Odd how it Even's out

Some years we exhaust ourselves with one outing after another.  Partying from sun up to sun down.

Decorating without abandon and dressing up with party hats.

Then some years we relax.

Play at the park.

Take it easy.

And make a most unelaborate cake with candles stuck in the birthday boys piece after it's been cut and served.

Must be an odd year thing.

But it 'even's' out.

Dreaming of Summer Bliss

The first day of Spring arrived, blue skies, tulips emerging, a backyard hot dog roast and an afternoon outside resulted in some sunburned arms and happy people.  

The next day an inch of snow covered the ground.

Easter Sunday was the end of a four day spring break of delightful weather and relaxation.

Monday morning brought a drastic drop in temperature and .... more dreaded snow.

Soooo.. to combat.  

We remember summer days of bliss and contentment. 

An impromptu game of baseball at the ranch.

This is the all new workout regime that is making headlines!!

The Can Crusher.

A fabulous upper body workout.

It can be done solo or with your exercise partner. 

Best of all... water play.

(pants apparently optional)

It's the Year of the Monkey

Although it feels like it's always the year of the monkeys around here.. It's officially the year of the Monkey according to the Chinese zodiac.

For Cub Scouts we had our Blue and Gold Banquet and chose to celebrate the Chinese New Year.

At my district meeting I had been asked to come up with an idea to share for a Blue and Gold Banquet.  With the date of the banquet in February I thought the Chinese New Year would be fun.   My partner chose an Angry Bird's theme.  However she broke her foot and wasn't able to do hers but it was already on the schedule so the kids and I took on the Angry Bird one as well... Yes it was as much fun to plan an Angry Bird Party as it sounds!  We presented our ideas to the district leaders and had a lot of fun.  The leaders of my own pack saw that I already had everything planned out for a banquet and decided to use the Chinese New Year since I'd already planned it out for them.  We had a blast.

The only problem I ran into was that I could stop coming up with great ideas and had to stop at some point.

Setting up for the banquet was fun and it turned out well.  We dimmed the lights and had our glow stick Chinese Kirigami lanterns strung for fun lighting.  

Each table was ready for our evening.  We served Mandarin orange chicken, with ham fried rice, and egg rolls.  All eaten with chopsticks of course!  

For dessert we had a Chinese dragon cake.  Thanks to Miles for making him look authentic.  (He looked like a snake when I had finished.  Miles added a tail, some feet and tweaked the scales)

By far the best game of the night was a game we stole from my Angry Birds plans.  We had a 3 man slingshot to launch our monkeys at the target.  A calendar on the wall.  We were sending the monkey into the new year.

At the end of the evening when it was all cleaned up we went home pleased.  We also went home with leftover food and lanterns.  The boys immediately strung them up in their room and went to bed with the glow of the lanterns welcoming in the new year!