Our Beautiful Blessings!: Owen's Army Party!

Months and months ago I knew that I was going to do an Army party for Owen. I had been putting off making all the stuff for his party, but thankfully right before we got sick in December I got a bug under me and got busy designing the invitations and signs.

Of course when I scheduled the party I wasn't thinking that the Seahawks would go to the Playoffs. We've had the kids birthday parties on Sunday for quite a while now so it's just gotten to be a habit. It started back when Papa Martin was working at Wal-Mart and Sunday was his only guaranteed weekend day off. Now that he's retired it doesn't matter what weekend day we have the party on. I have been informed that from now on Owen's birthday party will be on a Saturday and even then we'll have to check the Playoff schedule since some of the games are played on Saturdays as well.

We normally set up tables and do the party and activities in the garage, but with the game on I knew that no one was going to be in the garage. So this year instead of hanging the birthday banner on the garage doors I decided to hang it on the fireplace mantle.

Sergeant Martin was all ready to go, but not all the kids had arrived yet. They were almost to halftime and you can see it on his face how well the game was going.

Right when the kids stepped through the door they saw the Enlistment Office.

This is where they signed their life over to the military and got their dog tags. It was so cute...in fact I have the piece of paper where they signed or made their mark on my frig.

Jackson got his dog tags and was ready to go. I bought the dog tags from Amazon months ago.

Josiah was so concentrating so hard at writing his name.

Ready and awaiting orders from Sergeant Martin. Then it was off to...

Boot Camp!!

Earlier in the day it was pouring out and we were not going to have the kids go out in that. I was getting nervous because we really didn't have a back-up plan at all. Michael said that he could bring a couple of the challenges into the garage, but thankfully when it was time it was just sprinkling and by the end the sun was out. Yay!!

The first challenge was Land Navigation where the kids had to repel down the stairs, climb the rock wall on the playhouse, slide down the slide, step through rungs on a ladder and then balance up a leaning beam. Sergeant Martin had a rope to use, but it was so rough he knew it would eat through the kids sweet hands so he opted for an extension cord instead. This part of boot camp was the scariest for most of the kids. Heck it was scary for me. There are 17 stairs to our backyard and there is a concrete pad at the bottom. You wouldn't be getting away unscathed if something went wrong.

Dominic and Donald were pros at this though. They knew just want to do...lean back! That made it much better!

Josiah did a great job saving himself from the big mud puddle at the bottom of the slide.

Stepping through the rungs.

Camryn and Samantha are so funny they always show up at parties in dresses. I warned parents about making sure their kids wore shoes that could get dirty, but Camryn still chose her high heeled shoes. She's such a girl! Samantha was hilarious because through the course she kept saying, "I hate this...I really do!", but then she's have this smile on her face.

The easement was were the next challenge took place...Victim Rescue.

The kids were in teams of three and they had to pull the "gurney" up the hill to safety.

I love how these two pictures show that the bigger boys are really the ones doing most of the work!

Ella looks quite determine here when in fact she was barely even holding on to the rope!

Wahoo....they made it!

Next up was Weapons Training.

Each child got a clip with 6 darts to shoot at "George" our Caution Kids as Play sign.

We were going to let the kids use the pump action Nerf gun...we literally have at least 20 Nerf guns, but then we thought better about it and decided to use the battery operated one instead.

Patiently waiting her turn!

Then the kids got to pose in front of the Army Jeep...post coming soon. I saw Caleb saluting so I thought that would be fun to have all the kids salute.

After this picture was taken Caleb told me he wasn't saluting he was just blocking the sun from his eyes!

The last challenge was the Mortar Launcher. Sergeant Martin made this out of PVC pipe. I seriously have no idea how it worked I just know that he used PVC pipe, a stick, a tennis ball, bungie cords and a foam rocket. He's a modern day MacGyver!

Handsome birthday boy!

At the end of training Sergeant Martin congratulated the Recruits and said, "I'm proud of what you've accomplished you succeeded where others did not fail!"...of course everyone passed boot camp!

Andrew was quite precise when it came to his salute.

Anna was thinking...holy cow Sergeant Martin is tall!

Ella was so fast with her first salute that she had to do it again...she was so sloppy!

Owen's Birthday Army Party Graduating Class 2015

Be All You Can Be!

An Army Of One!

Army Strong!

After all that hard work it was time for the Recruits to head to the....

to get some grub!

I had MRE's all ready for them. They could choose from PB & J, PB & N, Ham or Ham and Cheese.

Of course there were other things to eat as well!

I asked Andrew and Josiah to smile and Josiah saluted....we trained them well!

While we were out doing Boot Camp we only missed the 3rd and a little bit of the 4th quarter of the games. So nothing special thank goodness!

As you can see by the half smile on Bill's face it was a tough game to watch.

I never really gave up, but I do remember saying, "I wasn't ready for football season to be over".

Micah is not a football fanatic so he probably though we were CRAZY!!! When things started turning around I was yelling and poor Andrew was covering his ears. I had to apologize, but that didn't stop me from screaming my head off the next time something awesome happened!

Sitting on the edge of his seat!!! During this time I couldn't sit still...I was walking around frantically eating sugar snap peas. I do remember before things really turned around saying to my BIL Jon...stranger things have happened! Our guys never gave up! This game is seriously going down in history as one of the best Playoff games EVER! I wish I had gotten pictures of us celebrating, but we were too busy cheering and in complete and utter shock! I was just walking around and I would randomly grab someone by the shoulders, shake them and say, "WE'RE GOING TO THE SUPERBOWL!"

After the game was over we got word that there was an insurgent in the back yard. The freshly trained Recruits walked quietly down the easement in hopes of sneaking up on the enemy!

Once they got to the backyard they found a bucket filled with grenade water balloons.

Unfortunately the grenade water balloons did not want to pop so the insurgent got some pretty awesome ammunition. We were under heavy attack! I'm not gonna lie...it got messy and there were some losses! :)

Every one had great fun!

And I was able to use the leftover water in the bucket to get the insurgent. I accidentally ended up soaking Caleb in the process, but he was a good sport about it. I felt so bad though!

Next up was cupcakes! Eight candles on a small cupcake are a lot!

Owen wanted a camo cake, but I told him he was getting cupcakes instead. I found this recipe on Pinterest. It was quite an endeavor! I used 2 cake mixes one white and one chocolate. I separated the white into 3 bowls...one white, one white and chocolate to make the lighter brown, one white with the little bit of chocolate and green food coloring to make the dirty green color. Each cake mix went into its own Ziploc bag and I cut the corner off so I could squeeze it out. Then it was time to fill the cupcake liners. I did this by plopping a little white in each cupcake, then green, then light brown and so on and so on until they were full. For the frosting I made a homemade buttercream and divided them into 3 bowls. One white, one green with food coloring and one brown with cocoa. Each of those went into a Ziploc bag and I sniped the corner and then stuffed them all into one piping bag and frosted the cupcakes. They actually turned out way cuter than I thought they would!

Chowing down on that sweet goodness!

Time for presents! Uncle Jon and Aunt Becky gave Owen $10.

Uncle Ry and Aunt Stephie got him two Call of Duty Army sets.

Daddy spent two hours that night putting this tank together. It was quite complicated! Owen loves it though so it was totally worth it!

The Kuch Klan made this cool target for Owen. The kids have already shot arrows and darts at it!

Papa and Grandma Martin got Owen his cool Army helicopter!

Ga- Ga & Pa got Owen this awesome Aircraft Carrier or as he calls it an Anti-Aircraft Carrier...he gets confused between this and an Anti-Aircraft Gun.

Jackson was so sweet he wanted to spend his own money to get Owen a present. Off to Target we went where we looked at all the toys. I found two things I thought Owen might like...a helicopter and a TMNT pinball machine on clearance for $11! I had to talk him into it, but he ended up getting the Pinball machine. I did tell him he had enough money to buy himself something so he went and bought the helicopter. I'm so glad he didn't buy the helicopter for Owen since Papa Martin got Owen one. Now they both have their own to play with and go on rescue missions!

Owen also got a Rocket Kit, a Science Experiment set...he loves to do science experiments and a sticker book about soldiers. It was so crazy though I honestly don't know who bought those except I know the sticker book was from Micah and Kim. Oh and Andrew gave Owen this cool invention he made....so sweet!

So in all the party rocked! The weather was great for us, no one got hurt, the Hawks won and many of them gave all the glory to God! What more could we have asked for!