Steph's Fabulous at Forty Family Fun Day!

The pressure was "on"! Stephanie wanted some sort of elaborate celebration for her fortieth. Mindy rejected most ideas. We settled on bowling---much to Mindy's chagrin.  Bowling wasn't deemed "special" enough for a big birthday. We wanted to do one of those "escape room" adventures, but we have too many people for that. Soooo, bowing it was to be.

Then came the day I was standing in line to get my driver's license renewed. I was looking around and saw this:

The name of the place was "Soar Adventure Center." I checked it out online and found out it was some sort of highflying obstacle course. I KNEW the family would be all over this. I made the reservations.

Wouldn't you know it. After record breaking high temperatures, we had our first cold day. It was about 40 degrees when we got there--even colder on top.

I chose to be the photographer and observe from below. My highflying days are over! I have to say, I think I would have really liked it.

Justin had to work, so Stephanie and Nicky's childhood friend, Nick joined us (he's in the hoodie).

He spent a lot of time at our house growing up. He just recently moved back to Nashville after spending 18 years in California. I couldn't believe it had been that long. Of course, he came "home" a lot.

This was a tricky one---you had to "tightrope" it to the swing. Then getting on the swing was tricky. Balance is key!

I was also "holder of the stuff." 7 phones---one was missing, don't know whose--there were 9 of us. Mine is taking the picture.

 Jordan (on the right) stops for a picnic.

 I wanted them all to get on the guitars, but Carter was the only one who could do it. It doesn't look like it would be hard, but they swing around---you can't just walk on them, you have to use your arms to really navigate them.

As it turns out, with the exception of Carter, Nick and the girls, "the boys" (which would also have included Justin---had he been with us) are a little squeamish of heights. I could tell right away that Butch and Nicky were approaching the entire thing with trepidation. It never even dawned on me that this could be someone's worse nightmare! Still, they all had a good time. They said it was much harder than it looks. Apparently Carter was the only one that could do the ones that required total upper body strength.

After 2 hours, they were all worn out. The girls changed clothes and we headed to lunch. Stephanie opened presents.

We had a great time and it was a fun day. It's not the sort of thing you would want to do all the time. We were lucky to have the place nearly all to ourselves. There were a couple little girls there, but they stayed on the "lower" course--for children. I think the age limit was 10 and below. I might have been able to do that if it was 10 and under or 60 and older!