kirstencan

Monkey's Seventh

My baby is seven.  For you newer moms or not-yet moms, I'll bet you get tired of everyone saying how fast the time goes.  But it goes SO FAST.

When I started this blog, this kid had just turned 1. He was my baby.  He's still my baby.  But he's seven.

We got him a set of Makedo and a bunch of boxes we'd been saving for him to build with.

Makedo is as cool as everyone says it is.  For the right kid, anyway.  This kid is STOKED about it.

He is also pretty excited about these snap circuits.  When one project played Happy Birthday to him - that was just a bonus.

He chose donuts for breakfast, a trip to the library before lunch (deviled eggs with leftover piroshki), and pizza for dinner with Grandma, Grandpa and Aunt Kellie.

His birthday shirt:

Not the best picture - but he draws dragons all the time.  In fact, he has a notebook he titled '[Monkey]'s book of Deadly Dragons' and he regularly adds new ones.  So I made a freezer paper stencil based on a two-headed dragon he drew.  He critiqued the placement of the eyes, but otherwise approves.  That's okay, he critiqued his monkey birthday shirt, too.

More building.  And he still wears the birthday crown Grandma made him when he turned two.  All my kids get their crowns out and wear them all day on their birthdays.

He is such a random, creative, silly stinker of a kid.  You never can predict him.  Those deviled eggs he asked for lunch?  He originally asked for them to be in a pinata. 

I know.

We love him to pieces.

He blew out the candles in his coconut cream pie before the birthday song was over.  Typical.

And Grandma and Grandpa brought him more boxes.  So this is what my living room looked like last night after they left. 

We're so classy.

We need an inventing room...

Happy Stuff

It was a fun weekend, full of tutus, cat ears, glitter (and lots of driving).

The performances were wonderful.

So fun to see my girl performing in a ballet we've seen together six times before.  SIX.  Our first time was when she was only three years old.  And she got to perform one dance en pointe.  That's good happy mom stuff.

My birthday was fun, lots of fun treats and presents and good company. We hadn't planned on a cake (cookies + ice cream instead) until I opened my package from my in-laws.  FUN fun cake stuff!

Isn't that adorable?

One borrowed cake mix later (thanks, neighbors!) and we had super fun little cakes and cupcakes.

And the aftermath.  My sister helped my daughter decorate them. There's no way to describe the bug-cupcake holders adequately - I have to show you.

So fun!  All our cupcakes were looking at us. ;)  Now I'm off to sneak an eye into my daughter's scrambled eggs...

Train museum = Heaven

So that railroad museum?  I can't believe we've never made the effort to go before!  It takes an hour to get there, but it was well worth it!  Especially for the boy who used to spend hours watching Thomas, then hours watching train documentaries and has multiple train sets, loves the model train shows, etc.  Good. Stuff.

Outside they have a bunch of engines/cars* that you can check out/climb on.

Heaven.

Seriously, they climbed all over these things (a breakdown train!).

Oh, yeah, and this boy was wearing his birthday shirt.  I stenciled a shield shape (going with the Knight theme kinda) and decided on Roman numerals for the '9'.  I was worried if I put a regular 9 on it he might not wear it next year, and I'll bet it still fits!

Anyway, I kinda dig how it turned out...

We got to go inside a couple of cars, like this mail car (with a hook for picking up the bags! My kids didn't know what that was, but I did - cartoons?).  I loved all the sorting bins and cubbies.  We also saw a hospital car (which included an amputation saw...).

Did I mention you could climb all over these things?

We all had a ton of fun (and these are just the outside photos!  We went inside the actual museum, too and it was way cool) and really made this kid's day.

Happy Birthday part Two to the Birthday King!

*A silly pet peeve of mine is when people call engines 'trains'.  Engines PULL trains.  Trains are made up of cars/coaches.  'Thomas the Train' isn't his real name either, I don't know who started that - it's 'Thomas the Tank Engine' (hasn't everyone heard the theme song?).  Silly, right?  That's what I get for watching/overhearing years and years of train dvd's...

Celebrating

After another seriously busy couple of weeks, (my mom says I've been saying that all year...) we are celebrating today.

Most importantly, celebrating this boy, who turned nine yesterday:

He had a lovely family party last night.  He loved the attention, declared himself King (and then Emporer), welcomed us to his quarters, and then demanded we bow to him.

Umm...

But since his bday was on a Sunday, we didn't go out for burgers like he wanted to (wants to - every day), so we're doing a Part Two celebration today.  Aaron took the day off, the birthday shirt was washed so he can wear it again, and we're heading to the train museum followed by Five Guys. 

I'm also celebrating that our Primary program is over! It was yesterday, and since it was my resonsibility, I definitely felt the pressure.  For months.  And then it was over.  That was it?  I was too involved to enjoy it, I think!

Oh well.  And to thank the other members of the presidency and our music leaders (and to celebrate that we were finally done with this!) I made little tissue holders for them and brought them to church yesterday.

They say "In case there are tears today... happy or otherwise!"

(Like I said, I was stressed about it!).

It was actually really relaxing to sit and sew a bit last week.  I haven't made tissue holders for a long time, and forgot how fast and easy they are.  I think I got all of these done in less than 45 minutes.

Sewing is good.

Which reminds me of another project I need to share with you...

To my daughter: Eleven reasons why I love you

1. You have been my go-to wedding reception date since you were about three.  By the way, your dad loves you for this, too. ;)

2. You breathe books and love the library.

3. You practically potty-trained yourself (and taught yourself so many other things).  While this sounds embarassing now, it was HUGE when you were 2 and you made motherhood seem pretty easy.  If you hadn't, you may not have ever had any siblings...

4. You used to look like this:

(2yo)

5. You still love dolls and fairies and dressing up.

6. You think EVERYTHING is fun (unless I asked you to clean something).

7. You don't walk, you dance. Even in public.  And you don't even realize it.

8. Given the choice between Justin Bieber and The Clash, you would pick The Clash every time.

9. You are super responsible and have been such a help to me - especially with your brothers.

10. You like EVERYONE.

11. You have many talents, which makes for lots of fun things to go watch you do.

(Birthday shirt inspired by Erin)

Happy Birthday to my now ELEVEN year old girl!  I can only imagine where the next eleven years will take you.

Hope you have an extra-special day.

Love you!

A Miyazaki Birthday

I had another party for Monkey all planned.  It was going to rock.  And then not too long ago, he said he really wanted 'a Miyazaki party'.

Yeah, so that's pretty much the coolest thing I've ever heard a five year old say.  I couldn't say no.  I did make sure he understood that a lot of his friends weren't familiar with these movies, but he was okay with that (we're huge fans - and his coolest friends are, too).  So the planning started all over (yay!).

You know I carved some stamps for the invites (soot sprite, Totoro, log).  I'm really happy with how the front turned out - it has lyrics from the opening title of Totoro plus 'Happy Birthday' in Japanese.

Aaron said, 'I think you've had more fun getting ready for this party than any of the other ones.'  I don't know - the last two were both such fun, too, but I LOVED getting ready for this party!

(Green is his fave color).

Totoro cut-outs!  Thanks to my sister and brother who spent an afternoon (or two) helping me paint them.

And see the birthday shirt I painted (inspired by one I found online that doesn't come in kids' sizes).  It's such a happy shirt!

I had fun cutting out lots of little totoro for a couple buntings, and created a big tree inspired by the Camphor tree in Totoro.  Monkey wanted something that looked like 'the place where Mei meets Totoro.'

The poster was a birthday gift, too (ordered from amazon).

We had soot sprites (dust bunnies) hiding in all the corners.  

The table was covered with butcher paper and stamped with our Totoro stamps, plus wooden acorns and origami cranes.

I love background music at parties, so we bought some songs from this album to play - they're so pretty!

The table was set up for our first activity:  making shrinky dink Totoro and acorn lucky charm necklaces. 

Then they played a game with the polka dot balloons (while I baked and assembled the necklaces), and then we transferred the pompom soot sprites down the line with spoons (and laughing to get rid of them).

Then we had a guest appearance by Kiki!  My daughter gladly dressed up in a last-minute Kiki costume and had the kids help her find Jiji (her black cat made out of paper).  Then they hid him again and again.

Next we cut, colored, pasted and drew to add friends to Ponyo's mural.

A quick (and crazy and slightly violent) game of freeze dance and then we were ready for opening presents.

Before cake was served we had everyone put on leaf hats like Totoro does in the rain.  The kids looked so cute!

I've been wanting to make a Totoro or catbus cake for YEARS!

We also had chips and Soot SPRITE to drink - get it?

We had a few extra minutes, so I put the Totoro movie on while we waited for parents to arrive.

The guests were sent home with Japanese coloring/writing books and a stamped goody bag with treats (and their necklaces).

My mom picked up the books, treats, and little erasers for me from Daiso when she was in California recently, so that worked out perfectly (for me - Thanks!).

We had a great day, Monkey was excited to have all his friends over, and they all had fun.  In fact, a mom of one of the guests stopped me the next day to report that her daughter said it was the best party she'd ever been to!

Yes!!! *fist pump*

Happy 6th Birthday, Monkey!

And thank you, Mr. Miyazaki, for such amazing films and wonderful inspiration for a magical party!

Ready set let's go!

Monkey is having a birthday next week!  And since it's a 'friend-party' year I'm having SO much fun getting ready.  Also because he picked an awesome theme.

So far it's lots of paper...

... some ink, cardboard and paint, and a little elastic thread.

If anyone can guess the theme already they get a gold star and fifty Kirsten Bucks!

35 today

A big, round-ish number.

Yikes.

However.  I'm so happy where I am. 

That is good.

And a lot of my friends I've met online are a bit older than me and such wonderful, creative, beautiful people they are.  They're still cool.  Makes getting older less scary, really.

I just wish the little gray hairs would stop popping up.

Also, I had two cool age-related compliments recently.

Yesterday, one of my neighbors who knows me fairly well called to tell me early Happy Birthday and asked 'Are you even 30 yet?'

Booyah.

A couple weeks ago I was getting my hair cut at a new salon, and tried to bring up 'my 10 year old daughter's hair' to get some free advice (because oh my goodness, her hair is... a lot).  My stylist stopped and was like, "You have a 10 year old??  How old are you?"  And was surprised.

So that's good.

My big present (besides couches, which we're having the hardest time shopping for) is Aaron taking the day off work.  Right now he and the boys are off getting my birthday donuts.  I'm going to head downstairs and check out the banner the kiddos surprised me with and then get a nice sugar high.  Then we're off on a field trip to the planetarium, and later out to dinner together. 

Because my birthday is a family holiday. 

It's a Lego Birthday!

You're not surprised, right?  :)

Thomas got to have a friend party this year, and a Lego theme was chosen way back in June when I was stuck in bed... and planned the whole thing.

For invitations I knew I wanted to somehow incorporate photos of his Lego minifigures.  Shutterfly sent me an offer for 10 free cards, so that was what I decided to do.  I had fun taking some shots of his favorite little toys.  Quite frankly, the $5.99 shipping for these was quite a bit more than I have spent on invites before, but they turned out cute and were great quality.

And of course there was a birthday shirt.  Involving 8 Lego minifig's for a new 8 year old.

For decorations we put some Duplo (since they're bigger I thought that visually they'd look better) in mason jars for balloon weights.  We also set up the Duplo castle stuff on the school cubbies.

The girl made the '8' sign.  We also hung our traditional birthday buntings and got out all of our Lego books.

Sharpie-drawn faces on the yellow cups livened the table up a lot.  We went with cupcakes again (with circle-punched photos for the toppers).  I thought the Lego Creator gameboard made a cool centerpiece.

Also I thought it would be cool to make a Lego baseplate inspired table runner.  A marker cap dipped in green acrylic paint stamped on green cotton did the trick.  I did think about ironing it... and didn't. ;)

My kids all did some Duplo stamping as well, to make wrapping paper!

The goodie bags were minifig inspired as well (sharpies are cool).

In the 'racing room' we made up a ramp the morning of the party.  A folding table from the basement (half-folded) with cardboard duct-taped to the end and painter's tape to make lanes.  I dug out the checkered flag bunting from Thomas' 4th bday (can't believe I kept it!) and taped it on the sides and we were good to go.

When the guests arrived they were welcomed by the guest of honor and checked in by his big sister.  They had to pick up their official builder's passes.

After I designed these I printed them as photos and trimmed them up.  The lanyards I got as a set of 10 on eBay for a couple of dollars.  My kids had different versions of these.  Thomas' had 'Official VIP Builder's pass' and a star with 'birthday boy' on it.  Monkey had 'Official builder's pass & little brother of the VIP' and the girl had 'Assistant Race Coordinator'. 

We set up one of our Lego tables and some of our Lego bricks in the living room.  The kids grabbed some wheels and got busy building.  Some of the racers they made were quite impressive.

I plugged my camera into the TV and played a slideshow of Legoland photos while they were building.

Then they raced!

They would run back to the 'building room' to make improvements and then come back and race some more.  We didn't really keep track or anything, just whoever wanted to race raced. 

They got star stickers on the back of their badges color-coordinated for places (gold -1st, silver - 2nd, blue - tie) but it was way casual.  We did try a little tournament at the end, but they weren't super competitive about it.  They just wanted to make cool cars.

After cake and presents we turned on the Clutch Powers dvd, which most of the boys hadn't seen, so it calmed the hyperness down quite a bit.  But they kept building and racing until I kicked them out.

The birthday boy made sure everyone got their goodybag, which I forgot to take a photo of the contents of until just now - so it's not quite right.

A lego minifigure (I already threw away all the packaging), a tub of playdoh, a mini postcard from Legoland, fruitsnacks, and a little coloring book.  I thought those turned out cute.  The cover I printed as a photo.

Inside are little minifig coloring pages I found online.

The party was a success, I think everyone had a great time. 

Especially this kid.

I don't know if you can tell or not... ;)

Happy Birthday to my awesome 8yo.  You are amazing.

8 is Great!

 

Oh, and here's an 'after' photo. 

Boys.

The Awesome 80's Bash

I feel the need to mention that this 80's party was not about any kind of pop star, High School Musical, Hannah Montana, Jonas Brothers, or any other 'tween' interests.  Nothing like that.  At.  All.

Thank goodness.

Seriously, my girl loves 80's music.  Started years ago with Material Girl and We've Got the Beat and was solidified with Cyndi Lauper and the Bangles (I believe I've mentioned Manic Monday here before!).  Really?  A lot of good, fun girl bands happened in the 80's, so I think it's way fun, too.  And for the record, she also totally digs the Cure, the Ramones, and the Clash... I could go on.  So, boy bands, too.

Anyway!  This party has kept me busy for a while!  Besides the invitations, I made record bowls: 

New, matchy bunting tied with scraps:

And embellished with wallet-sized photos and stars.

Ribbon barrettes for favors:

You remember these barrettes, right?  I totally wore them when I was little.  I was originally going to make cassette tape sugar cookies for favors and had emailed Ann for advice several times (thanks, Ann!), but when Lori pointed out these, I had to go with the barrettes.

Also, I thought it might be faster/easier.  That's debatable. I wish I would have had time to do both.

 

I packaged them on little cards in cellophane bags, tied with scraps, too.

They were surprisingly hard to make.  Luckily I had my mom and sister to help out (and my mom to actually figure them out and start all of them for us).  I believe my sister's exact words were 'Are you sure this is easier than sugar cookies?  I kinda hate you right now.'

That's just cuz we made 24 of them.

I also whipped up a 'Women of 80's Pop/Rock' mobile.  Because the Supermonkey mobile was so fun to make.

This one is not quite as cool...

In the above shot you can see Joan Jett, Madonna, and Tiffany.  Not pictured are the Bangles, Blondie, and Pat Benetar.  All faves of the girl.

 
I put together some giant posters.  I used this site to turn some images into awesomely huge ones that I could print/trim/tape together to make giant posters. 

One for the dining area:

 

And one over the couch.  Good ol' Cyndi.

Right before the party started I got a little nervous.  Everything was ready.

The treats were on the table, pink lemonade made, posters hung, etc.  But what if this didn't work?  What if no one wanted to sing?

What if they thought the silly inflatable guitars (also Target) were too silly to play with?

I shouldn't have worried.  It rocked. They sang (and sang).  They played with the guitars and danced and fist-pumped. The adults laughed and laughed.

When the girls arrived they got to pick out some accessories - the ones I stumbled upon at the Target Dollar Spot last summer - because that's when the ideas for this party started flowing (I know - nerd!).  The day after we decided on the theme, I found fingerless gloves, buttons, and clearance jelly bracelets there.  It was meant to be.

They had to earn their buttons, though - by singing!

They got to have purple streaks put in their hair (wash out, of course), the crimper was plugged in and ready to use, and we added tulle bows and scrunchies around a few side-ponytails.

 

The girls looked awesome.  We had textbook 80's bangs, Morrissey and Tiffany concert tshirts, big hoop earrings, wig + aviator glasses, the works.  LOTS of jean jackets were hanging up and most opted for the skirt/legging combo.  I would've, too.

We used the Singstar (80's version) game for our karaoke.  My parents have several Singstar games and we love playing them when everyone gets together.  The advantages to Singstar over traditional karaoke are that they show the real music videos behind the words (ha!  HILARIOUS!), which is entertaining, but also a little more interesting for everyone to watch.  And since everyone faces the TV, instead of staring at the singers, it's good for shy singers.  Not that we had any of those.  And then everyone just gets up and sings all together, which was awesome.  Singstar also has party mode settings - like 'pass the mic', which we did a few rounds of.

The girls signed up for turns - it filled up fast!  By the end, though, everyone just sang all together - adorable and oh, so loud.

We got the girls away from the mics long enough to take some shots in our playroom photo-op setup (Thanks, Whitney for bringing the frame!!!).  They hammed it up quite nicely.  We'll be printing some of those for thank you cards.

After presents and 'cake' (the girl requested a pile of donuts), the girls sang and sang some more.  Until their parents dragged them away.  Or I kicked them out.

It was awesome.

My husband asked, "Who had more fun, you or the girls?"

The girls.  Which is how it should be.

But it was a close call.

p.s. Monkey cut some of the balloons off today.  They'll come down one of these days, right?