Happy birthday Ryan!

Today we celebrated Ryan's 7th birthday.  According to him it was the best birthday ever.  Woo hoo!  At least we're doing something right around here.  

Ryan asked for a pitching machine for his birthday.  He has never shown any interest in baseball before, but recently we went miniature golfing and he saw some batting cages there.  He thought they looked awesome, so that is what he got (on a much smaller scale of course).  He was outside practicing hitting balls at 7:30 in the morning. 

And being the smart boy that he is, he asked to have Kneader's chunky cinnamon french toast with creamy caramel syrup and whipped cream for breakfast.  You can never go wrong with that.

I told Ryan he could have a friend party this year, and his big dilemma was whether he should invite his real friends, or if he should just invite his entire school class, because he would get a lot more presents that way.  I told him it was up to him (dumb choice on my part).  However, with only the slightest of nudging, did he decide that he would invite his real friends.  I was quite relieved.  We decided a Mario Brothers party would be fun, and being the silly "home-made" kinda gal that I am, I got started on a lot of work to make his party fun.  We played a few games like

Pin the mustache on Mario

and a bean bag toss game with Boo

stomp the goomba  (balloons)

and don't drop Yoshi's egg. 

Of course we opened presents.

and ate cupcakes that look like mushrooms.

A couple of other things that I thought made this party extra fun were these cute chocolate Mario mustache suckers,

and these coin boxes that we filled with chocolate gold coins as they completed each of their games.

I also thought these Boo balloons were about the cutest things I've ever seen.  I wish I had taken a picture of ours, but I forgot, so I'll just post the picture that was my inspiration for them instead.

We had an exhausting super fun time!  Happy birthday buddy!

On Your Mark, Get Set, Go!

About 2 weeks ago, we experienced our first Pinewood Derby.  Then last night, we experienced our second Pinewood Derby.  That's a  lot of car building for a first-timer, right?  Why, yes. Yes it is.

A few weeks ago we found out about Tyler's derby only 5 days before the actual race.  Apparently we were supposed to have been given our car kit a month before, but nobody ever got around to letting us know about it, so we were left scrambling.  

The car building duties fell to me, because I feared that if Greg was in charge it would end up looking (and racing) like the car Greg built for himself when the men had their own Pinewood Derby a few years ago.  Five minutes before his race, he grabbed his block of wood, colored it red with a magic marker, and hammer the wheels on.  I wish I had a picture to show you, but you'll just have to close your eyes and try to imagine it.  Not pretty.  Not very fast, either.  Just not his thing, I guess.

Anyway, I think Tyler and I did a pretty good job on his car.  He wanted to make it look like a Wii remote,  and here is what we ended up with.

However, looks aren't everything.  Unfortunately his car came in dead last in every race.  Apparently you have to put the graphite on, and then get those wheels spinning BEFORE you actually start racing.  After the official race was over, the boys got to race their cars just for fun, and Tyler's car started doing MUCH better, even taking 1st place several times.  Lesson learned.  At least we still have years and years of Pinewood Derbies ahead of us (oh, joy!) to get things figured out.

 Turns out I didn't have to wait a whole year to work on my next car.  Last night our ward had a Daddy/Daughter Powder Puff Pinewood Derby race for the activity days girls.  This time I did a little research and figured out the best way to weight the car and to get those wheels spinning.  Now keep in mind, we don't own any fancy tools, (a hammer, a few screwdrivers, and a drill are about the extent of our collection), so I am never expecting to have a car that even comes close to winning it all.  All I want is to help my kids build a car that at least won't cause them a great amount of embarrassment.  So here is what we came up with for Alyssa

So cute, and soooo easy.  I told her it may not be fast, but at least it will look good!

Turns out it was cute, and also fairly decent on the track.  She ended up tying for 4th place out of 31 cars.  Not to shabby!

 

Wax Museum

Each year our second grade does a "wax museum" in which the kids choose a famous person that they want to portray.  They are supposed to memorize a 30 second script about their person and then repeat it each time someone pushes their "button".  Tyler chose to be NBA player Kyle Korver (mostly because I suggested it would be an easy costume since all he would have to do is throw on a jersey and hold a basketball).  We made his poster and then I told him we would work on his script right after I finished writing my report and making my poster about giraffes helping Ryan with his giraffe report. 

Well, Tyler decided that I was taking too long and decided to write his own script.  It goes like this:  

My name is Kyle Korver.  I am very tall.  I am the best basketball player in the world.  I have brown hair and tan skin.....

Ha ha ha.  That last part cracks me up.  Anyway, I told him that we should probably google him and maybe find out some things that were a little more factual. 

 And so we did.  

And Tyler did a great job in the wax museum.

It's the simple things in life

Who knew that something as simple as eating a powdered donut could bring such joy?  I gave Dylan his first donut the other day.  I was pretty sure he would enjoy it, just as he enjoys pretty much every food/treat he eats. However, I have never seen anyone enjoy anything quite so much.  

He shrieked with joy every time he took a bite.

And giggled the whole time he was chewing.  

It was so funny that I had to keep giving him more.  You would think three donuts would be enough to satisfy this skinny little boy, especially after just having finished his dinner, but no, he was still looking for his next fix.  Sadly, that was the end of the donuts.  

How cute are these?

I was in need of some inspiration for teacher appreciation week when I came across this cute idea.  

I love the tag, it reads: 

"The contents of this can are to be used purely for the treatment of stress due to teaching.  When feeling such ailments, wait for recess, lock door, hide under desk, and consume immediately."

  I made one for each of my kids teachers and filled them with hershey's kisses.  There is a tutorial on how to make these cute cans from the girls over at Our Best Bites.

Nerd Day

I have mixed feelings about my kids' school's Nerd Day.  Should we really encourage them to dress up as kids who are ostracized and picked on?  Isn't it kind of making fun of kids who are less fortunate in the social skills/wardrobe department?  That being said, my kids did want to dress up, and I let them.  

Ryan asked me to help him pick out some good nerd clothes.  He got upset as I was pulling things out of his drawer, saying they looked nothing like nerd clothes.  "Um, Ryan..." I said, "do you think you are supposed to dress up like the CANDY?"  

"Yes," he said.  "What else would I be dressing up like?"

So I had to try to explain what a "nerd" was.  He was not as excited to dress up like a nerd person as he was about dressing up like the candy.  Anyway, this is the best we could come up with...

Since there was never a note or anything sent home, and I was just relying on the fact that my kids told me today was nerd day and they needed to dress up, I hope they were speaking the truth.  I would hate to send my kids to school looking like this on a regular day.

Thinner Thursdays (Really Friday)

Didn't get around to this post yesterday.  Maybe because I was feeling bad.  This last week was a total FAIL.  Easter was not kind. 

 These fudge-filled coconut pound cake cupcakes with sugar cookie bunny ears that I made certainly didn't help things.

Neither did these chick sugar cookies....

And 31 cent scoop night at Baskin Robbins?  A yearly family tradition.  Could I just have taken the kids and not gotten any for myself?  Yes.  But I didn't.  And can I just say that their pumpkin pie ice cream is delicious?

Anyway, up 2 lbs.  Not happy about that at all.  I promise to do better this week.