iron chef + bingo + yard sale-ing

In addition to our Alice in Wonderland party, 

my family spent a few days last weekend continuing our "Great Staycation of 2012." 

[Since we all don't have enough money to go on a fun trip this summer, we've been creatively finding fun things to do at home or around town. It's been a blast!]

We played Human Bingo, participated in an Iron Chef tournament and had a Yard Sale competition.

On Friday night, we went to City Creek and filled out Bingo cards with different kinds of people we had to see.

Brans and I were the first to get Bingo - then we played for Blackout.

As soon as our time limited expired, we met at the fountains in City Creek to watch their nightly show, set to music. It was fun. And yes, that is fire in the middle of the fountain. It's so beautiful. And so amazing that we've figured out a way to sync water to music. Awesome.

On Saturday morning, we woke up early and split into teams. During the week, we thought of things we needed and made a list of items we'd like to find. Each team got $20 to spend and 3 hours to find as many things on the list as possible.

We didn't do so well with the list - and Brans and I spent a little bit extra, but the haul we ended up with was pretty great. Mostly things we needed - plus two fun music things to add to our collection.

After our Yard Sale Escapade, we came back to our house to watch the Olympic Opening Ceremonies. (We recorded it to watch later sans commercials. We so love modern technology. Rewinding and fast-forwarding TV is marvelous.) I love the Olympics! But more on that later...

Then, we split up into three teams [again - each time, different teams] 

and began our Iron Chef competition.

Our ingredients:

Our task:

To create a complete meal using all of these ingredients.

main course, side/appetizer and dessert.

It was really fun to see what everyone came up with. 

It was an eclectic meal, for sure, but everything was delicious and everyone had fun in the kitchen.

As always, we ate too much food, but it was oh, so tasty.

I know I say this all. the. time. 

but I really do have an amazing family.

I'm so grateful that we all get along so well,

and that we can have so much fun together.

"We don't have much, but we've got us..."

Go team!

alice in wonderland

It's been four years since all eight of the siblings in my family have been home. And it's likely it will be another six years after this. So, we've been making the most of our limited time together and doing all sorts of fun things.

My favorite was our Alice in Wonderland Murder Mystery Dinner Party.

It

was

EPIC.

For years, I've wanted to have a Wonderland themed party, and it turned out so well. It was so very fun - Everyone laughed, enjoyed the company and ate way too much. 

I had a blast decorating and setting the scene.

Everyone was assigned a different character. I altered a game I found online, added a few characters, made sure everything was family friendly and went from there. My family did an excellent job of finding amazing costumes. Some of them were so elaborate, yet I think between all of us we spent less than $20 on costume supplies.

First, we had Tea. The Mad Hatter opened with a speech - 

And Tay could not have given a better performance. 

[Ha ha - We actually made him do it twice because it was so hilarious!]

We had five different kinds of 'tea' [read: koolaid] in fun colors.

And our Tea menu consisted of:

Mini Quiches

Cucumber Sandwiches

Egg Salad Sandwiches

Crumpets and Jelly

After tea, we played a rousing game of croquet with flamingos and hedgehogs.

We had to be authentic, you know.

And after croquet, we had dinner and continued our investigation -
asking and answering questions, accusing, laughing...

 The menu:

Bread and Butter-flies
Strawberry Mushroom Salad
Carrot Bottoms
Mad Hatter Rice
Absolem Catepillar Chicken with Avacado
and Rainbow Parfaits

I boiled the rice in my neon food color gel to get the bright colors,
and broiled the chicken in lemon juice and sea salt.

And for dessert:

Wonderland Cake
Queen of Hearts Tarts
Cheshire Cat Tails

The cake was six layers - each a different neon color. I decorated it with white roses, in the spirit of playing cards painting them red [with red sprinkles].
And the Cheshire Cat Tails were made out of marshmallows and chocolate.

So fun.

 [My mom was an exquisite Queen of Hearts - in character the whole time. It was so funny to see my mom so very different from her usual pleasant, gracious self. At the end of the night, she said, "It's exhausting being so grumpy all the time!"]

 [Can you see the eyes on the daffodils?]

 [Bryson was a perfect White Rabbit. He was so fidgety, and the way he ate his food was hysterical! He would take these little tiny bites, scrunch his nose, and chew everything with his front teeth. Awesome.]

Later on in the evening,
Executioner Ace did his duty, and upon the Queen's request,
[OFF WITH HIS HEAD!]
Held an execution.

It was so very much fun.
It was so entertaining, and extremely hilarious.
It's been a couple weeks since we did it, and still we all want to talk about it.
Memories were made for sure,
And a new family tradition created.

My family really is the best.
No question.