A Paw Patrol Birthday Party

Zachary is THREE - three! - how did that happen? This was a exciting birthday because this was his first birthday where he was walking independently! Hooray!! Some parents get excited when their child is walking by their first birthday - I'm thrilled that he's walking at his third. =) 

Zach's most favorite thing at the moment is Nick Jr's Paw Patrol. I have to admit, of all the cartoons out there, this one is pretty good. It's less annoying than a lot of the other options. I'm always a little anti character-themed parties, but he loves it so much that I made an exception this year.

We were celebrating on a Sunday afternoon after church and were going to be out of town most of that Saturday, so I couldn't have too much crazy prep going on.

My mom helped me out and printed this banner from the Nick Jr website and sewed it to a ribbon. Thanks Mom!

My friend Stephanie made this cake for the party. Zach thought it was great that all the puppies were on it. =)

Of course he got some great Paw Patrol gifts that he and his brother have spent the next few days arguing over.....

I checked out some other great party's on Pinterest and picked my favorite ideas from a few. My husband grilled hot dogs for everyone, we had Pawtato Salad, Pupcorn and two types of Puppy Chow. I did the Cinnamon Curro and S'mores Puppy Chow (that one was a huge hit). I bought these great dog bowls at Dollar Tree! They were the perfect serving size for my snacks! I downloaded the blank food labels from Mom's Tot School and just hand wrote on them with a Sharpie.

Here's a lovely mid-party messy view of the table.... =)

I did get some Paw Patrol plates, napkins, tablecloth and balloons for the party. Although we had a few late minute RSVPs, so I dug in my past party supplies and found some blue plates and red napkins to supplement! Whew!

We just had lemonade in my lovely teardrop dispenser from World Market (I just couldn't handle drinking something that was called "Toilet Water" like I saw of a few other sites...) and some mason jar cups with fun straws. I printed off a little sign for the front door (sorry for the blurry photo) and printed off some graphics from the Nick Jr website for gift bags. The name tags were some more blank food labels from Mom's Tot School. 

I wish I'd remembered to take a photo of what was inside the gift bags, but it was a packet of coloring pages I'd printed off the Nick Jr website, a 4-pack of crayon's from Party City in Paw Patrol boxes, a small doggie tennis ball (Target), a mask of one of the dogs, a package of Annie's fruit snacks and some Paw Patrol tattoos and stickers also purchased at Party City.

It was a fun party, but I'm happy that the party-planning is now over for the year - birthday's are stressful! =)

Woodland Themed Birthday Party!

I thought I'd share a few pictures of Zach's 2nd birthday party. We did a Woodland Theme. This is also how his bedroom is decorated, so I thought I'd just carry it through to a birthday party. Of course I scoured Pinterest for ideas and I think it turned out pretty cute. =)

First the food: I had my husband cut me these little wood rounds from his firewood stash in the backyard for my labels. I stole that idea from someone online.... can't remember where though. I used a collection of similar ideas from several sites to make up my food names and selections. I had Teddy Grahams in the bowl "Don't Feed the Bears", fresh fruit in the decorated white cups for "Forest Berries", banana chips for "Chipmunk Chips", gummy frogs and worms (Malachi was super impressed by the fact that there were gummy worms! lol). My mom made me some really cute Owl cookies (which I apparently never took a photo of) and those cute little acorn candies (Hershey kiss, peanut butter candy melt and a peanut butter chip). I also made some little cream cheese sandwhiches. One with salmon cream cheese and one with regular cream cheese and cucumbers. Yum!

I made this funny tree for the front door out of a roll of brown paper and some scrapbooking paper. Its a little goofy, but I thought it was cute. My friend Stephanie made this awesome cake. She has made all the birthday cakes for my boys' parties and I think they get better every year! This one had cute little frosting animals and mushrooms all over it. I found Zach on top of the dining room table a few days later munching on the animals!

Here's the birthday boy. His favorite part? The balloons. =) 

Can't believe my baby is TWO!! I'm a little traumatized if I'm honest. 

Happy Birthday To Me

Today is my birthday. Hmmm.... not so sure how I feel about that this year. To be honest, I'm feeling a little old this time around. I'm 32 today and ... well ... I'm not just thirty anymore. I'm definitely into the thirties and I'm not too sure I like it. My oldest child is starting Kindergarten. Everything feels so strange.

I have had a very nice birthday... my parents had some family over for a get-together Saturday. Sunday we did a birthday/Mother's Day thing with my in-laws and tonight my parents took us to dinner and then my husband took us to ice cream after Malachi's soccer game. All very nice. I got some good gifts and I'm very blessed. But seriously... I think I'm getting old! 

I have been doing a bit of deep thinking the past few months about life. Not really sure what has brought it on, but I have been thinking a lot about what's important in life and WHO is important. My family is - of course - at the top of that list. But what about friends?

I think I'm old enough now to see how some friendships come and go - how some people are a part of your life for a season and then are gone - and some seem to endure. I'm not really got me started thinking about this... I'm sure there was a certain relationship that initially got me started, but for whatever reason, it has continued. What I've really been thinking about is how to decide which relationships are the most important ones?

 Honestly, as I get older and I'm spread thinner and thinner, I don't have time for everyone. I have "friends" in my MOPS group, Bible study, church, bunco, book club, old friends, cousins, etc.... my husband cannot keep track of all my "friends" and gets them all mixed up because there are "too many". But in reality, not all those people are real friends. Not all those people do I entrust with my heart. They are people I know.

One thing I have recently decided in my many musings is that I want to be friends with people who are authentic. I don't want to be friends with people who are afraid to show their real life and projecting an image of having it all together if they really don't. I'm not perfect and my life is not perfect. My kids are definitely not perfect. You might have it a little more together than I do and that's fine, but just be real about it. I have been carefully taking notice of those "friends" surrounding me and wanting to do "playdates" or "hang out". There are lots of nice people out there and I'm happy to hang out with anyone, but which people are authentic? Who is willing to show their real self? I hope I am one of those people. 

I think that through blogging, social media and our culture in general, moms feel this need to show off their best side. We are always comparing our lives. I know people talk about this all the time, but it's true! We show all the good things we're "doing" (look at this awesome cake I just baked and perfectly decorated from Pinterest!), but it's much harder to show the messy bits. Not to say I need to know ALL the messy bits mind you. There is an appropriate limit, I think. =)

Anyway... as I'm look at this year - 32 - I'm trying to be intentional and authentic in my friendships, a mom who spends more time playing on the floor with my kids and less on the computer or in a book, and a wife who is supportive of her husband. Like I said, I'm not perfect. =)

Quick update

I still haven't gotten myself a new computer - which is why I'm still only basically posting book reviews. One of these days....

We've been pretty busy around here lately. At the moment, both of my boys are sick with some nasty bug, which means we are staying home and watching movies and I'm doing millions of loads of laundry... unfortunately. I'm praying I don't catch whatever they have - yuck. Anyway... since they're moving kinda slow today (the 5-year-old is currently sleeping!!) I thought I'd take the opportunity to write a little post.

We celebrated Malachi's 5th birthday party on March 22nd. I can't believe my boy is FIVE! He wanted a Seahawks themed party, so we served Game Day food and he wore his jersey. It was fun. His big gift from us was a new bike. It's SO big. 

We are trying to make decisions on school for Fall, which has been a bit stressful. I want Malachi to attend a public school Montessori school in our area. The complicated part though? We're out of the school district. I was all prepared to use my parents address to give him a higher chance of getting in, but I just couldn't bring myself to lie. If it had been a situation where we were just trying to switch to another regular school in a different district, I think I would have been fine. Since it's by priority though, I felt like I was cheating and decided that if he was really meant to be in that school, it didn't matter where he was on the list, he'd get in. Well.... he's currently on the waiting list. They say there is a lot of movement over the spring and summer, so I guess I'll just have to keep my fingers crossed and if he doesn't get it - well - then it wasn't meant to be. The school in our neighborhood is supposed to be fairly good. Maybe he is just meant to go there. =)

Zach is currently crawling like a crazy-kid. He's into everything. He likes to get in all my cupboards and do things that Malachi never got into. We're still going to physical therapy every couple months, but I think he is definitely making good progress. Maybe he'll walk by his 2nd birthday if I'm lucky! 

His vocabulary is also growing steadily and that's always a fun stage. He's always pointing and saying "look!" everywhere we go. His new thing is that he waves to all "doggies". When we take walks or just see people around town with dogs he waves to the dog - not necessarily to the people. Ha! A veterinarian in our future maybe?

Okay... well,  that's it for the day, I guess. Got to get back to these sickies. 

A Very Hungry Caterpillar Birthday

Months ago, I started planning a Very Hungry Caterpillar birthday party for Zach's 1st birthday. Little did I know how prophetic that choice was going to be. He really is like the Hungry Caterpillar in the way he eats. =)

My mom helped me out a ton with this party. It was meant to be fairly simple considering it's for a one-year-old, but it seems that even simple can be a lot of work. 

His shirt was just a white polo from Target with some felt circles sewn to it. I cut out the circles at work the night before (using my K-Cup as a guide!) and my mom sewed it together today before the party.

My mom made me this adorable tissue-paper garlands. I originally saw it done on another blog, but my moms followed the links to this DIY Tissue Garland. Seriously SO easy (or so it looked when she did it) and it added SO much to our decor. 

I had quite a few of these strung around the house: from the mantle, this one over the couch (on my currently bare wall), over the living room curtains and over the doorway in the dining room. Very colorful. I asked her to do the tissue circles double-layered. The blog I'd seen it on before only used a single layer of tissue and it was very transparent and I wanted a little more solid look.

I also put together a hanging caterpiller out of those tissue paper poms. There are a million tutorials out there, so I won't post one here. I just got red, light and dark green tissue and hung them from the ceiling with some fishing line. I had seen something like this made with hanging paper lanterns, but those things can be kinda expensive... so this was my alternative.

I was very excited about my food table. I researched lots of different parties and everyone had a cute idea. I finally decided on doing some simple foods and making cute little signs with wording from the book on them.

I got the graphics for the from Polka Dots and Puppies blog. (The link to her free printable is listed in the comments - FYI.) I made a little card for each thing for example: "On Saturday he ate through one PICKLE" or "In the light of the moon a little EGG lay on a LEAF". During the week, the caterpillar eats through a bunch of fruits and instead of having them each separate, I mixed them all up into a yummy fruit salad.

Our Hungry Caterpillar Food:

• Small dill pickles
• Mixed fruit salad (apples, pears, plums, strawberries and oranges)
• Watermelon
• Deviled eggs on lettuce leaves
• Salami and Swiss cheese tray with butterfly crackers

For drinks we had iced tea and raspberry lemonade. I got these super cute mason jar lids for another party (which I have to blog about eventually) and had these red striped straws left over from my Red Hot Bunco party.

And lastly - but most importantly - the cake. I am so blessed to have a good friend who decorates cakes and she always makes my boys their birthday cakes and does an awesome job. This year was no exception with this adorable Hungry Caterpillar cake. Isn't he cute!?

So there it is... the Very Hungry Caterpillar Birthday Party. It was fun, simple and fairly cheap. Perfect for a little boy who won't remember it. =)

Nature Walk

This past Monday was my birthday. We had celebrated with family all weekend, so I was trying to think of something to do that was kind of low-key. It has been unseasonably warm here in the Pacific NW this past 10 days or so and I really wanted to get outside to do something! I checked out a few local hiking trails and found one I'd never been too.

Malachi loved it OF COURSE. There were bugs flying around and salamanders swimming in the water (eww!). At first Zach enjoyed his ride on Daddy's back, but about 3/4 through he wanted to be held - by me - the rest of the way around the loop. Oh well. =) It was a very fun trip - we ate lunch at a little picnic area and then walked the trails for a fun family time.

It's a Dinosaur Birthday!

It was a long, hectic day, but I think the kids had fun and it was a success. I spent the morning finishing up my decorations. I loved the tissue paper pom poms from my Red Hot Bunco, so I made some more for the dinosaur party. So easy and they give so much color to the rooms! I also strung streamers around and had some balloons inflated at our local grocery store. I also took the cute dinosaur masks and strung them off the mantle. I kind of forgot to give most of them out at the end of the party - oh well, they looked cute!

My mom made us an adorable tail-less dinosaur that I placed on a big empty wall in the playroom. I was unsure how successful my Pin-the-Tail-on-the-Dinosaur game would be. Although it looked cute, only the older or bravest kids wanted to do it. I gave out a prize to the winner of some of those Grow Your Own Dinosaur capsules from the $1 Store.

After the fact, I've decided that the food was a little difficult. We had three sections of food: Herbivore, Carnivore and Dessertivore. 

Herbivore Menu: 

Fruit tray

Dino Toe Nails (Bugles)

Dino Salad (hummus and veggie stick cups)

Carnivore Menu:

Dinosaur Chicken Nuggets

Mini Corn Dogs

Dessertivore Menu:

Fossil Cookies

Dino Egg Nests

Dino Cakes!

Drinks:

Orange and Green Hawaiian Punch

Most of this I had prepared ahead of time. The cookies and no-bake nest cookies were done the night before. The fruit tray and toe nails didn't require any prep and I had the individual hummus cups prepared a few hours  before. The part that was hard was trying to time the corn dogs and nuggets so that they would be warm! And I only have one oven, so I kept having to throw another couple cookie sheets of food into the oven and then throw them out on the table as they got done.... let's just say I'm not doing something like that again.

One of my good friend's is a cake decorator and she made Malachi's cake. She just started a new job and I wasn't going to ask her to make it, but HE asked her to make him a dinosaur cake! Something I did LAST year and forgot to do THIS year was to scoop my ice cream ahead of time.  What a difference it makes to pre-scoop your ice cream into cupcake liners and then just place them on you cake plates!

For activities we had the Pin-the-Tail-on-the-Dino game, a Dinosaur Egg Hunt and a Dino Dig in Malachi's brand-new sandbox that my husband built for him! 

The kids really seemed to enjoy the egg hunt. I got little plastic buckets at Party City for .99 each and they ran around the yard searching for eggs. The sandbox was the biggest hit though - I almost couldn't keep them out of it! It's huge and we decided that it was going to be his main present from us. He's been in it everyday since!

I have to admit that all his friends were pretty creative with their presents! Malachi got a plethora of dinosaur gifts - all very fun!!

Happy 4th Birthday Malachi!!

Dinosaur Birthday Party Prep

Tomorrow is our big Dinosaur Birthday Party! I've been busy running all over town to get all the necessary supplies and crafting away! I still feel like I have WAY too many things to do and I'm glad I took the day off work today or I'm sure I'd be stressing!!

Here is a little preview of what I've been up to:

Treat bags. I found these colored kraft bags at Michaels in our perfect party colors of orange and lime green. 

I've filled them with: Dino stickers, a dino egg with a dino tattoo inside, dinosaur fruit snacks, a bouncy ball and a green and orange Sixlets. 

Then I folded the tops over and tied them with some raffia I found from our Cowboy Party last year! Hooray for using stuff we already have! I also made some personalized name cards out of green and orange cardstock and printed with a Dinosaur font I downloaded.

Then I made up some little food signs including: Carnivore, Herbivore and Dessertivore. Along with a few specific foods.

And of course, there's a picture of my birthday boy!!

Party Planning & House Painting

Looking ahead to our schedule for March, things are going to get busy! Not only am I planning a super-fun prehistoric dinosaur party for Malachi's 4th birthday (check out these cute invites I ordered!), but I'm also planning a bunco party for the 2nd week of March. Things in the works here are - a sandbox big enough to let 10 kids do a Dino Dig, food ideas and how to pull off a Dino Egg Hunt....

The birthday is not until the end of the month so I was thinking we had plenty of time to get the house fixed up, but now I have two weeks less before this bunco get-together and I want things finished for it. My goal is to have the kitchen/dining room painted, a new curtain rod in the living room and my art up the walls in the two areas.

Yesterday my husband and I stopped to pick up the paint colors for the kitchen/dining rooms. We are renting and so I'm trying to stay with very neutral colors so we don't have to re-paint later. We painted the accent wall last night and I'm already happier with the way this room looks! There is very odd lighting in here, so a picture of the true color is kinda difficult, but here it is.

Next on the list is painting the trim around the door white (I'd really like to paint the door also, but I don't want to get in trouble) and then that other facing wall. The other walls are going to be a different color.

Along with these house updates, I'm frantically trying to plan my bunco party! I was not supposed to be hosting this month, but a series of unfortunate events has led to it. I usually start planning my next bunco theme immediately after I host at my house, which gives me a significant amount of time to gather ideas (like my jane austen party this past September)... this time I have a couple weeks. I decided to go with a super simple theme - but I think I can still make it really fun! I have settled on a Red Hot theme. I'm thinking fiesta themed food (hot). Red candies and decorations. I'm also thinking that instead of voting on the best costume like we usually do, I'll have us vote on the best red accessory... to make it easy, but fun. Here are a couple of my favorite pinterest finds....

Source: theyummylife.com viaElsie on Pinterest

Source: itstaylormade.com viaElsie on Pinterest

So.... I am in party planning mode... I'm actually having a lot of fun with it! I might be stressed in a couple weeks though!

Dinosaurs are coming!

I've been planning Malachi a construction themed birthday party for awhile now. I was actually going to do it LAST year, but the house we were living in at the time wasn't very practical for some of my ideas (sandboxes!). So last year I decided on a Cowboy themed birthday party instead.

Well, I thought this year would be perfect for the construction theme... except when I asked him what kind of party he wanted he enthusiastically said, "Dinosaurs!" Ummmm... okay. I thought I had him convinced for the construction theme, but when I asked him to tell his grandparents and cousins yesterday what his party theme would be he said, "Dinosaurs!". Sooo... apparently we're doing a Dinosaur theme instead. 

I have been frantically researching dinosaur party ideas and I'm actually getting pretty excited. I think there are going to be a lot of really fun activities.

Source: etsy.com via Elsie on Pinterest

More to come... =)

Milestones

I turned 30 today.


It seems like a big deal kind of, but for some reason I wasn't really that into it. Partly, I'm sick. And pregnant. And my job wears me out and so I'm tired. =) 


But still, I turned 30 today.


I spent the day at church and then went to my parents house where we had dinner and some family over. We ate cake and it was a nice, restful, relaxing day. An added bonus - it was actually a NICE day - as in the weather was sunny!


Also on the milestone agenda... I'm 32 weeks! Only 8 weeks to go and the time seems to be flying by! I have a doctors appt tomorrow, so I won't go into anything much about my pregnancy this week until after that, but it does seem like I'm on the homestretch and that I'm not sure if I'm ready to be there yet!

Lastly, I've accepted a new job position at work that would get me out of working in the ER and some much better hours for me and our family - especially after baby. Although, there seems to be a lot of drama going on at work surrounding jobs and such, so I'm kind of waiting to get too excited at this point, as I'm not convinced I'll get to keep it. (But hopefully yes!)

Cowboys and Birthdays

My Little Guy is going to turn 3 on Sunday!!!

On Saturday we're having a Cowboy Birthday Party. =)

Here's a little preview....

I just finished ironing all those bandannas, which will be our napkins for the event.

My mom has sewed us some bandanna pendant banners and we have our stash of mason jars for glasses! I'm excited to see how it all comes together on Saturday!