Three Years Old and Loving It!

It's a Minnie Mouse and friends party!  Expecting my second baby, I wanted to keep the party somewhat simple, but it had to be fun and cute too!

Here were the invites:

I used a Minnie image from somewhere out on the internet and word clipart for the balloons.  I inserted the birthday girl's name with letter art and then voila... glue them to appropriately sized scrapbook paper and I had her invitation front.

The inside was fun too... I purchased circular mailing labels and printed the info on them, creating a polka dot effect with all the pertinent info on the inside of the invite.

The decorations were super easy too!  For table cloths I used stickers on plastic table covering.  I cut out mickey mouse shapes and bows from 12x12 paper in lots of colors, and put them up all over the place.  Lastly, I used images that I blew up, printed the different parts of the pictures, and then glued them together on varying colors of poster-board.

The Minnie mouse pinata was fun too, of course!

The cake was a take on the princess cake with the cake skirt and a doll inserted, only it was Minnie mouse! I used white chocolate polka dots and sprinkles, because at three, who doesn't love some good sprinkles?  I also made some extra cupcakes in bright colors for the boys who were attending.

Minnie Mouse cake

Activities included the pinata, my homemade ball pit with enclosure, and a coloring table.  The ball pit was a total success.  We used 750 balls from the toy store, a few extra larger balls for variety, and made a pvc pipe and fabric enclosure to help keep the balls contained.  The pit itself was just a blow up swimming pool.  Other than storage, this is going to make a great activity and quite a few birthdays from now on.  I pre-stuffed the goody/pinata bags with a few heavier items like play-dough and put each guest name on the mickey sticker on the front.

We had so much fun!  I can't believe my baby girl is three.

Baby shower fun!

This weekend, I had the honor of throwing one of my best friends a baby shower.  She loves the garden and she was not going all pink.  We had fun putting together her garden themed baby shower.

Her sister and mom made this adorable clothesline for a decoration:

I made this diaper cake with different colors of ribbon and flowers:

We had fun making this sign with a cricut, wooden stakes and black foam board to welcome the guests:

The food spread included all finger foods, some of the recipes for which I have posted at everydayfoodadventures.

The dessert table was to die for!  We used painted terra cotta pots to add height to the table.

This lemon berry marscapone cake was a hit, and it is so pretty too!

These sugar cookies were decorated with pastel chocolate.

And there was a huge variety of sparkly and sprinkle dipped pretzel sticks.

I can't wait to meet this little girl!

Movies and Books

For awhile now, I haven't had an overwhelming desire to read.  That was odd too, because I have been an avid reader since I was 7.  Recently though, I have picked up and started reading again and I think I know why.

Part of reading is about angst.  There has to be a tension, a conflict, a connection with the reader, and without that, a novel just isn't any good.  But that was the problem.  I didn't need any more conflict.  Or angst.  Or pull in any direction.  I was already being pulled in too many directions.  That is why I read the end of the final Harry Potter long before I was even half way into the book, why I couldn't deal with reading anything too deep, and why I couldn't bring myself to see any movie other than children's animated flicks or comedies... and even those might have been too serious.

And now, I am reading again.  In the last two weeks, I have read  Goodbye Mr Chips, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Awakening, Cane, Other People, and I am now working on We the Living.  I can handle a little bit of angst again, and that, beyond anything else, is a good sign.  Maybe I am coming back.

Trying Hard not to Complain.

Work starts tomorrow.

And I don't want to complain.  Good Grief.  I am a teacher.  I love what I do.  I work 186 days a year, and right now, 7 of those are furlough days.  It couldn't get much sweeter.  And I love my students.  And I love my job.

And I love to write fragments, I suppose.

But here is the thing:  more than anything else, I want to be a mom.  A full time, stay at home mom.  I love it.  I don't mind difficult days.  I enjoy finding things to do and ways to teach Penelope about the world.  I hate leaving her.

And tomorrow I have to.  And it sucks.  And I am really having a rough time with the thought of working full time again.

Thank you for reading my rant.

Cell Phone Use

We live in an age of convenience, and isn't it nice?  If we need directions, they are at our fingertips.  If we need to reach someone, we all walk around with a cell phone glued to us.  If we need a phone number the internet is a few clicks away.  And yet, that convenience has led to inconvenience and a feeling of being connected when real connections are ignored.

Once a month, I gather with some of my closest girl friends for a night of food and talking.  Not once has anyone had their phone on the dinner table, and only rarely does someone answer their phone.  On those rare occasions, it is a mom or someone who has already expressed that there is something urgent going on that might need to be tended to.  Shocking isn't it?

It is so sad that this mutual respect I speak of is rare in a young group of twenty somethings.  Would you like to know the most earth shattering part?  We have no cell phone rule.  None.  Nada.  Zip.  We just get it.  We all understand that if we are going to spend time with friends we value, that time is special.  Phone calls can wait.  Texts can wait.  Facebook comments can wait.

They

Can

All

Wait.

We need, desperately, as a society, as young people, as professionals, and as friends to start showing mutual respect to the person we are with at the moment.  It is only fair, and it will only lead to better, deeper, stronger and more lasting friendships that we can count on.  If we don't change our habits soon, our social media and text driven lives may soon destroy what real relationships we do have.  I don't know about you, but when I need to cry, I'd rather have a hug that a text: <3, and when I laugh at something funny with friends, a real laugh together is so much more valuable than a delayed "lol."

Little talking girl

I love watching Penelope grow up.

I love watching her talk more: "'mon mama, more run my momma!"

I love watching her develop humor: "Who is this?" (pointing to big bird)  "Abby, Elmo, Cookie (giggle)" You know who this is!  Who is it?"  "Big Birds-- Abby!"

I love watching her learn: "whas tha?" "Who's that?" "wha's this"

I love watching her personality flourish.

I love being a mommy, and I love my little girl.

"Terrible" Twos Here We Come!

This party was brought to you by the letter P and the number 2.

We had so much fun today and all of my hours of prep wok over the last 4-6 weeks came out just the way I wanted!  I had pictures of characters three feet high up all over the place, Sesame Street cake pop holders, and a few fun games to play.

And here is my army of cake pops inspired by Bakerella. They weren't quite as good as hers, but I was happy.  I filled them with different flavors... Elmo was funfetti, Big Bird was lemon cream cheese, Oscar was chocolate ganache, and Cookie was my creation of "chocolate chip cookie dough" cake.  I even had fun figuring out which filling was right for which character.

Here is the birthday girl wearing her Elmo overalls that I scored on sale from Sears:

...always so serious!  You should have seen her right before the party started, you might have thought she was at a funeral or something.

Fortunately, she finally lightened up.

We had Pizza, corn dogs, guacamole(13 avocados worth!) veggies, fruit, and drinks.  We had story time, threw Oscar's trash into his can, and found Ernie's rubber duckies (which he kindly let us take home).  Penelope's grandpa Steve even made balloon animals for all the kids, and a few of them even got Elmo!

What kid doesn't like opening presents?

Especially when she gets stuff like this homemade sesame street quilt from her Grandma Gerry?

Ahh, the Elmo laptop, definitely one of the hit gifts.

What a great party!