Okay, I'm part Irish. At least a smidge. =)
Happy St. Patrick's Day! This year the holiday fell on a Tuesday but we were still able to attend the Mt. Dora St. Patrick's Day festivities (if there is a formal name for that event, I don't know what it is) at Gilbert Park. The event took place on Saturday. We all got decked out in our green and took off for the park. The city sets up an event complete with bounce houses, games, popcorn and snow cones, and (most importantly) a treasure hunt. They "hide" these bags of gold coins all over the playgrounds and then children go in and find the treasure. The hunts are broken down into age groups so Kenzie is still in the youngest group. Needless to say, Will did not participate. We did this last year and Kenzie had fun but this was the first year she honestly understood what was going on and she had a BLAST.
Shortly after we arrived Kenzie made a beeline for the bounce house. Steven and I were convinced that we would be going in after her pretty quickly but she jumped right in and started bouncing away. She thought it was great! Then... she decided to try the slide. Kenzie is actually not one for slides. At least she wasn't until this weekend. She used to LOVE them and then one day she decided that she didn't like them. She took quite a long time to climb the ladder to get to the top of the slide. Again, we thought we were going to be heading in after her to help her down, but she made it to the top. Then, when we saw her there on top of the slide we thought there was no way she was going down it. She surprised us both though by sliding down! Then she wanted to do it again! And again! She had so much fun. After her first time though she decided she would go down on her belly, feet first. Whatever works. She slid and that was a major accomplishment. We had to drag her away to play a few games. After those though, she was right back in the bounce house. She even tried the bigger kid bounce house and went down that slide, as well! We were super impressed.
The treasure hunt started at 11:30am and Kenzie went in with Steven. She didn't really need his help though and she found a ton of treasure. For the little kids they just throw it on the ground, so it wasn't super hard but she thought she was hot stuff. You can then turn your treasure in for prizes. Kenzie had so many bags of treasure that we didn't even "spend" it all. She took one of every prize and we moved on. Her favorite though was her sword. When Kenzie doesn't think she is Doc McStuffins, she thinks she is on Jake's pirate crew. She spent about 15 minutes chasing poor Jack around the house later telling him to say "argh". She also spent about 5 minutes trying to get Will to do the same. He didn't comply. =)
After the treasure hunt Kenzie played on the playground for a while and even did all of the normal slides! Color us impressed! Apparently we have beat our slide fear. Thank goodness! It makes playing at the park a lot more fun.
After the park we went to downtown Mt. Dora with our neighbors that were also at the treasure hunt to get cupcakes at this little shop. We ended up taking ours home. Steven and I both had chocolate chip cookie dough (which were awesome and we ate them while watching Horrible Bosses 2 later that night). Kenzie just had a normal chocolate cupcake. We let her eat about 1/4 of it there since we had not yet had lunch. She has since finished it. She actually finished it yesterday and spent the entire time she was eating it saying, "Yum! Sugar!" She's a nut. She also doesn't get many sweets so she was (obviously) excited.
That evening we had our first picnic of the season at Magnolia Park overlooking Lake Apopka at sunset. We initially planned to make hot dogs and mac and cheese but time got away from us. We ended up with Publix subs, strawberries, and chips but it was still good. After dinner we played at the park for a while. Again, Kenzie did the slides over and over again. She even made Steven go down them after her. She thought that was hilarious! Honestly... I have to agree. It seemed like he was more than 3/4 of the way down before his body finally left the top. I'm not quite sure how he contorted himself into that curly shape, but he did just to make her smile. =)
Today we are celebrating by wearing our green (again) so that we don't get pinched. Haha! For dinner I am making corned beef. It's been years since either of us have eaten it. I hope it comes out yummy. Neither Steven nor I like cabbage so we settled on mashed potatoes and I'm just making sugar snap peas, but we are excited. I hope Kenzie will try it. She is super picky but we have noticed that she is getting just a bit more adventurous lately with her food. I hope that keeps up.
I hope your St. Patrick's Day was filled with the luck of the Irish and that you avoided all those pinches!
Happy St. Patrick's Day from the Young Family!!!
Happy St. Patrick's Day! This year the holiday fell on a Tuesday but we were still able to attend the Mt. Dora St. Patrick's Day festivities (if there is a formal name for that event, I don't know what it is) at Gilbert Park. The event took place on Saturday. We all got decked out in our green and took off for the park. The city sets up an event complete with bounce houses, games, popcorn and snow cones, and (most importantly) a treasure hunt. They "hide" these bags of gold coins all over the playgrounds and then children go in and find the treasure. The hunts are broken down into age groups so Kenzie is still in the youngest group. Needless to say, Will did not participate. We did this last year and Kenzie had fun but this was the first year she honestly understood what was going on and she had a BLAST.
Shortly after we arrived Kenzie made a beeline for the bounce house. Steven and I were convinced that we would be going in after her pretty quickly but she jumped right in and started bouncing away. She thought it was great! Then... she decided to try the slide. Kenzie is actually not one for slides. At least she wasn't until this weekend. She used to LOVE them and then one day she decided that she didn't like them. She took quite a long time to climb the ladder to get to the top of the slide. Again, we thought we were going to be heading in after her to help her down, but she made it to the top. Then, when we saw her there on top of the slide we thought there was no way she was going down it. She surprised us both though by sliding down! Then she wanted to do it again! And again! She had so much fun. After her first time though she decided she would go down on her belly, feet first. Whatever works. She slid and that was a major accomplishment. We had to drag her away to play a few games. After those though, she was right back in the bounce house. She even tried the bigger kid bounce house and went down that slide, as well! We were super impressed.
The treasure hunt started at 11:30am and Kenzie went in with Steven. She didn't really need his help though and she found a ton of treasure. For the little kids they just throw it on the ground, so it wasn't super hard but she thought she was hot stuff. You can then turn your treasure in for prizes. Kenzie had so many bags of treasure that we didn't even "spend" it all. She took one of every prize and we moved on. Her favorite though was her sword. When Kenzie doesn't think she is Doc McStuffins, she thinks she is on Jake's pirate crew. She spent about 15 minutes chasing poor Jack around the house later telling him to say "argh". She also spent about 5 minutes trying to get Will to do the same. He didn't comply. =)
After the treasure hunt Kenzie played on the playground for a while and even did all of the normal slides! Color us impressed! Apparently we have beat our slide fear. Thank goodness! It makes playing at the park a lot more fun.
After the park we went to downtown Mt. Dora with our neighbors that were also at the treasure hunt to get cupcakes at this little shop. We ended up taking ours home. Steven and I both had chocolate chip cookie dough (which were awesome and we ate them while watching Horrible Bosses 2 later that night). Kenzie just had a normal chocolate cupcake. We let her eat about 1/4 of it there since we had not yet had lunch. She has since finished it. She actually finished it yesterday and spent the entire time she was eating it saying, "Yum! Sugar!" She's a nut. She also doesn't get many sweets so she was (obviously) excited.
That evening we had our first picnic of the season at Magnolia Park overlooking Lake Apopka at sunset. We initially planned to make hot dogs and mac and cheese but time got away from us. We ended up with Publix subs, strawberries, and chips but it was still good. After dinner we played at the park for a while. Again, Kenzie did the slides over and over again. She even made Steven go down them after her. She thought that was hilarious! Honestly... I have to agree. It seemed like he was more than 3/4 of the way down before his body finally left the top. I'm not quite sure how he contorted himself into that curly shape, but he did just to make her smile. =)
Today we are celebrating by wearing our green (again) so that we don't get pinched. Haha! For dinner I am making corned beef. It's been years since either of us have eaten it. I hope it comes out yummy. Neither Steven nor I like cabbage so we settled on mashed potatoes and I'm just making sugar snap peas, but we are excited. I hope Kenzie will try it. She is super picky but we have noticed that she is getting just a bit more adventurous lately with her food. I hope that keeps up.
I hope your St. Patrick's Day was filled with the luck of the Irish and that you avoided all those pinches!
Happy St. Patrick's Day from the Young Family!!!
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