Superheroes & UP

What a busy weekend! It was nice to have back-to-back 3-day weekends, but this coming weekend is going to suck, being only 2 days. Oh well. Friday was spent mostly getting ready for the party, but I did find time to get a mani/pedi (which, I’m thinking it had probably been about 4 years – LONG overdue). I also found time to sneak in a trip to the LOFT (hey, I had a gift card and 2 rewards certificates – they were burning a hole in my pocket!) We had used Visa points to get some Lowe’s gift cards, and Josh went & got us a new grill, and he also got us a misting fan for outside. It’s AWESOME!! You just attach it to your hose & it blows a fine mist as it oscillates. Highly recommend this fan. That afternoon we took the Spiderman cupcakes to Zachary’s class. I have not had a chance to upload pictures yet but hope to so that very soon (and when I do, I’ll just let you know & there will be a link over to Shutterfly, so I don’t have to post them in both places). You’ll notice when you look at the pictures that the kids are wearing pj’s again – I promise they do not have pj day every day there. It probably just seems that way because anytime I go in for a party & take pictures it’s what they are wearing. Zachary was so excited – they said he didn’t even come close to taking a nap because he was so excited. Apparently he kept asking all day if it was 3:00 yet (that was when we told him we were coming).

On Saturday we spent the morning setting up for the party. Rather than just have the kids run around the back yard with nothing organized for them to do, I decided to have some superhero crafts. There was a superhero badge table, a superhero mask table, superhero t-shirts, and superhero tattoos. Although it looked like most of the kids were just wearing the masks plain, and I think most of the t-shirts were made by the parents (with a couple of exceptions). About halfway through the party we did another activity. Josh had this brilliant idea to go dress up in his scary Halloween mask & multi-colored clown wig, and come out to the party as a “bad guy”. I had armed each child with a can of silly string (I told them it was their web shooter…) and told them that when the bad guy showed up they needed to spray him with their web until he was down. When it was time, there comes Josh in mask & wig (complete with plastic sword) growling & yelling. Most of the kids began to spray him, but then I looked over and Zachary was in tears, running for my mom. Oops…Yeah, he was not so much a big fan of that. We both sat there & told him that it was just Daddy, but he did not like that. I hope he will not be scarred for life now! Later his buddy Cameron said that he wasn’t scared because he is a brave boy. Then we put out the piñata. We opted for the safer (yet much less exciting) route of just pulling the strings instead of beating it with a stick. After that we had the cake. Zachary was all excited because it was the same cake his friend Grant had at his birthday party last month. And I have to say, it was the ugliest cake I have ever bought…It was all black & gray…yuck. But it had Spiderman on it and that was what he wanted. We sang Happy Birthday and then he & his little friend John (remember the Bromance?) blew out the candles. What? Yes, John helped. Not sure why, but Zachary seemed excited that his friend had helped him (which is weird – most kids are really possessive about blowing out their own candles…even the Gosselins re-lit the candles on their cake 6 times so each child could blow them out by themselves).

Yesterday was Zachary’s actual birthday. We decided to go out for breakfast (something we hardly ever do, usually because we’re headed to church). Later in the morning we left Liam at home with Josh’s parents so we could take Zachary to see UP. This was the first time he’s seen a movie in a theater. He did pretty well, but I’m not sure the movie really kept his attention. Josh & I liked it – it was a really good movie. But it didn’t have any superheroes or cars – just an old man & a chubby kid. Not exactly exciting stuff for a 4-year-old I guess. I think he enjoyed the experience though. After Liam got up, we decided to try out the pool (I think I had previously mentioned that during the winter they took out the chlorine filtration system & replaced it with saltwater – I was NOT excited about this). Well, I have to say it was not bad. It didn’t have that chemical smell, and (as weird as it may sound) I even licked my hand once or twice to see if it tasted salty. Which it didn’t but then that got me to wondering again how it could be clean if it didn’t taste like salt or chemicals. It will either remain a mystery, or we will all contract e-coli. We’ll keep you posted.

So all in all a fun weekend. But now I have a terrible cold, and could have used a day to rest up & recuperate from the festivities. We crammed a lot into just a few days. It was worth it though. I still can’t believe that Zachary is 4. Crazy.