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!

Snow Picnic

To avoid a whole week of sitting and watching tv/playing on iPods, I thought we'd try a snow picnic! We phoned the neighbours, rounded up Miss E and Tulip and packed our grub and headed for the woods! We weren't very far in when they started asking "how much further!?!?!?" and "I'm thirsty" started even before that. I held them off til we got to the beaver dam and then we set out the feast. Of course, that's exactly when the biting wind picked up and gave us all instant frostbite! Ok not quite but it was COLD!

We decided to retreat into the trees and found a sheltered spot and started over. It wasn't long before our fingers chilled and our drinks froze in our glasses so we didn't linger! The way back over the pond was a wide open area and the wind had blown the snow in over Murray's trail. It was harder going since we couldn't use his packed surface so the kids took turns being the trailblazer and forging the new path. It was very organized and I was impressed! 

We took a shortcut once we got closer to the road and came home to find Boo waiting for us! She'd brought her skates again but we needed to get the chill out of our bones so we had a Minecraft break before lacing up and heading back out to the rink. 

Teena and I were able to have a nice visit and get lots of chatting in!