Color Me Rad 2013

I heard about the color races a couple of years ago, and always wanted to try one. So this year, Janie and I scrounged up some tickets and decided to give it a try. Let me just say - YOU HAVE TO DO THIS NEXT YEAR!!  

It was one of the most fun things I've done in a long time. The race is not even a real race... as in, they don't time you. The only reason why you have numbers is so that you can look up the photos they take of you online. And you can turn around at any point! So if you want to take your kids, you don't have to go the whole 5K if they can't make it. Or you can push a stroller. I saw tons of kids, strollers, walkers, runners, didn't matter - it was all for fun!

I am taking all of us next year - it was fantastic. 

I had to go get our packets early, and here is the truck... I thought it was cool.

I got pretty into it, and I didn't want to be left out, so I bought us a whole pile of stuff - yes those are knee-high socks and headbands...  Lots of people ran in crazy clothes and huge tutus - all sorts of stuff.. They give everyone sunglasses, which is great for the color dust that they throw. But the dust is not so bad - I was prepared for it to get in my nose, mouth, and eyes, but it didn't - it was really no big deal - only fun...

The people on the side toss colored cornstarch on you clothes as you pass through all of the color zones - here's the pink one. 

Here's a shot of the race - see how the people on the right are going and those on the left are coming back? Really, anyone could turn around at any point. All you would miss is a couple of color zones...

Look who surprised me at the finish line!! JB was all about getting some color on herself... Beckham thought it was just plain weird. he wasn't about to touch the stuff...

Here's our before & after shot!! We got pretty messy!! See you there next year!!

St Paddy's Day Weekend

Last year I completely forgot about St. Paddy's Day. I couldn't believe it went by without my even realizing it. Well, Jane Bradley realized it the next day and made us wear all green as a family anyway. A day late. So we did because we had been promising a green day coming up and when you're 5, you don't care what the date is. 

Well, this year, we made up for it. See following photo. We woke up in the morning with big parade-like plans. We dressed in our St. Paddy's Day finest, and headed out.

We picked up Jay-Jay on the way there because she's very similar to having your own personal portable theme park. She injects super-human amounts of fun into everything. So we love it when she's in town. (She's moving back here in a week and we are OVER THE MOON excited!)

We watched a little parade...

Rode a few rides...

Walked around in our green hats and green spraypainted hair...

Some of us played in the fountain...

And played "don't step on the crack" games with Jay-Jay... Who can make even waiting around on a sidewalk fun...

Slid down the jumbo-slide a few times...

All in all - we more than made up for missing it last year. Until we tried to leave early and Brad found out that his too-good-to-be-true parking place was, in fact, too good to be true. It was inside the parade route boundary. So we had to wait for OVER AN HOUR inside our car while the rest of the parade drove by and the kids watched a movie in the car and we were all late to the next party we had to get to. 

At least the morning was fun! And we learned our lesson about the parking - the people under the bridge are not nuts for parking there.  We will be joining the hikers next year :)

Spring Break Staycation - pt. 3 Bowling

Another night of Spring Break we decided to test out our family's bowling skills. It was so cool because at Fannin Lanes you can program each player with or without bumpers. 

Let me just say, Beckham LOVES to bowl. Almost as much as he loves to pretend to play the motorcycle racing game at the arcade right behind the bowling lanes - which is where we kept finding him after we realized he was lost about 5 times. 

Brad beat us all - but that's not unusual... at every sport.

One of the most fun parts was that Aunt Jay-Jay came to join the fun and show us all the ways it can be done... She's a pretty good bowler!!

Then Brad took Beckham to race motorcycles...

And we squeezed in a typical family photo... 

Spring Break Stay-cation - Part 2

Like I said, I spent a lot of time this Spring Break trying to think of ways to entertain the kids and myself. One night, I was warming up a normal, yet humdrum dinner, and I thought, "Man, I wish we were about to do something FUNNER than sit down and eat pork tenderloin at home." So then I called Brad and told him that I was packing up our dinner because we were going to the park. He could meet us there after work. The weather was gorgeous, and Brad was all like "Sounds like a plan." So we did. And it was definitely more fun this way. 

I really don't think the kids cared that we didn't leave town after all...

Spring Break Staycation pt. 1

Note to self: Plan something fun for Spring Break next year. I did not plan ahead so well this year, and we ended up staying home with nothing to do. So I had to get creative... It turned out that we had a little fun - not as much fun as the beach, but more fun than school, for sure... or so I'm told. Here's the story...

Day 1. It took about half minute before Jane Bradley was crazy bored. So I pulled out a cake mix and let her have at it. I helped her read the instructions, but that was about it... bought us a couple of hours at least!

Of course, licking the bowl is part of the privilege... 

Day 2: I called a last minute babysitter and threw the bigs in the car to meet some friends at the zoo. We had a fun time, and I met my quota for the Jackson zoo for the year :)

You know, you can see the Guh-jraffs - that's what Beckham calls them (and if anyone corrects him, I will never forgive you.) - right when you walk in the gate. I love this picture - because of the two that follow.

They both thought the giraffe smelled terrible. 

The animals were not as big of a hit as the huge, fake dinosaur eggs that they wanted to run in and out of.

I think this is a beaver exhibit? 

Of course, when you see fish up close, you make a fish face... 

Cotton candy is on JB's list of favorites. Beckham doesn't like it. He thinks it's just plain weird. 

We finished up the trip on the carousel. And he chose the tiger because, obviously, it's the fastest.

Carousel

 We played outside the rest of the afternoon. These pictures make me smile...