A Very Scooby Party

There are more pictures I could put up from Utah but I think it is time to move forward before I get too far behind.  Megan turned six in the end of August but we waited a couple of weeks before having her birthday party.  She wanted a Scooby Doo party.

Whitney had a Scooby Doo party a couple of years ago.  I wanted this party to be different.  The only thing that was the same was the traditional coloring pages at the beginning while waiting for everyone to arrive.

Then the kids had to attend monster fighting academy to be ready to join the Scooby Doo gang on a mystery.  We had to shoot a ghost.  I think this ended up being one of the favorite activities for everyone.

We did monster bowling.  Poor Will had to be the setter upper for all monster pins.

A beanbag toss to knock over the monsters I drew on boards.

They all got medals for graduating from the academy.  Then it was time for the mystery - the candy was stolen!  The kids had to put together this puzzle to get their first clue.

They had to dress like mummies to get their clue from the mummy.

They had to find the sea monster who was hiding under one of these fish,

They had to tell a joke to the clown monster to get their clue.  Adam needed a little help thinking of a joke.

And they had to feed snowballs to the hungry snow monster.

Eventually the clues led them to Red Beard (sans the beard) who had taken the candy.  The kids were happy to get it back.  I had put things like Scooby Doo fruit snacks and Scooby Snack Grahams and Scooby straws in it. 

We had a pizza cake.  I must admit I was pretty proud of how this cake turned out.  It was a huge hit with all the kids.

And finally the opening of the presents.  The kids were so cute and excited when Megan would open the present from them.

Anyway, I think the party turned out well.  And Megan had a fun day.  That's the most important.

BYU

Being in Utah always makes me want to return to good ol' BYU.  I like walking around the grounds and walking down memory lane.  So we took a day to go see BYU.  It was also Education week so it may not have been the best idea, but it was fun.

We met up with my sister-in-law, Allison, at the Beane Museum.  The kids were all fascinated by all the animals.

Looking at 'Shasta' - the liger.

This bear is close to the front of the museum and if you get close to the glass it will roar at you.  This made Hannah nervous.  She didn't want to sit by it for the picture.

The older kids went to the show at the museum and got to actually meet some animals.  I stuck with Hannah and walked around.  Megan liked touching the snake.

We also went to the Science Center.  This has a few more hands on science - y things.  So that was fun.

Trying to make the sound travel from one side of the building to the other.  I don't think this was working all the way but that didn't bother Adam.  He just wanted to yell into it.

We also went to the Museum of Art.  Some of us wondered about this broken violin. 

Rachel and Megan peer at each other under this huge exhibit in the museum. 

And sitting in the BYU bookstore. 

And everybody's favorite part was the bus ride back to our car.  We parked at the stadium and walked to BYU.  But I am glad we were able to take a bus ride back.  Some of us were extra tired and cranky with all that walking.

Anyway, now I have walked down memory lane.  It was fun seeing everything again.

Parks, Chocolate, and Swimming

We had a fun day right outside Salt Lake.  It started off with going to the park.  Rachel wanted to go to the park and have a picnic.

I don't remember what this park is called but it is in Salt Lake and is huge.  My sister Erin had the day off work and was able to come with us.  The park had some fun and unique toys - like this funny spinning ball.

And lots of swings for everyone.

It was hot, but we found a shady spot for our picnic.  Rachel was thrilled.

Then we went to Mrs. Cavanaugh's Chocolate Factory for a tour.

This lady sure knew what she was doing.  She was really fast at making the chocolates.

From up high we could see what everyone was doing.  We also could look for the Curious Georges.  They had several stuffed Curious Georges hanging around (based on the book where Curious George goes to a chocolate factory).  So that was a fun touch.

Standing in front of the wall of chocolates.  If only they were real candies. 

All throughout the factory were fun chocolate quotes.  We got to eat some samples along our tour and even stopped for ice cream afterwards. 

We found an indoor pool halfway between Lehi and Salt Lake.  Will's parents met us there. 

The pool was pretty empty since school had already started in Utah. 

They had a great kids area and an awesome lazy river and fun slide.  Anyway, it was extra fun because with so many adults I could relax a bit more in the water.  Not be constantly counting kids.  And everyone thought the pool was great.

So it was another super awesome day in Utah.

Museum of Ancient Life

Because we are slightly crazy we also went to a third museum on this $2 Tuesday - the Dinosaur Museum. 

My sister brought her two kids along and we all enjoyed looking at the way animal life has changed over thousands of years of history.

Stopping to play in a tunnel.

We saw lots of bones of different kinds of dinosaurs.  Some small.

And some very big.

This is a favorite spot - it is like a water/sand table put together.

Hannah had a hard time reaching the dirt, which is very important, so Will went in there and helped her.

A couple of cute kiddos got on the scale to see what they weighed in dinosaur.

Playing on some dinosaur toys.

We moved up several thousand years to get to the ice age animals.

And everyone's favorite part was the pretending to be a paleontologist and look for some bones.  When it became just throw dirt at people time it was time to go home. 

So it was a fun way to end an exciting Thanksgiving Point day.

The Kids Museum

My kids had begged even before going to Utah to go to the kids museum at Thanksgiving Point.  So we went and had a great time. 

We started off going to the chamber of knowledge.  It is a cool maze.

After finding all the stations the kids put in their answers and won.  They were awesome discoverers.

Playing "soccer" on the ground.

We spent a fair amount of time climbing on this structure up high.  It is hard to tell but one of my kids is up in the net.  I ended up in the structure chasing Adam.  We only struggled a little bit trying to find the way down.

Can we jump like a frog?  Will impressed everyone with how high he could jump.

And this machine was how much you weigh in animals.

This was a new part of the museum.You pretended to be a settler landing in America.  Can you survive?

There were questions to test you and you might get points for health but negative points in morale.  Things like that.  Here the kids had to cross the stream by going across the rock wall.

Most of the kids 'died' and then wanted to try again.  It was interesting.  I guess a lot of the early settlers didn't make it.

Unfortunately, my phone died and I didn't get more pictures.  The kiddos also had fun dressing up and doing crafts and playing in the water stations.  So it was a fun time at the kids museum.