Boondocks

Shane's mom, Karen, turned 51 this past Wednesday.  They took everyone to Boondocks to celebrate!  We'd never been there, but I'd heard good things about it, so I was excited to show the kids the place.

After pizza, cake, and ice cream, we started out with mini-golfing. 

Shane helping Kaden

 Two holes in, Lexi was bored and wanted to be done.  I can't say I blame her...golfing is the most boring "sport" in history.  So, I took her to the bumper boats, but it was super windy, which made it really, really cold and I didn't want to get wet.  (Mostly because I knew Lexi would be whiny the rest of the night if she was even slightly wet.)  I convinced her to try the bumper/race cars instead.  She technically wasn't tall enough, but the guy didn't stop us....  ;)

Eventually, all the girls had to go potty, so the rest of us went inside and Shane stayed outside with Kaden and did the bumper boats and race track.  There is arcade-type stuff to do inside (like a super expensive Chuck-E-Cheese).

The kids were all obsessed with the motorcycles.

Cute Ryley!

 

He loves posing and it cracks me up.

Roller balls!  Perfect size for the little kids.

The birthday girl bowling!

Shane had to go get Ari's ball.

Val helping Ryley.

Trying to show Ari how to roll the ball as opposed to throw it.

Kaden would get a running start and chuck the ball really hard.

Posing again

Ryley and Ari hugging

More motorcycles

It was a really fun night and the kids had a blast!  They got some cheap-y toys with their token ticket things and fell asleep on the way home.  :)

Happy 30th to Shane!

Since I had done Shane's surprise party the week before, I didn't really have anything planned for his actual birthday.  Especially because I had to work that evening.  We did our usual for lunch (Red Robin) and Shane let each of the kids get a ball out of the "vending" machine thingy.

Happy birthday!!

Oh my gosh she's SO stinkin' cute!!

They give you a free mud pie for your birthday and our kids devoured it!!  I barely had time to take a picture before it was gone!

Nom, nom, nom

I ended up getting a call from my boss while we were there and she told me not to worry about coming in since it was my husband's birthday.  :)  Which ended up being perfect because my best friend, M, invited us to her family's craw fish boil for dinner!  I tried craw fish and shrimp!!  Shane had tried craw fish before when someone brought it into work, but I knew this stuff would be waaay more fresh than what he'd tried.  He really liked it and we had a great time!  It was a great, relaxing day for Shane.

Almost there!

We're almost done with soccer this season!!

Ari was loving playing with sticks in her new outfit.

My mom and Kent came to the game. Lexi's my cuddlebug!

You can see the bruise a little bit better in this one.

Kaden's expression here is hilarious.

One more game to go!!

Random

A couple of weeks ago, Ari decided to continue jumping from chair to chair in the kitchen after I'd repeatedly told her not to.  Just as I predicted, she fell off.  BUT she fell off face first.

That's her finger that she just HAD to have on camera.  But see the bruise by her eye? :(

I've tried to be better about couponing and ad matching lately, and I saw this in the Macey's ad last week:

Those are the meatiest tortillas I've ever seen!  hahaha

Kaden's preschool does all of the summer birthdays in May (plus the May birthdays), so he's been coming home with all sorts of goodies every single time he has class.  He hasn't taken this mask off:

My little superhero

SURPRISE!!

For months I've been planning Shane's surprise 30th birthday party.  Ever since January I've been planning and plotting.  

I let myself "forget" the fact that Shane said not to do a surprise party for him...  ;)

About six weeks ago, I emailed everyone and their dog to invite them to his party. (His real birthday isn't until next week.)  Everything came together really nicely.  I decided to do pulled pork, but instead of 15 lbs like I should have, I got 30.  And cooked it all.

I wanted to have enough!

I tried fitting 5.77 lbs of pork loin into my teeny, tiny crockpot the night before the party.  

It didn't go well.

Cutting off the string around it.  It looked like a lobster tail.

It took some squeezing, but we got it all in....kind of.  :)

Long story short, I left the meat in overnight (I started it late at night) and woke up at 4:00 AM to find the juices in the crockpot had overflowed.  ALL. OVER. I spent an hour and a half shredding the pork, then had to Clorox wipe everything down, then mop cause it was still sticky.  What better way is there to start the day?

A few decorations

I special ordered the cake.  I wanted it to be Lord of the Rings themed and knew I couldn't make one that would look as nice as this one turned out.

Fairy elvish writing

Tilt your head to the right.  That's how the evil eye is supposed to look.

I need to get a better picture of Shane's face.

 He was honestly 100% surprised!!  I'm awesome!

We ate lunch (which everyone helped out by bringing stuff), then Shane opened some presents before we busted out the cake and brownies and ice cream.

Shane loved the cake!

It was really fun and Shane enjoyed himself!

P.S. Kelly: thank you so, so, so, so, so, soooo much!!  You were a huge help!  

I couldn't have done this without you!