Birthday Memories

Week 4 in the Me before Mom series asks: How did you celebrate your birthday? Do you have a favorite celebration? Worst? From the cake to the presents to the guests, invite us in to the party.

I don't remember too many big birthdays when I was a kid, so the parties I did have really stand out in my mind. I think my favorite birthday was when I turned 6. My birthday is a few days before Halloween so we had a costume party. My mom found a prom dress at Good Will and, using her mad sewing skills, turned it into a pint sized gown. We were really into country music so I was a salon girl and my brother was a cowboy. I don't just remember the party from the photos. I have vivid memories of bits and pieces of it. We lived in a condo complex and we split up into 2 groups and went on a scavenger hunt. Then we had cake and all the girls stayed for a sleep over.

 

Ahh, the 80's and my mom's feathered hair. Good times. I loved this party. It still makes me warm and fuzzy thinking about it. My pretty costume and my first sleepover will never be forgotten.  

Of course many a birthday passed after that one. There was the birthday in 3rd grade when I got in trouble at school for lying and my party got cancelled. Fast forward to 6th grade and me and my best friend got to go to a New Kids on the Block concert as my present.

Jump 9 more years to my "Not-so-sweet 16" and you can call that my worst birthday on record. In a nut shell, I got a powder blue, '67 rag top, VW bug. I took the day off of school to get my drivers license. I went to school only for my first class, in which I had a test, and then I left. I made an off-hand comment to a teammate on the volleyball team about missing practice, which she told my coach and got me kicked off of the team. My mom had planned a surprise party so, to get me out of the house, my boyfriend and I took my new, old VW and went to dinner at the Olive Garden. On the way home my car died going up a hill and I couldn't get it started. A cop had to block traffic the other way, we pushed the car so it was going downhill and had to pop the clutch to get it going. By now, my awful day had me in tears. We manage to get home and I walk into the party. "SURPRISE" is right, the girl who got me kicked off of the team is at my party. Long story short. Suckiest birthday ever, made worse by the fact that I was a dramatic teenager.

5 years later, I turned 21 in the city where everyone should turn 21, Las Vegas! A bunch of my friends from work decided to drive up with us, so we were rolling 10 deep in the casino. I was so sassy with my burgundy bob! I can't remember how many shots I ingested, exactly, but I managed to not get sick. I wish I could say the same for my friend who puked at the Black Jack table. I was so mortified that we grabbed our chips and cashed out! I did win $250 bucks on a slot machine and was the star of a song at the NY NY dueling piano bar.

 

 

On my 26th birthday, the Red Sox broke the 86 year curse and won the World Series. My hubby is convinced I broke the curse, and who am I to argue with his logic? My 30th birthday was spent watching Coldplay live with my bestie Joelle. I have some fun plans for my 35th birthday so stay tuned! I love birthdays. I think it is like having your own holiday. It is your day, the day you came into the world. I don't think I will ever stop wanting to celebrate or at least acknowledge it, no matter how old I get! 

Princess Birthday Party!

My baby turned 3 last week. After I finished crying about the fact that my BABY was going to be 3, I went to work planning her Princess Party. She had been asking for a castle cake for 7 months, so I assumed she was serious. I wanted it to be fun and whimsical and not too character focused. It came together exactly as I  had hoped!

The dessert table was centered around the gorgeous cake my sister in-law's bakery, Treats on Washington, made. They amaze me every time with their gorgeous, detailed work!

I re-purposed a frame from Goodwill and prettied it up with some spray paint, fabric and added Princess Arielle's initial to it. The best part is, it is now hanging in her room! I covered some cardboard hat boxes from Jo-Ann craft store in scrapbook paper and topped them with a fun dress form jewelry holder.

The wands were part of the girls' party favors and were hand made by me and my good friend Liz. She saved me with some last minute crafting help!

The other part of the favors were the felt crowns. I had so much fun making these. The girls seemed to love them too. Apparently my little one wasn't the only one who went to sleep in theirs that night !

The activities included decorating their own cookies,

picking out and showing off their royal jewels,

getting the tiniest princess press-on nails I have ever seen (which stayed on a total of 6.2 seconds) and coloring princess pictures. All the while, music from Disney princess movies was playing in the background. I admit to singing along and dancing like it was my own royal ball!

As I watched my sweet 3 year old girl blow out her candles, I had to smile and wipe my eyes. She might not be a baby any more, but she will always be MY baby.

 

Quick run down of the who's, what's and where's:
Invitation: Made by me with princess clip art from Pretty Grafik on Etsy
Pom pom garland: Martha Stewart bought from Amazon.com
Dress form, crafting supplies and princess coloring pages: Jo-Ann craft store
AMAZING Cake: Treats on Washington in Boston, MA
Felt wand inspiration: Make things for Kids
Felt Crown inspiration: Curly Birds
Arielle's Princess dress: Amazon
Rock Candy and candy pearls: Sweet Indulgence
Sweet little blue bird: Middleburg Folk Art Studio (it is actually something I bought for her room when she was a baby) 

Wild Kratts Birthday Party!

Nate turns 5 tomorrow but we had his party on Sunday. He loves the show Wild Kratts so we decided to run with that theme! There was a lot of Pinterest browsing for this party! I had a good time pinning away and, as you will see, used a lot of good ideas that I found. I decided to make Nate's invite myself in Photoshop. I found a couple of images online and then did the rest.

We had the party at an awesome playground called the ImPossible Dream. It is actually the only fully handicap accessible playground in RI! The had a room that is inside the playground and it was a perfect spot to have our party. I tend to go a little nuts for birthdays and I saw some friends on FB post about an amazing local woman, Stacie of Stace Your Face,  who does face painting. I noticed that she was especially good at animal faces so I booked her for the party! Of course the rebel birthday boy was all about being Spiderman instead of an animal, but I let it go. It WAS his birthday after all! Luckily all but 1 other child decided to rock the wild life look! I set up a "photo booth" and took a picture of each child right after they got their faces done! For the favors I made each child a Wild Kratts vest complete with attachable creature power discs!

My sister in-law owns a bakery in Boston called Treats on Washington and they made my son's birthday cake! It was a creature power disk with a cheetah on it. He was very impressed..and so was his stinker of a sister who took a bite out of the side before it was time to sing. Clever turning of said side away from the camera and walla, you can't even tell! Grr.

The kids had a great time. We didn't get to play the games I planned, but I suppose it was a lofty goal to get 15 kids to do anything at the same time! Instead, they ran and played in the huge enclosed playground and had a blast!

I am proud of the fact that I managed to get into 2 pictures this time! I had to ask someone to take them, but I stepped out from behind the camera for a minute so when my kids look back, they know I was actually there! Do you like my "snow leopard" shirt. I use quotes because I have no idea if that's what it is. I found it and A's cheetah pants while getting other things at Walmart. Gotta love trashy Walmart for its availability of $4 animal print shirts and $3 kid's cheetah leggings!

It was an amazing day and I would recommend this park to anyone. They are open to the public 7 days a week too! Now for a quick rundown of all of the party stuff:

Animal print balloons: Amazon
Birthday Banner: Made by me with animal print paper, sticky foam letters and twine
Cake Inspiration: A Mom Photographer's Crazy Life
Vest Inspiration (I used fleece and felt and just measured Nate to figure out the dimensions):Mom Endeavors
Cake Made by: Treats on Washington (in Brighton MA)
Amazing Face Painting: Stace Your Face
Animal plates: Walmart in the paper goods (not party) section
Photo booth: Made by hubby out of plywood and covered with zebra fabric from Jo-Ann

Arielle waddles into 2!! Purple Penguin Birthday

Some beautious girl went and turned 2! I'm not sure what makes her think she can just keep growing when I clearly wish to freeze her in the uber cuteness that she is right at this moment. Oh well, that's what blogging is for, right??

Lil' Miss Arielle has a penchant for penguins, so I thought I'd take remove the Christmasy vibe and go with a cute purple, black and white theme for her party. I made the invites in Photoshop and then ran from there with the color scheme.

I wanted it to be cute without looking too grown up. She is only two, you know. I was thrilled with how everything came out. We decided to make it easy on ourselves and do catered sandwiches and picnic salads instead of trying to make food. This was the best idea ever. I can't tell you how many parties we have had at our house when people are arriving and I am still not even dressed because I am still cooking or putting things together. Shut up. I am not a procrastinator. Ok, maybe a little. Anyway, it was a life saver! I made cake pops, candy dipped pretzel sticks and had fresh fruit, dark chocolate kisses and oreos. My amazing Sister-in-law owns a bakery in Boston called Treats on Washington. Her bakery made Arielle's cake and it was amazing!

Without further ado, here are the pictures from the party!

 It was an amazing 60 degrees on the day of her party, so all of the kids were running around outside...minus the time they were destroying my family room. For party favors, I got the super cute penguin boxes on Etsy and I made felt penguin masks for the kiddos and then gave them little sticker books. I made Arielle's party shirt and I'm glad I took a few pictures before she proceeded to ruin it with Oreos and all kinds of other mess! The penguin clip came from another Etsy shop. (I love supporting handmade when I can!) I made the table surround out of 2 pieces of fabric that I simply pinned together. The best part is, I can reuse the fabric...I see a purple dress in Arielle's future.

Overall, it has to be the most relaxed party I have thrown to date. We kept it small and I did as much as I could in advance. I had a couple other projects that I didn't get to, and I didn't let it bother me. This is big for me. Overachievers have a hard time admitting defeat!

 It was a bittersweet moment watching my baby turn 2. She'll be the last and I don't want the baby to fade into childhood too quickly. Happy birthday Puddin Pie!

Birthday Snow and Tutus

Never in my life has it snowed on my birthday. Part of this may have to do with the fact that I was a West coast girl until I was 26. The other part is, snow has no place in October. None. It is bad enough that it can exist November through March. That being said, I have no control over the weather. Surprising, I know.

I turned 33 Thursday. That's 396 months, as my lovely friend Liz pointed out. It snowed a bit on Thursday and then we got 3 inches of snow Saturday night. I still don't believe it. I am usually in the "Can't beat 'em, join 'em" camp, so this year I will stop fighting and embrace the snow...for my kids' sake only.

Nate was so excited to see the snow, so I dressed both kids up in their winter gear for the first time this year and we headed into the back yard. Nate mostly threw himself on the ground on purpose and Arielle spent her time falling after every 2 steps. Poor, uncoordinated child of mine.

As if snow wasn't bad enough to wake up to on Sunday, I had a 5k to run. Liz and I did the Monster Dash which ran through downtown Providence. It was freezing and, as you can see, we were wearing tutus. Most people dressed in costumes. It was hilarious to run up behind someone who was running in an ape costume with a fake bum hanging out. This was my 2nd 5k this month. The first one I finished in 28:44 (9 min 17 second pace) and I was thrilled for my first race. This time Liz and I ran together and in the freezing cold, with tutus on, we still finished in 30:09 (9 min 42 second pace). I am happy with that! We are going to train for a half marathon. I know I can do it, but it will be a long road to next August! 

That was my weekend in a nutshell. Next I tackle Halloween and attempt to get a 23 month post in for Arielle before the poor girl turns 2!