Olympic celebrations

Saturday morning we were lucky enough to get to participate in our town's Olympic Torch relay.  B decided he was not really interested in running the leg with O, so Owen ran his 1/4 mile stretch alone. The participents ran down the river greenway and back to Pickett's Run park where they got to light a 'real' torch and have some snacks (which of course were my kids favorite part!)

Almost time to run!

Run Owen, run!!

Almost there!

Lighting the torch in the park!

Before Owen ran I told him to run fast and not goof around because other people were waiting for the torch.  I told him he didn't have to sprint the whole way, just don't goof around.  In Owen's head this translated to SPRINT AS FAST AS YOU CAN!!!  The poor kiddo fell over after handing the torch off.  He did recover in time to run part of the final leg to the torch pit.

This event was part of a national movement called Let's move.  Bluffton is one of the cities that has been featured on the page!  How cool!

The boys and I also decided to do an Olympic medal count this year.  We made flags for the USA, Norway, and Ireland (I picked the other two countries for part of our heritage). Then we cut out circles to represent 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place finishes.  Each day we check the medal count and add circles under our flags. 

Today we decided that we needed the Olympic rings above our flags so we colored paper plates to match the rings, cut out the centers of the plates, and arranged them above the flags!

I'm loving finding ways to get the boys more interested and involved in the Olympics!



Science Central

I'm seriously trying to get caught up here! 

Last Tuesday we got to visit Science Central.  I had a Groupon (Bonus!) so we all got to go for pretty cheap.  (If you don't use Groupon, you really should check it out! http://www.groupon.com/r/uu11270899 )
The boys really loved Science Central.  I feel so blessed that there are so many great family things to do in our area!

(Sorry for the tiny pics.  I was a bad mom and forgot the camera.  Thank goodness for smartphones!)

3-D Mars

Watching the 'movie' in the wheel

Both boys loved the space section!

My little shorty

Playing with the air rocket

It didn't take long to go through the building, and we say just about everything, but they had a great time.  Add in the discount and it was a day well spent.  We also went to brunch as a family before hand!

IronKid Triathalon

Yes, this happened over a week ago.  Yes, I have been meaning to get this posted.  No, I just didn't find the time.  ;)

I am so proud of both of my boys.  They both tried their best and neither one stopped during the whole thing. They didn't place in the top three, and while they were upset they didn't get trophies, I was still so impressed they both finished. 

The race started with some swimming.  Brenner swam the width of the pool, while Owen had to swim the width of the pool twice.

After climbing out of the pool they had to race over to their bikes and put on socks, shoes, and their shirt with their race bib. They then biked just over a mile through town over to the 4-H park.

Once the got to the 4-H park they parked their bikes and took off running.  The route was just over 1/2 mile.  I got to run with Brenner for the biking and the running portion before circling back around to finish the run with Owen.  (I was one tired mama!)

All the participents recieved a medal for finishing. Their were over 100 kids that participated in the event this year! And we are already discussing training for next year's event! :)

After the race we interviewed with the paper (the boys had 2 articles covering their training and finish, including pictures!! They are famous!).  Then this exhausted mama took them home and made them play quietly so I could nap.  Did I mention I'd worked 3rd shift and come straight to their race?  Yeah, I'm just that awesome!  

Fort Wayne Children's Zoo

Ok, I'm behind again.  We have checked off quite a few things in the last few days, I just haven't had time to sit down and put them on this blog. 

Last Friday we went to the zoo.  We got there early since I worked 3rd shift that night and needed to get a nap in after the zoo and before work!  It started off chilly (who would have guessed!) and misty, but turned into a gorgeous day.

Owen insists he is a monkey, so first we had to stop and check out his monkey mom and dad.  He claims the monkey king is also his monkey dad.  Yeah, I know, he's a bit odd.  But he's cute. 

Everything after that is a bit of a blur.  I'm pretty sure that they were far more interested in riding the rides than seeing the animals.

The Fort Wayne zoo is one of our favorite places to visit in the summer.  It's so interactive and there is always plenty to do!!

Brenner's Mario Bros Birthday party!

My baby boy turned 6 this week.  So while I struggled with thought of having a 6 and 8 year old I also got to struggle to get things ready for his party this weekend.  Thank goodness my parents volunteered to have the party at their house so we could use the pool.  Unfortunately my stepmom didn't remember this and also planned their annual summer garage sale for this weekend.  Great.  I got to add the garage sale struggle to the ever growing pile for the week.  Did I mention that I worked last Saturday night, Monday and Tuesday day, and Wednesday evening?  No?  Yup, the week kept getting better and better.

So we got nothing done on our list this week.  I'm not even sure I had time to pee.  But everything came together and we had a fantastic party!

A lot of the ideas I found on Pinterest.  I adapted some to fit what I wanted to do and some I changed not at all. I picked everything that would be the simplest to do and give the best effect.  So we made chocolate mustaches and marshmallow mushroom pops, played pin the mustache on Mario, had sandwiches, pretzels, and Mario fruit snacks to eat, and had a green pipe cake with a pirahna plant decoration on it.  The goodie 'bags' were gold '?' boxes with bubble gum coins in them. I used solid color plates, napkins, cups, and plasticware. My stepmom provided the baskets and buckets.

I made the mustaches with candy melts and a couple of molds I got on ebay.  I used the extra sticks from that and stuck marshmallows on them.  I dipped those in red candy melts and dotted them with white chocolate the next day.  I found the gold boxes and bubble gum coins at Oriental Trading and just drew the question marks on with a sharpie. I adapted an idea I found here for the cake.  The cake itself is just 3 6in round cakes topped with an 8in round cake and covered in green tinted carmel buttercream (butter, powdered sugar, vanilla extract and carmel extract). 

The pin the mustache on Mario game was homemade.  I found a picture of Mario's face and copied it onto a piece of cardboard.  I then drew a mustache to fit onto another piece of cardboard and trace enough so each kid would have one chance. We used duct tape to stick them to the face. The birthday boy though it would be a lot more fun to throw the mustaches at the face, but we convinced him that wouldn't work nearly as well as walking up and placing it where he wanted it.

We had planned to do egg races using hard boiled eggs that my boys had drawn spots on with sharpie in the different yoshi colors (green, yellow, blue, and pink).  Unfortunately it was just too hot out and the kids were much happier in the pool anyway.  My husband used them to make a very large batch of egg salad today instead.

Everyone had a fantastic time, even this stressed out mom.  Because once I had things done and set up I let everyone else run the show and sat back with my camera and one of these.