Birthday Party! July 2011

	The venue for Robert's Seventh Birthday Party was Urban Evolution. They are a gym specializing in Parkour, which I equate to training to be a stunt double. When Sarah found out that they do kids programs (and have Nerf guns), we were signed up (just before this popped up on Washington Post). With it being close to 100 degrees and the gym having fans but no air conditioning, the car was full of ice and drinks and I forgot my camera, so these are cell phone photos.
They started the kids out with some stretches to warm them up -- well to stretch out muscles, they were already warm. And then thay ran several obstacle courses. It reminded me a little bit of the opening to the original Sesame Street with over, under, through and around. The old Sesame Street intro seems to have been filmed in an urban construction site that looked little bit like this.
	Eleanor coming out of the crawl and hopping over Spider-Man on her way to trampoline and mat jump.
Robert's big dismount from the mat pile. The instructor told they kids they could jump down anyway they wanted to, then did a flip and said, "except for that." There were some pretty good cannon balls and a couple belly flops. After several runs of different obstacle courses, the staff brought out the Nerf guns. The kids divided up into two teams for the most un-Burgundy birthday party yet: chasing and shooting at each other in this faux-urban environment. Below is Eleanor asking for more ammo.
	Below left is Eleanor and Robert sneaking around a corner. Below right, Robert's team on the attack. The kids had lots of fun, the adults seemed to enjoy the chaos and were intrigued by the gym and the atmosphere. No one was hurt, plenty of fluids were consumed and the cake was tasty. A success all around.