church picnic

our church had their 10th anniversary picnic today.  i had to go up to the church for a vbs orientation meeting (i am volunteering since they offer childcare for the littles of volunteers - sweet!)  so matt and the kids met me there when the picnic got rolling.  there was some concern that i was going to rain, but the weather actually was perfect.  it was cloudy so you couldn't get too much sun and there was a strong breeze to keep things cool.  matt and the kids got there right as things were getting started so we didn't have to wait in super long lines.  

we started with the caricature because they did such a nice job last year that i knew we wanted one of all four. i told matt he could hang it in his office at work.  isn't it so cute?!  i thought she did a great job of capturing all four.

manning was a happy boy for the first hour or so, but then he didn't like the food options or waiting in line and it just went down hill.  he was really excited to be sitting in the front of the double stroller.  it was the first time he had sat up there and he liked being able to see all of the action.

next we did face painting.  another advantage of multiple kids is that as each one was finished being drawn, they would go get in the next line.  we were split in lines a lot of the time.

a lion

maddux jumped in the bounce house for the first time and liked it!

manning spent a lot of time giving me 'kisses'.

mason would not go down the slide today.  he has been on these slides many, many times and loves them but he would not come down - maybe because it was outside and so windy - so matt had to go up and make him slide down.

then matt took the kids to get some snow cones to eat while we waited in the slowest line - balloon animals.  we had waited in this line for about 30 minutes after face painting but heard someone say it would be hard to carry them and keep them from popping the rest of the time so we went off to have lunch (not vegan - at all).

so we waited, and waited, and waited.  manning was loosing it so matt took him to the van in the hope that he would fall asleep.  about an hour later we were only three back in the line.  matt called from the van so that i could hear manning screaming his head off.  we had already waited so long and were finally so close that we decided to trade.  i would go nurse manning in the hopes of calming him down and matt would wait in line with the kids.

here are their finished 'animals'.  mason got spider-man, madelyn a pony and maddux got a pirate sword.

such a wonderful free family event.  the kids had a great time and i was thinking about how much they already loved church and how this was just icing on the top.  in fact, when they got there, madelyn said she thought that they were just going to church and she was already excited before even seeing the picnic set up.  we are very blessed to be at this church at this point in our lives.  they really have a focus on the word of God.  we are looking forward to getting more involved.  love.