Kara-tay Par-tay

Our kids enjoy being helpers--and I think that's great, because the world needs more people who are willing to step in and fill a gap where others don't choose to serve. This was a fun gap to fill--hosting games at their karate school's Halloween party :)

We arrived early and everyone chose which game they'd like to help with--Gabby worked with the stick the smile on the skeleton punching bag, Graysen helped with the bean bag toss, Caelan was the princess of pop for the ring toss, and Brennen (who was more interested in playing football than getting a costume together before we left--so he's a hunter guy--sort of :) worked with the suction cup ninja star throw against the mirrors.

That was a one sentence paragraph, yes it was ;)

The first costumed crowd ranged in age from three to six years (along with lots of baby siblings). I was selected from among the moms present to help judge the costume parade. This was tricky, since we didn't know the names of most of the small children--and several of them were wearing masks ;) They were awfully cute, though, so it was a fun job.

During the games, I wandered around, observing how our kids were interacting with others--there are some challenging personalities in the world and they got to spend some time with the younger versions of these. However, they chose to remain polite and cheerful and encouraging. Nice work, Crew!

Approximately 45 minutes later, the little ones left and the big ones arrived. Graysen abandoned his game to join the party, while the other three continued to help (there were a lot of helpers, though, so it was fine for Graysen to play). He self-constructed his costume from cardboard--he's been working on prototypes for months. I think we'll add a little spray paint to jazz it up before tomorrow, but had he not had a mom on the judging panel (as did three other kids in his costume parade) he was for sure in the running for "most original costume." His Spartan moves were impressive.

There were several children who disqualified themselves from receiving a certificate just because they were incredibly rude and sassy. "We're not rewarding that behavior," said a co-judge. Agreed! And some of the costumes--I mean, seriously parents? The little ones were mostly cute and fun, but the elementary school crowd had all kinds of eyebrow raisers.

After Graysen had collected his prizes from the various games, we collectively decided to head out. There was a teen party afterwards--pizza and a movie--but our girls were like, "Eh. We just wanted to help with the little kids." That's cool with me! Let's go home! :)