Toddler TIme!

Jillian turned one on Saturday- she's now officially a toddler!

Her chunky butt self just loved the cake!

Homemade high chair banner.

Homemade table decoration. Both things were made from stuff I already had on hand- aren't I just so frugal.

And what would a birthday be without a homemade cake?

Of course she liked the wrapping paper way better than any of the presents (don't mind her outfit- my husband gave her a bath due to her slathering cake all over herself and he picked out clothes that did not match).

Bye bye baby Jillian and hello I'm-going-to-drive-you-crazy-by-getting-into-everything Jillian!

Three...

My little Alli is now a big three year old. She is the sweetest girl you've ever met until you cross her and then she turns into a street thug- if she were allowed to use scissors she would probably cut you. Out of all of the cool stuff she got for her birthday she was most excited about the Airheads candy my mom gave her- kids are weird.

This year she requested a Tinkerbell cake so I obliged- compared to the Angry Birds cake I made for my son's birthday this one was a walk in the park.

Another kids birthday down and one more to go this year- Jilly Billy turns one in November. Then not too long after that I turn thirty and will be old- at least that is what I thought when I was a teenager, once you hit thirty you were an old fart. Old fart-dom here I come!

Angry Birds Birthday Party

Today was the big day- my son's birthday party. The weather was great (though a little hot) and everyone seemed to have fun.

Here is the cake. This cake took me a loooong time to decorate. I now hate frosting.

How can you have an Angy Birds birthday party without a life sized game of Angry Birds?

These balls also took me a looong time to make but unlike the cake we will have them forever (or at least until my kids find a way to destroy them). I used this tutorial but decided on playground balls because I wanted something a little more heavy duty.

The boxes are just random boxes that I wrapped in craft paper.

The kids loved it. My son thought I was a pretty cool mom so my hard work was totally worth it.

Here is one of the goodie bags. My son was more excited about the goodie bags than the cake. How annoying considering the cake kept me up till 3 am and these goodie bags took half an hour to make.

So the party was a success and I am one tired mama.

Birthday Prep is Sucking the Life Out of Me...

photo credit

Please forgive me for my lack of posting- my son's birthday party is tomorrow and I have been running around trying to get everything done that I need to get done. I need to make a mental note for next year to not wait until two weeks before the party to start getting stuff together.

So far I have made the ten Angry Bird balls, covered a butt-load of boxes with craft paper for the life sized Angry Birds game, made the Angry Birds goodie bags and stuffed them with cool stuff (bubbles, Goldfish crackers, fruit snacks, ring pops, Angry Birds stickers and craft kits), filled the Angry Birds pinata with lots of teeth rotting candy, reserved the bounce house, ordered the calzone and pizza for the party and bought all miscellaneous table wear and food.

Oh yes, and then there is the cake. Unlike years past where I have waited until getting home from work on Saturday night to bake the cake therefore making it necessary for me to stay up until two in the morning decorating it, this year I baked the cake yesterday and crumb coated it so that tonight when I get home I can jump right into decorating. This will be by far the most time intensive cake I have done. They don't make Angry Birds cake pans so there was no lazy way out for me. I had to dust off my creative brain cells and come up with my own design. Six batches of homemade cake and a double batch of homemade frosting later I am very excited about how the cake is looking, though it weighs a ton! Now I just have to try and not screw it up with sub par decorating and then hope we don't drop it when we transport it outside for the party (I would literally die if that happened- die).

All of this is for my son who is turning five- I can't wait to see his face when everything is set up for his party. His happiness makes my stress and lack of sleep all worth it. Once his big day is over, Alli's third birthday is only a month away but luckily she isn't in school yet and doesn't have any friends so her big day will be much smaller and more manageable. After that I don't even have to think about birthdays until Jilly Billy turns one in November.

Angry Bird-Day Party Countdown...

When asked what kind of birthday party he wanted, my son replied "Angry Birds".

I have until May 20th to make it happen. 

The first step was the invitations which I made because I am crazy and enjoy crafty stuff like that. Next I am going to make Angry Bird playground balls and paint boxes brown and gray- all for a life sized game of Angry Birds for the kids to play at the party.

Then it is onto coming up with an idea for the cake. They don't make Angry Birds cake pans so it's all on me to come up with something cool. Then I will pray that I can pull it off when I get home from work that Saturday because the party is on a Sunday- I predict I will be up until 2 am and be covered in frosting.

And on top of the stuff I'm making I have to decide what kind of food we're having (and order it- we decided that grilling for everyone is too much of a hassle), buy snacks and drinks, make favor bags and buy stuff to fill them, reserve the bouncy house and buy miscellaneous party supplies (plates, utensils, cups, napkins, table covers, etc). Oh yes, and we just have to have a pinata because the birthday boy made a special request.

Sixteen days and counting...

Another Birthday, Another Cake...

My little princess turned two this weekend and she really, really wanted a Buzz Lightyear cake so like the sucker good mom I am I labored all night to make her this cake. She absolutely loved it and gave me a big hug and said "thank you mommy" when she saw it. Awww, I'll try to remember her being so sweet when she is throwing her next monumental tantrum.

Here is the birthday girl, my little fashionista. As you can tell I like to vicariously live through her when it comes to dressing cute.

This is my son trying to be cute- why is it that whenever I tell him to smile for the camera he has to pose like a weirdo?

MMMMM, cake.

My Creation...

So here it is- my son's birthday cake (please disregard the writing in the left bottom corner of the cake- I ran out of frosting and had to use the crappy tubed stuff last minute).

My son really wanted another Spiderman cake this year but the Wilton pan I used last year wasn't going to be enough cake for everyone at the party. That is where the sheet cake comes in.

I made two sheet cakes and the plopped Spiderman on top (one of the sheets fell in on itself when I was putting it on the board so I had to fill it in with a ton of icing- that is the part I wrote on and I did not let anyone eat it so I could hide that fact that I am dumb).

I did cheat this year and instead of making the cake from scratch I lazied out and used five boxes of Duncan Hines devils food cake mix. I made the butter cream frosting from scratch though and completely hand decorated the cake so I suppose I somewhat redeemed myself in my mind.

I wasn't outside when my husband brought the cake out but he said all of the adults thought it looked awesome. The kids went wild over it and of course when I cut it they each had a request for exactly what piece they wanted. Most importantly though, my son thought it was really cool.

I am proud that I followed through and finished the God forsaken cake and am so glad that I (hopefully) will never have to make a monstrous sized Spiderman cake again.

I Am Still Alive

The past few days have been a whirlwind and I have neglected to post anything.

On Thursday night I became really sick and pretty much spent the whole day Friday on the couch in fetal position only getting up to run to the bathroom and dry heave (tmi, I know). I didn't go to work on Saturday because I was still feeling sick but I mustered up enough energy to go grocery shopping for my son's birthday party. When I got home from the store I thought I was feeling better but then started feeling dizzy and got a horrible case of the chills so I laid on the couch for a few hours, much to my detriment because I was supposed to start making my son's birthday cake. I do want to say that I didn't have anything contagious- I have Crohn's Disease which is a chronic digestive disease so basically whenever I eat something bad my body overreacts- a normal person may just get an upset stomach or not have a symptoms wheras my body acts as if I ate nuclear waste. This is why I am so careful about making sure food is cooked properly and that I don't eat anything that has been sitting our for too long.

Once I rested and finally felt better I started making the cake at around 6 o'clock. Eight hours later at 2 am I finally got to go to sleep. I had to make two sheet cakes (45 minutes each in the oven) , a Spiderman cake mold (about 30 minutes in the oven) and at least six batches of butter cream frosting. I only had one sheet cake pan so I had to cool the first one for a bit and then wash the pan before I could cook the second one. I am sure if I were more organized the whole endeavor would have taken less time but alas I am not so it is what it is.

Yesterday was the party and everything went wonderful. All of the kids came from my son's class along with their moms and all of my family was there- everyone seemed to have a great time. The weather also ended up being nice so the kids got to run around the whole time playing on the swing set, in the sand box and in the bouncy house (the bouncy house was well worth the money to rent it because the kids loved it). And thankfully I felt a lot better too, just a little weak because I hadn't eaten for two days.

Today I am going to try and post my recent shopping trips and a picture of the ginormous cake I made that took eight hours out of my life that I will never get back. Oh yeah, I am also going to stuff my face with all of the leftover food from the party because I'm starving and think I lost a few pounds (sorry baby in my belly!). And I guess I'll take care of my kids in between all of that.

Birthday Anxiety

My son turns four on May 21st and to celebrate I have decided to have a real party for him. By real party I mean I am inviting his little friends from school along with our neighbors and their kids and our family.

I rented a bounce house but am having a bit of anxiety of what else to do. We are going to have our usual cook out, a pinata and cake (my son wants a Spiderman cake again- how boring) but the party is from 1 to 4 pm and what else do I do to keep the kids entertained? I have never been to a kids birthday party before, other than over over twenty years ago when I was a kid, so I don't know what it is that people do when they have kids parties at their houses.

I know I'm over thinking this- I mean four year old kids have fun just doing their own thing, but at the same time I don't want his party to suck. Plus, the kids' parents will be there so I want to make sure that they don't have an awful time. And to top it off, if it rains that day I will completely freak out because what the heck do you do for an indoor birthday party?

If anyone has ever had a kids birthday party please enlighten me to what I can do to make my son's first real party decent. Please.