Saturday, April 28, 2007

All Party-ed Out

Two parties in a day and a half is a lot!

Party #1 was a sleepover. Zack invited 8 of his friends over to play and camp out overnight in the backyard. God answered our prayers with nice weather and no rain!

The boys had fun running around and doing what boys do, like playing ball, exploring in the woods, watching a movie, playing PS2 games, eating, and not getting much sleep. We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows over a fire and did experiments on how quickly do various items burn when thrown into the fire, such as plates, plastic spoons, chips, and leftover hot dogs.









They also did the traditional birthday traditions of gifts and blowing out candles. Zack however did not have a traditional cake. He chose, instead, to have Special K bars. They were his favorite potluck treat in MN and has missed not having them since moving to the NW. We'll be having those again soon!






The boys finally headed for the tents around 10 pm and some were determined to stay up all night, much to the dismay of those who wanted to sleep. Some nodded off, while others headed for the "sleeping tents" to try to get some shut-eye. At 1 am, Chris had to go out and put a stop to a late night football game in the backyard. After discussions about bagels and promises of "hit me if I fall asleep, ok" they all managed to drift off.

Unfortunately, at 5am one of the boys thought it was 6:30 and that he needed to get up. What was really unfortunate was that 2 other boys and Chris and I woke up too. After coming in and realizing their mistake, they went back to sleep in the family room until 6am when the rest of the crew woke up.

Despite the severe lack of sleep, everyone had a great time and somehow found the energy to get ready for...

Party #2

We always have a party to celebrate Zack’s birthday, my birthday, and Mother’s Day on Mother’s Day weekend. This year we couldn’t do that, so we had it yesterday. It made for a crazy day, but it went well.

Our immediate family from Portland all came up to help us celebrate! We had so much fun! The weather was gorgeous! We got to be outside to play and eat. Again, we did all the traditional birthday stuff like cake and gifts. But we did non-traditional stuff, too. My sisters and I went to Michael’s to oogle over the new line of Martha Stewart craft stuff. It is so cute!!! I don’t really like her, but I love her stuff!!!! I will probably be using my 40% coupon every week I can now.




Maggie kept everyone cool during gift opening


Charlie liked chewing on my new freezer mugs


but couldn't understand why he was still thirsty


It was so nice to see everybody again and we had a great time! Even the dogs had fun together. That is a picture of my brother and sister-in-law’s dog, Ernie. He had lots of fun going out the creek behind the house and laying in the nice cool mud!

At the end of the day we were all exhausted! We enjoyed a soak in the hot tub, there were hot showers for all the boys, and an early bed time!


2 comments:

CJ Olson said...

Sounds like you guys had a fun time....a tiring one but a fun time! :-)

Michaels sounds like fun....hmmm maybe I should go there tomorrow.

call*me*kate said...

Boy, you've been busy! Wish Zack a Happy Birthday from us! Sounds like the parties were a success all around. Chad will be 12 in July and it hardly seem real, I know how you feel. I love the quilt you made - the fabric store in CB is really great, I haven't been there in awhile but hope to go back soon. I'm glad you've been able to get more painting done. That's a job that sure takes a lot of time. Funny, just yesterday I told Todd that I wanted to go to Multnomah Falls - loved your photos. Thanks for your encouraging comments on my post. Maybe someday soon we'll have more time to talk and you can tell me more about God answering your prayer (the one you mentioned in your comment). It's supposed to rain all week - great time to get more painting done! Take care and God bless!

Kate