A "Super" Party for a super kid

For those of you who are unaware, Lincoln is pretty much obsessed with everything Mario. He loves to play the games on the Wii (Super Mario Brothers and Mario Kart), he would wear a Mario shirt every day if he owned that many, and he can spot Mario from very far away. So when I started thinking about his birthday, I knew it needed to be revolved around his love for Mario. Sadly, there isn't a lot out there right now in terms of Mario, and even a search online doesn't bring up much. (Enough to get the creative juices flowing and allow for some purchases of items, but no all in one stop for ideas and supplies)

The first thing we had to do was put together an invitation, so I used some images I found online and some Photoshop magic to put a little something together.

There has to be party games of course, but since its 100+ degrees outside, we didn't want to spend the whole time out there unless it was in the pool. And the inside of the house is a little small for the large number of family and friends t

hat would be joining us. So we kept them to a minimal, but I still think the kids had fun. Here are the games we played-

Yoshi Egg Hunt- I found some plastic Easter Eggs in April that reminded me of the Yoshi eggs on the game, so we filled them up with candy and coins and hid them in the yard. We limited the kids to how many they could find to keep it fair, and then also gave a prize to the person who hadthe most coins inside the eggs they found.

Goomba Stomp: We bought brown balloons and added plastic coins inside of them in different amounts prior to blowing them up. Once they were inflated, I added a printed out image of the Goomba to the balloon. For the game, we had all the kids stand in a circle and then dumped them all out into the center . They had a great time trying to break ope

n the balloons by stomping on them. Once again the person who collected the most coins received a small prize.

Chain Chomper Pinata: With a little pain and some paper we turned a soccer ball pinata into a chain chomper,

chain and all. Justin did an awesome job putting this guy together and the kids had a great time trying to break him open!

We also put together some pretty fun party favors if I do say so myself. I wanted to make boxes that looked like the question mark boxes on the game, but found some awesome yellow colored chinese food cartons at Party City that I think turned out great. Not exactly square, but so much less work!

I then found some inexpensive water bottles that I personalized with a variety of Mario Brothers characters.

As well as some funny straws that I did the same thing with. But I think the hit of the party was the life size Mario that my Mother made for us. It turned out great!!

I didn't make the cake myself, with just coming back form camp and preparing to leave again for my tech conference, I took the easy way out and ordered the cake instead. I did create the image that we used to print and place on the cake, but I let some one else do the baking. I feel a little guilty about that, but I don't think he will hold it against me in the long run.

Girls Camp

Wow! I can't believe it's over! Thankfully, the week went great. The weather was nice overall, a little chilly the first night (okay it was downright cold) and a bit of wind on Tuesday (okay it blew a few tents over), but we all come out of it fine. We all stayed dry and that is the best blessing of all, because in my mind camping in the rain is the worst.

It was a pretty nonstop week, from the Stake Activity to the Hikes and the Certification Relay, we kept the girls going. Which I think is a great way to have peaceful nights! :)

I was in charge of creating the after camp video, which turned ou

t good I think. It is about 20 minutes long though so I am not going to post it here, but I think it showcased the week pretty well if I do say so myself!

It was our first really big event as the new Young Women's Stake Presidency. We had a great time getting to know the girls and each other.

Making Memories on Memorial Day

What better way to celebrate Memorial day than to spend time with family enjoying one of America's favorite past times- swimming. Sadly we have had a few blustery days prior to the holiday so the water was a little chilly. Ok, it wasn't just chilly it was down right freezing! But we swam even though our skin was turning red from the cold not the heat!

And the kids swam for a surprisingly long time considering it was so cold. And I still managed to get a pretty decent sunburn which is no surprise. But it looks like Lincoln might take after his Daddy, I think the little man is going to have a pretty good tan line by the time this summer is over!

Baseball Fanatic

My little man has been obsessed with baseball lately. He loves to throw the balls, hit the balls, find the balls, etc. Pretty much he loves the ball part of baseball. So we took him to the 51's baseball game. He had a great time, although a 9 inning baseball was a little long for a 2 year old. Thankfully, the stadium realizes that kids need a place to run off a little steam so there is a grassy knoll that they open for families. Lincoln and I spent quite a bit of time there! :) But he had a blast acting like a big kid, running around trying to join into the different games the older kids were playing.

We were lucky enough to have awesome seats- (thanks Grandma and Grandpa Worthen) so we were close to the action. And had a perfect view of the fireworks that they set off after the game was over. Overall, it was a great time. But if we do it again, we might pass on the first few innings of the game! :)

You have a what for me??

You know how sometimes you figure that having two callings is pretty safe. You figure there isn't much else they could ask you to do. Heck, you don't really feel like you are living up to your potential in the callings you have. And then as you are already rushing to a meeting that starts in 5 minutes you miss a text from a member of the Stake Presidency, asking if they can meet with your and your husband right after said meeting. And since you don't respond he tracks you down at said meeting to see what can be worked out. You think nothing of it really until you truly read the text and see that they want to extend a calling to you. at first you think they must mean your husband is getting a new calling, but then you read it again and realize it is you they want to extend a calling to. But you still don't really think much about it because you already have a stake calling as an Assistant Stake Camp director. You try to call your husband to see if he can run down, but there is no answer. And the meeting has already started so you need to focus on that, and by the time he responds it has already been decided that the counselor in the stake presidency will just come to your house instead. So you drive like a mad woman to drop off a computer you had to coax back to life to your father and then still arrive before your preisthood leaders. So spend a good 15 minutes wondering what in the world is going on, only to have an epiphany as soon as you see who arrives with the counselor. And when they ask you to be the secretary in the new Stake Young Women's Presidency you are speechless but not completely surprised. And after some one sided conversation in your head as you move through all the reasons why you are not cut out to accept this calling, you accept it anyway. And then you are not allowed to tell anyone until Stake Conference that the call has been extended, so they are all about as shocked as you were when your name is called in Conference. Well, if you have ever had this happen then you know how I feel right now! Totally and completely overwhelmed and underqualified for such a position. And the crazy thing is I wasn't released from either of my other two callings :) So if I thought I was busy before, I guess I haven't seen anything yet!!

Love is in the Air

We traveled to Denver this weekend to celebrate the marriage of my cousin Chantelle. We are so excited for her and this new step in her life. We were a little afraid that none of the cousins on my Dad's side would ever decide to tie the knot!

Justin, Lincoln, and I flew into Denver on Thursday and my Mom joined us on Friday. The Temple Sealing was on Saturday with a reception after. It was a great time. We filled some of the hours by taking Lincoln to the park, hanging out at GiGi's playing with blocks, and seeing family.

The trip was a little more interesting than I would like when I realized late Friday night that I had forgotten to grab my temple recommend out of my temple bag. Luckily, I happen to have an awesome member of the stake presidency that was able to call the temple and get me a pass :)

Our garden

We planted a garden this spring, here is the first fruits of our labor!