Townie Movie Night

We were supposed to go camping this weekend with the Reams and the Souths, but last week we decided not to.  (And by decided not to I mean Gigi talked me out of it.)  ((And by talked me out of it mentioned that they might not go, to which I sighed with relief because 1. Camping is A LOT of work with 4 kids and 2. We seem to be super busy lately.)

Anyway.

I knew the kids would be disappointed so I figured if we came up with a fun (but considerably less time-consuming) activity they might forgive us.  Lance and I were bouncing ideas off of one another when he mentioned having a movie outside.

Bingo!  Outside, staying up late, playing with friends, eating junk food: all the best parts of camping in my kids' eyes.

So Lance borrowed a projector from work and we rigged up a screen from an old sheet, set up a few chairs and tables and we were set!

Of course the boys had to play a little old school Street Fighter while we were waiting for our townie friends, the Asays and the Reams, to arrive.

Poor Spencer was dying - he lost computer/video game privileges for the weekend so he couldn't join in.  Maybe he'll think twice about not turning in school work!  (No.  No he won't.)

There's our concession stand.  Super fancy with the droopy lights and big ol' garbage can.

Miss Tess in her jammies.  She actually lasted a bit longer than I expected, sitting on my lap, eating my goodies, yelling "Scary!!!!" at loud parts of the movie and continuously looking up at the night sky and yelling "Stars!  Look stars!!"

Two year olds are fun.

Think I made enough popcorn?  (You'd be impressed with how much got eaten!)

We didn't get to have dutch oven cobbler the last time we went camping, so Craig made some tonight.  He baked it in an empty corner of the garden.

A blurry shot at the beginning of the movie.  We had a hard time deciding which movie to watch: it had to be family friendly, but we also wanted adults to enjoy it. (Read: no Smurfs.) There were a lot of great kid movies this summer, but none of them have come out on DVD yet.  We toyed with Star Wars, Ghostbusters, The Muppets, and The Wizard of Oz, but finally decided on Percy Jackson and the Olympians.  It was a good one to watch!

Craig the dutch oven king.  His cherry cobbler was so yummy!  I made homemade ice cream to go with it, and it was soooo rich, especially with that cobbler.  (The ice cream had SEVEN eggs in it.  YUM.)

The kids played around the yard and had a great time.  They finally all settled in on the ground to watch the movie.  Lance sure did a great job hanging that screen!

It was a great way to spend the evening. A good movie, yummy goodies, and happy children. My only complaint is that I didn't get to really talk with my friends that much.

But all in all, still better than camping. :)