Minecraft!

We thought that since the Wii dance party had been a big hit, we'd try another technological interest! As soon as I floated the idea of using Minecraft for the next church family event, the girls were all in favour! Their enthusiasm was promising and I talked to Julie about it and she was immediately on board as well and found some great table decorations plus a great big wearable creeper head! A friend of mine had used a Minecraft theme for her son's bday recently so I got some good ideas for party snacks from her and looked to Pinterest for decorations!

It was a lot of work and I may or may not have blown the budget but the room looked fabulous when the kids all arrived! I got there early and started putting balloons and things up. Julie & I had done a bit of decorating the night before but there's always the last minute stuff plus the food to set out.

Everything was awesome! One mom asked if we had any other games/activities lined up and when I admitted we didn't, she said "that's great! My daughter only wants to play Minecraft and she was afraid you'd make them stop to do other stuff!"  Until the kids all fired up their iPods/Pads/androids and could NOT get their games to join up. It was instant panic and stress! (and the kids were upset too!) THIS was NOT my department. THIS was the part that was supposed to take care of itself. I'd talked to my IT guy about having so many devices on the church wifi at the same time, no concerns there, and checked that off my list! We had more kids at this party than any other that I can remember! It had looked so promising, and did I mention the fabulous food and decor???? It was supposed to be fun and everything perfect!!! Everyone was going to go home and say our party was lame!!! The horrors!!!

Eventually Murray and Dale got things working so they could play but connections kept dropping and it didn't go as planned. I was upset but Dale cheered me up when he told me he overheard one little guy say:

"This minecraft party is awesome!!! I wish they'd have one EVERY week!!!"

and another boy had to leave early so the mom could get his sister to dance lessons and he was almost in tears he was so upset to go before it was over!

I talked to the kids on the way home and they all said it wasn't what they'd imagined but they'd still liked it and had a good time and would like to do it again. By the next day the sense of dismal failure had passed and I decided that our record breaking attendance was nothing to be disappointed in. Teena pointed out that to those who didn't know exactly what to expect were perfectly happy and it only seemed worse to me because I'd had a plan in mind. Those that didn't know the plan didn't care! and that's why she's my BFF! She fixes everything!   mmmmmwah!

Game ON!

Sunday night was dubbed "family game night" and we played an entertaining round of Creationary. I am officially awful at Lego. Just for the record! I managed to cobble together a butterfly with several pieces, none of which touched. I'm pretty sure that's NOT how Lego is supposed to work. Regardless, I got the point for my "creation"! Based on the volume of the laughter, I'd say everyone had a good time!

Hockey Star!

It's almost the end of hockey season and interest is flagging all round! Even Murray has almost had his fill of ice times and running back & forth to rinks. This weekend the girls had a few games and by last evening, Honey had had enough. She did NOT want to go. But when she heard Grammie & Grandad were coming to watch, she decided she'd lace up and hit the ice after all.

Good thing she did! At the end of the game, the coach awarded her a mini stick for "Player of the Game". We're not sure what she did that caught his eye but it certainly perked her right up and was the highlight of her year. She's not sure she'll sign up again in the fall but was certainly riding high on this last night. After he gave it to her they all headed for the dressing room and she just sat and stared at the stick in awe and almost looked a little teary eyed. They had a great game, won 8-5! It was their first win in MONTHS!

When we got home, she had some celebratory ice cream on our new "special day" plate that I painted at on our recent visit to Pottery Palace. She was quite pleased to be the first to use it, especially since she hadn't eaten her supper and never made it to the dessert round!

Hockey Night in Canada

Ok so it was a day game but hey, why mess with a good title???

The girls actually had 2 games today, one in the morning and another mid afternoon today. The morning one was with their regular team and this afternoon was the girls' team. They ended up losing both games but seemed to enjoy both. The 2nd game took a lot out of them as they didn't have quite enough skaters for two shifts, so they were on the ice A LOT! They were missing their older players this afternoon and the other team was not! The scorekeepers are kind in this league and hold the scores at a 3 goal lead so I'm not sure what the real final score was but we did have two goals in the end!

Sweetie spent some time at Tulip's house for the morning game while I was at my class at the gym this morning and came home for lunch and to get ready for the game. We ended up getting to the rink quite early and as it turned out, complex was next door to Teena's mom's house! Since we had time to kill anyway, Sweetie & I walked over and had a little visit until it was time for the game to begin. She was surprised to find us on our doorstep but seemed to welcome the diversion to undecorating her tree!

We got home from the game right at supper time and upheld another Canadian tradition, beans & wieners on Saturday night! We jazzed it up with Honey's homemade brown bread in the breadmaker. She was pleased when I announced we were eating HER bread for dinner :)

After dinner Lovey did her violin and then we had movie night & snacks! Mmmm mmmm!!! Needless to say they fell asleep fast tonight and I think I'm ready to do the same!

Girls' Game!

Yesterday the girls had their first game with the girls' team they've been working/practicing/training (whatever you call it...) with all season. They usually mostly do drills and not much actual game play. Honey has been quite excited for this event and it's been cancelled a couple of times so by Saturday she was completely psyched up! Lovey was looking forward to it but had a few little games during her week of hockey camp so wasn't as hyped up.

With no knowledge of game rules (positions? where do I go??? offside? whaaa???) other than what Murray managed to throw at them in the dressing room before the start, they hit the ice and managed to stay upright more often than not!

Their team ended up winning 6-5 and they really enjoyed themselves!

 Grandad maintaining his position so he could get a picture of Honey if she got a goal!

 and she sure tried!!!

guess whose kids won "best posed player of the game?"

Game One

Today was game day! Lovey had been looking forward to this all week and was pretty pumped up! The other 2 weren't quite as excited as she was but they did enough cheering to be annoying to the unfortunate souls sitting near us LOL

I'm not sure how much they explained to them in hockey school about the rules but we never went over any with her. I wasn't sure if she'd even know where to skate to when she went on. She floated around the ice for the warm up laps, enthusiastically smiling & waving to us each time she passed our section. Then the buzzer went and the keeners bombed over to the bench and were the first in the line up. Lovey got to their door just as the first shift was hitting the ice and was then part of the last shift. I was a bit nervous for her as I saw the first shift fly onto the ice, smoothly circling around, zipping into their positions!! How could she keep up with THAT??!?!? But Murray reminded me that the fastest ones on our bench would be on with the fastest ones on the blue team bench and as it went down the line, the slower the skaters and should all work out fairly evenly. (and of course it did).

The other team was quite a bit stronger overall but the scorekeepers were very kind and kept the difference in goals at a difference of 3 points at all times LOL. Blue team stayed at 5 goals until red team "tied" it up and then they stopped again at 8 goals. 

I was surprised that there was a girl goalie on each team. There were more boys overall than girls, but there were several girls playing. One day the university women's team came to do the coaching and Murray said they spent a lot of time with Lovey, helping her practice and encouraging her. She thought that was pretty cool!

Today, we ran into another family who had a baby in the NICU while we were there and had a chance to catch up with them which was neat! Their NICU baby was playing on the blue team and is in his 2nd year of hockey.

Lovey's team ended up losing the game but she enjoyed the whole thing regardless and was happy to have us there to watch her. :))) If you count Beanie Boos, she definitely had the biggest fan base!

By the time we got movie night done, she was a tired little player and is sleeping very soundly now!!!