March 29 - Ninja Warrior 2.0

Ninja Warrios!

The kids ninja warrior competition was rescheduled for last Sunday, the 25th. JD had to work all-day Saturday and had a lot of yard work to do, so it was me with the kiddos. I contemplated driving up Sunday morning and making a long day of it, but decided that would be too much with the baby. So we drove up Saturday afternoon and stayed at the Lost Pines Resort in Bastrop, Texas (just outside Austin, only 20min from the competition site). I've driven by the entrance to this hotel many times but had never been to the actual hotel. Wow! After turning at the sign we drove 3 miles down a winding road. The hotel has a golf course, ponds, pool with a lazy river and waterslide, hiking trails, horses and lots of open spaces for the kids to run around. They also had s'mores at an outdoor firepit, which Julia and Luke loved! 

S'mores!

After a quick night at Lost Pines (we will definitely go back for a long weekend at some point) it was time to head to the competition. We had no idea what tot expect and after parking in a field, we took a path to the courses. There were different courses for every age group and kids were signed up alphabetically. This was a bummer as both Julia and Luke were last and their courses were close to 1/4 mile apart from each other with no line of sight between them. Luke was in the 5-7 age group and Julia in the 8-10. They both had approx. 40 competitors listed (combined boys and girls, just like the tv show). After lugging Jillian back and forth multiple times, I found a parent on Julia's course who had a child competing in the spot in front of her. She agreed to text me when her daughter was going. I spent most of the time watching the 5-7's compete while Jillian played around...in the mud (there was no way to avoid mud there and she LOVED it.

Jillian watched Frozen and loved it!

I've never been so muddy in my life). There were 6 kids in front of Luke when I got the text "Your daughter in on-deck." I hightailed it back to Julia's course with Jillian (who wanted no part of leaving her mud pit and was limp noodle and crying) only to find they added 10+ competitors in front of Julia that were not on the posted list. I then hightailed it back just in time to see Luke. He did fantastic!! He made it through the course without penalty and was very proud of himself. We then ran once again back to Julia's course (no joke, I must have walked 6 miles between courses) and made it in the nick of time to see her compete. She was the last competitor and only 4 kids completed the course without penalty all day, she was one of the 4 with the fastest time. Great job!!

Ninja Luke

Ninja Julia