Pirate Camp

 

I got behind on my "summer camp" post.  I will post one a week till they are all caught up.  We did finish them!  Just finding time to blog with three kids home was rather difficult. But eventually the links will be filed all nice and neat, so you can reference them.  If you ever want to do your own pirate camp.

 

The night before I set up a treasure chest, pirate clothes and make a treasure hunt.

 

When they woke up I instuctued them to put on their pirate clothes and follow the directions on the treasure hunt map

 

Each map lead them to another map and each map had a pirate toy sitting on top of it

 

Once they had found all three "treasures"  the note said "Now go play with pirates"

 

On the kitchen table I had all of their pirate toys set up and ready to play with

 

This was our first day of pirate camp!

This can't happen every day.....

 

My brother came to visit from Virgina Beach and we had a really nice time visiting with him at my moms house.  Then it was time to go, the first day of school was the next day.   I start the task of loading up three children.  I load the diaper bag, ask the older kids to get shoes on, and collect all of our belongings.  We had borrowed my moms car & she had borrowed my van so I began switching back vehicles. 

 

Somewhere in the mist of this Noah runs through a pile of ants.  Hm no shoes?  Go figure.  So hes screaming "AHH ANTS! ANTS!  It hurts, It Hurts!"  My brother and my grandmother were trying to comfort him and all I had was some ice tea, so I poured it on his foot.   First I decided between Ice Tea and Coke and decided that Ice tea would be the better, less sticky option.   I kind of forget my brother is watching me while all this goes on, keep that in mind as your reading.  So I pretend that ice tea is like a magic fix to an ant bite.  "Really it still hurts?  Well just give it a few min, it should kick in soon"

 

So the ant thing calms down, I ask again "Go get on your shoes"  they run off - one would presume they were running off to get shoes.  Well I get the baby, get him strapped in the van and about this time we realise we don't have the keys to the van.  Mom does, and she ran off to the store. 

 

Well this is terrific.  So we decide to take her car home, leave the baby with grampa and they will bring us our van and the baby.  Time to switch cars!  Whoo-hoo excitement.  So I switch the cars back.  Now, where are those kids, you know the ones with their shoes?  Oh ya, one has his shoes on. 

 

I'm sitting in the car with it running, Noah in the back seat, talking to Michael, and waiting on Wes and Eli.  Wes comes I say "Hey wheres Eli?"  Wes says "I think hes coming, just getting his shoes on"  Here comes Eli.  Does he have his shoes on?  Take a guess, we don't call him "Eli Noshoe Murdock" for no reason.  So Wes gets out of the car to go help Eli find his shoes.

 

Michael and I are looking at each other like "man this is crazy"  and just about that time Noah pipes up from the backseat

 

"Hey Uncle Michael" 

"Ya Buddy"

"Your going to be sacrificed later"

 

Both Michael and I look at each other like "what the crap was that?"

 

"Noah - buckle up" I say.  I mean what else do you say when your child tells your brother hes going to be sacrificed?  That seemed like an appropriate response.  So here come Wes and Eli, thank the Lord, we do have our first day of school tomorrow.  We buckle up and drive home to finish last min preparations for school and get the kids to bed at a decent hour.

 

Later as Michael is recapping this story to my mom he says "Everyday can't be like that for her"

 

Oh Michael, if you only knew. 

 



Baby of the Corn

 

I was looking for some balls to add to my ball pit, but was having no luck.  Then I saw a 50lb bag of corn.  Terrific!

 

Micha and I ran home and dumped it in our "sensory pool"  I added some measuring cups for dumping

 

Because corn is a choking hazard, I sat in the pool with him.  When he would start to bring his hands to his mouth I said "no mouth" and moved his hands away.  He loved it!

 

He moved his legs the whole time we were in the corn listening to the crunching sound it made on the plastic.

 I would cover his feet in corn & then he would move them till he could see his toes again

 This lasted 30 min.  He would have stayed in longer, but it was time for me to feed him.

 when we were done I cleaned all the corn off of him and checked his diaper for any that had snuck in.  We will be doing this again soon

Papa's 80th Birthday Party - PIC Heavy

 

My grandfather just had his 80th birthday party.  And we decorated the tables with different themes from his life.  Hes liked a lot of things & had a lot of hobbies

 

We did a three tier cake from the Sugar Mama, representing the three Biggest parts of his life.  The Navy, being a barber and his faith

 



When he was 17 he raced motorcycles

 



 

He loves to golf & at one point in his life was really into growing roses

 



 

He was really into NASA and the space program & collected space patches

 



 

If you know my grandfather, you know he loves the 4th of July.  He leads the 4th of July parade in his neighborhood

 



 

Taking pictures was also another big hobby of my grandfathers.

 



 

A good shot of the cake table

And all the pretty cupcakes

 

When my parents were married, my grandmother on my fathers side, knew a man who did drawings.  He did a sketch of my grandfather as a barber & with a camera that my grandfather used on all his business cards.  It became his little logo.  For the party a good friend of my grandmothers changed it to fit all the centerpieces.

 

Clarence the cake topper - Party Man

 

 

Clarence the Motorcycle Man

Clarence the Gardner

 

Clarence "Mr. Independence

 

Faith Table

Navy table

Barber table

Camera table

Clarence LOVES Christmas

AND Baseball

Clarence the Golfer

All the papas!

 



 

Barber

Family Man

Papa and some guest

 

He spotted Michael

 

Suprise!

 

The three of us together!

Camera check

Three kids and mom

Mom and Emery

I have an idea, lets take a family photo - shot one

Shot two - lets try again, Micah was not looking

Shot three - Eli Next time be normal

 

Shot 4 - Really guys - please just look at the camera and smile

Shot 5 - I mean how hard is this?

Shot 6 - we said be normal and look at the camera

Shot 7 - Okay, um maybe we got one

 

At this time I cant figure out how to get my grandfathers speach uploaded, it may be too long to send to youtube.  Not sure.  I will keep working on it.  Here are some of the other speeches of what people had to say about him.

 

Happy Birthday PAPA!!!