It's that time of year again... That's right - it's Company Picnic time!! Thomas had so much fun last year, I was super excited to get to take them again, especially since they are a year older and love doing stuff just that much more. Unfortunately, it was scheduled for the same day Matt had to go leave work early and head down to the Kenai. (Don't feel too sorry for him - it was for a fishing trip!)
I really wanted to take both of the boys and was stressing over how to manage both of them at a really fun, but spread out event. Luckily, I knew someone that might be willing to help me out!
In case you can't tell from the photo - the theme this year was "Bug Out!" - they had cutesy bug stuff all around, though the photo booth was by far my favorite (bug wise).
I think she must love her nephews... Why else would you run around in the rain chasing a crazy three year old? Ha - the two of them ran through this maze about 5 times before Henry and I got through it once.
Henry just wasn't too sure why there were so many dead ends. He kept trucking along though! There was an older kid trying to scare younger kids at one of the intersections, I was fully prepared to berate him if he made my kids cry! But when he yelled "Boo!" at Henry, little man just gave him a "What's your deal?" look and kept walking. Ha!
They loved playing in the boxes of sand. They were, of course, full of plastic bug toys - but also dinosaurs! And I learned something neat the other day about plastic dinosaurs. Almost all of them have the name of the dinosaur imprinted on them - usually on the bottom. Now all of us parents can look like amateur paleontologists - woo!
Over to the pony ride! He wasn't too sure at first last year, but ended up holding on all by himself at the end. Look how serious he is here - he is ready to ride that pony all by himself!
Or, you know, hang on to his Aunt Heather the whole time. He was leaned over so far at one point I was convinced he was going to fall out of the saddle. Luckily Heather had a good hold on him.
Sigh...
Three year olds...
Henry was intent on watching his brother ride the pony. He seemed pretty content to just watch, but next year he is getting a chance at being a cowboy!
The petting zoo was thankfully missing the unruly calf from last year, but there were still plenty of animals capable of knocking Henry over. Thomas couldn't convince any of the goats to eat the piece of straw his was offering. Probably because they were more interested in trying to eat my hair. Rude goats!
As a side note - what is that kid in the background doing with his lips? Ha - kids are so weird!
When we were at the Solstice Festival last month, Heather was talking about how cool it would be to ride the bucking salmon, if only the line weren't sooo long. I knew there was one at the picnic last year, so when I spied it across the field today, I started asking Thomas if he wanted to see Aunt Heather ride it? "How cool would that be?!?"
Yes, I used my kids to make my sister ride the giant mechanical salmon. She *said* she wanted to ride it - who am I to deny her that?? Haha - she actually seemed to have fun once she stopped making pretend scared faces. And she didn't even complain too much about how the whole inflatable area was. ;)
Also highly entertaining were the hula hoops. She picked one up expecting to be able to hula hoop like we did back in elementary school. Apparently it is *not* like riding a bike...!
She tried to teach Thomas how to hula hoop, but that wasn't nearly as interesting as trying to attack me with the hula hoop. Luckily my dodging skills are pretty advanced thanks to the fact I live with two small boys. ;)
We all had a blast - even with the rain! It's hard to beat a festival thrown by work that is aimed at families. :)
And I even remembered to ask Heather to take a photo of me and the boys. I'm trying to get better about remembering to ask. I've been on a selfie kick with my phone recently, but it's really hard to get both boys in the frame.