Party Hangover

Mary had two soccer games this morning, starting at 8:00! She scored FIVE goals! It was very impressive, actually. Then we got cleaned up and went out to lunch at Olive Garden. We hit a few stores to get Mary a couple more birthday presents and spent the rest of the day recovering from all the partying.

We were too tired to try an make this family selfie work. Ha!

Mary Turns 11

We celebrated Mary's birthday with cinnamon rolls for breakfast and lots of pool toys for presents. This evening we had Mary's Amazing Race birthday party, which was really fun. I love this sweet, fun, creative, and valiant little lady. What made my mama heart happy was to watch how grateful she was during all the celebrating. Lots of thank you, hugs, and smiles that said, "thanks so much I love this creativity".

The party started with Would You Rather questions. Once everyone arrived, the amazing race began!

 Here's the amazing race progression:
1. Broke up into groups of 2 players, created a team name. We had the Chicken Canon Creators, Ninja Cows, Fuzzy Bananas, The Shorties, and Purple Penguins
2. Read the first Route Info to find scattered shoes in front lawn and have partner put them on.
3. Locate team colored string on outside tree and find the coin at the base of the tree with the birthday girl's birth year.
4. Do the first road block-one person builds a marshmallow launcher.
5. Launch three marshmallows into the basket on your teammate's head.
6. Detour-choose 1 of 2 activities-either a nature scavenger hunt or ball on a spoon relay race
7. Find hidden colored eggs and put together a puzzle. (This was hard) The photo was of a baby Mary sleeping--leading to the next task in her bedroom.
8. Pop the team color balloon on her bed and unscramble the letters to form a word; Mozart (next challenge at the piano)
9. Feed each other 11 gummy bears using chopsticks, one chopstick each.
10. Another Road Block-one person must eat M&M's until they find the smiley face at the bottom of the cup. There were tons of cups (and maybe some girls who have given up M&M's forever)!
11. "Junk in the Trunk" -tie the box onto your waist and jump up and down until the orange ball pops out. Race to the finish line.

Then it was a crepe bar, singing, candles, presents, a Kahoot game of how well you know Mary with prizes, a soccer movie, werewolf, and a sleep over with cousins once the friends left. It was one of the best parties I've thrown thanks to all the help from my mom and Sarah (helping me do last minute stuff I didn't have ready).

Phew!

Max's Mission Call

We FaceTimed Max as he opened his mission call this evening. Scotland/Ireland mission! How exciting! He will be amazing, no doubt!

Would You Rather?

Just getting ready for Mary's party today with this Would You Rather game. Cameron's response to Would you rather be able to fly or be invisible?, made me giggle: "Fly! So then I could fly up in the sky and see Jesus and say, 'hello!'". He's too much.

Ben's Work Out Buddy

Cameron spent an hour this evening working out and he had the sweat to prove it.

Teeny Tiny Tooth

Last time we went to the orthodontist he told us he would put brackets on the new teeth just barely poking through the gums. Well, he wasn't kidding. The tooth on her left had come down enough that it was no big deal fitting a bracket on, but the one on her right seemed impossible. BUT because she has good dental habits (woot! woot!) her gums were healthy enough to be lifted allowing the bracket to be fastened. We celebrated with a shake and some fries that she ended up not wanting to eat because her teeth were sore. I can't imagine why.

I think we had another three comments on her lashes today. If I had a dollar for every time we heard that!! Maybe we could pay for these braces!

At least it didn't hurt to lick the ketchup. 

Crying Mama

Got this ready today to use next week in primary. Crying Mama cries happy tears when she hears beautiful singing.