacle course race, Kyle tied one member of each team up in a rope, which the rest of the team was supposed to take off them, then untangle the rope, before they could go on.

Once untangled, the whole team had to hang onto the rope and couldn't let go while crawling under the string blocking the doorway into the yard, going across the logs, and crawling through a tunnel. Then, they could let go of the rope and go break some balloons to get clues on how to assemble a bracelet. The first team to do all that won that challenge.

MOPS Auction - 2012

The annual MOPS auction was this week, so Tuesday, instead of our regular MOPS program, we all worked on making the decoration for the auction. Our theme this year was "The Old West", and these moms were filling jars with rocks for the flower bouquets for the tables

Cindy is showing the paddles we used for bidding.

Adding flowers to the jars of rocks.

Making the bars for the bank.

A wrangler and a school marm from the old west.

Tiffany and Adriene behind bars at the bank.

Some cowgirls at the auction.

2 March Birthdays and 1 in April

Last Sunday we celebrated, Kari, Saben and Kyle's birthdays. We met at a Szechuan restaurant in Seattle for lunch, which was where Saben wanted to go for lunch. One of his favorite things to eat there is pepper fish, which is what he's holding in his hand, and I thought was on the spicy side.

We put Kari & Kyle in charge of ordering our food and we got a good variety of spicy and non-spicy dishes. (The non-spicy was for the kids and me.)

After lunch we were going to go to Todd & Betsy's house for cake and to open presents, but Seth fell asleep in the car on the way home, so we had to kill some time while he took his nap. We went to a park near their house and took a walk even though it was kind of drizzly.

Betsy & Seth had showed me what they call "the Papa tree" when I visited them once before, so I had to show everyone else the "Papa tree". Doesn't it look like Ken?

Going for our walk.

Luckily for us, Seth didn't nap to long, so we didn't get to wet and cold. I don't know what Annika's look was all about.

Opening presents.

There were even a couple for Kari & Kyle.

We had consulted one of our 4th grade students about an idea we had for a present for Saben, and had been told that he really liked them, so that's what we got Saben. They are called nano bugs or hex bugs and you can build things for them to go on. The bug is in the white hexagon and it vibrates when you turn it on, which causes it to move around areas. The orange thing on the table is another set to add to the smaller one and you can see them hooked together in the picture below.

The different pieces fit together and you can create a large area to put your bugs on. The orange thing had a ramp, some barriers, a teeter totter, and a second level for them to go to. All 3 kids seemed to enjoy playing with them.

Saben also got this from Todd, Betsy & Seth. It's called "Booger Bubbles" and you're supposed to have bubbles come out of the nostrils. When Saben tried it, he got some bubbles to come out, but because you blow the bubbles out with the tube in your mouth, he said he got soap in his mouth, which wasn't to pleasant! Hopefully he'll be able to figure out how to do it without that problem.

Snow on March 19th

This is what I woke up to this morning.

I can't believe we've had snow 4 mornings in March during a 2 week period and 2 of the days were yesterday and today.

This was a very icy snow.

Snow on the buds of my lilac.

Saturday and Sunday a Week Ago

I didn't take any pictures last weekend for a change, so at first I wasn't going to do a blog about it, even though we had Saben and Annika with us most of Saturday and Sunday. Then I decided I did want to blog about the weekend, but haven't gotten around to it until now. Saturday morning, we met Kyle in Mt. Vernon to get the kids for the rest of the weekend. Arlington High School was doing the play "Beauty and the Beast" and I wanted to take them to the matinee performance at 1pm. The high schoolers did a good job, but it was on the long side (2 1/2 hours), so there was some restlessness. When I asked each of them what their favorite part was, Saben said he liked the battle at the end of the play best and Annika, copying her brother said the same thing, although she added that she liked the dancing plates also. Saben's other comment was that the M&M cookie I bought them during the intermission was the worst cookie he had every eaten. (He did eat the whole thing however, so it must not have been to awful.) After the play was over, all the performers were in the lobby to greet the ones attending the play. I though Annika would want to meet the person playing the part of "Belle", but when it was our turn to talk to her and take a picture with her, she hid behind me and wouldn't talk to her or have her picture taken. Oh well, I tried! We spent the rest of that day at our house playing various games.

Sunday after church, whenever they stay with us, we have been in the habit of taking them to McDonald's for lunch and to play in the play area for awhile. The last time we had been there, Saben told me that he didn't really like the food at McDonald's any more, so I wasn't sure we should go there this time. After church, Annika wanted to know if we were going to go to McDonald's, so I explained that I didn't think they liked the food, so maybe we should go to Red Robin instead. Annika assured me that she liked the food and although Saben admitted he didn't like the food, he really wanted to play in the play area. I tried to discourage them from going there by telling them that if we went, they would have to eat because that would be our lunch. They both decided the play area was worth having to eat the food, so we went. I don't think we'll go again for lunch though, because in spite of them saying they would eat, they really didn't eat much lunch. Maybe next time, we'll eat somewhere else, then get an ice cream cone or something at McDonald's later, so they could still play there. My question is, Why doesn't anyone other than McDonald's or Burger King have play areas for kids? It would be nice if other restaurants had something like that so we wouldn't have to go to McDonald's to have an indoor play area!

Spring is on the Way!

Tuesday, our crocus looked like this.

Today, our crocus looked like this...

...like this...

...and like this. Spring is definitely on the way, in spite of the set back on Tuesday.