Or should I say, “Happy Kim Kardashian gets a divorce day” or “Happy Jessica Simpson really is preggers day!”

No, I’ll just say Happy Halloween!  Because it felt like this day was never going to get here.  We have been celebrating all week long. I’m officially exhausted.  But my little UPS truck driver and my adorable pink Minnie Mouse had a blast.  Now I’m going to put my feet up, throw on some mindless television, and sneak a couple of those Reese’s cups from the plastic pumpkins.  See you tomorrow.

Happy Birthday to my awesome husband.

We recently celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary and I gushed all about this man. And he deserves all the goopy gushing he can get.  He is my one and only.  And it’s because he puts up with me.  He’s my rock.  He’s also the greatest father.  He has that magic touch to always calm my son’s nerves and to bring down my tantruming 3 year old daughter in a single bound.

So, a big happy birthday to our super hero.  You deserve a day that’s all about you for a change.  Thank you for putting up with all us crazies: the tiny drama queen, the worrier, and the one who can’t even bake a birthday cake without reading the directions out loud.

We love you.

I wrote about Daniel’s “Cars and Trucks and Things That Go” birthday celebration HERE, but I needed a new entry to talk about one of the most important party elements: The goody bag!

It’s so funny because I do not remember the goody bag being a critical part of any of my birthday parties growing up.  Now it is a staple. My kiddies know that they will get some sort of treat at the end of a party.  It’s now expected.  So rather than wonder about it and think it’s ridiculous, I decided to embrace it and have fun with it.

Since it’s back-to-school time, I included a small bag of “Cars and Trucks and Things That Go” themed school supplies:

I bought the cellophane treat bags with ties at Hobby Lobby.  The transportation notepads are from Dollar Tree.  The cool transportation erasers are from Amazon.  The pencils and pencil sharpeners are from Oriental Trading.  The pencils were personalized with “Daniel’s 5th Birthday” and they are really inexpensive propecia generico.

I also included a Truck Pez Dispenser, a transportation puffy sticker sheet, and a Matchbox car.

I bought brown paper gift bags and transportation “Thank You” tags from Etsy’s Stitches by Susan.  I traced each child’s initial on colorful wrapping paper and glued it on the front of each bag.  I stuffed each bag with the same style tissue paper and Voila!

Now I have six months to plan my daughter’s birthday party.  I think I have set the bar a bit high.  Uh oh.

Once we decided on the theme for Daniel’s 5th birthday party, Annabel would walk around talking about Daniel’s “Cars and Trucks and Things That Go Birthday Celebration!”   It was the “celebration” part that always cracked me up.  And she was right.  It was a CELEBRATION.

This was the first time we had a kids party at our house.  Daniel’s August birthday in Florida will always be a challenge.  It’s so hot and it’s (usually!) hurricane season.  (I’m sorry friends and family up north!) Last year we did the Pump it Up gym, so this year we wanted to try something new.  I know five year old boys want to run and play and be outside, so we decided to take our chances and have an outdoor party.  We ordered the bounce house, tent, tables, and chairs and I even found a cool mist fan.  I also planned activities for our enclosed patio and the food stations were inside the house.

The fun for me is always the theme and the details.  I love to plan the decorations, crafts, food, cake, and goody bags. Daniel is obsessed with his cars and trucks, so we knew that was to be incorporated.  He is also obsessed with Richard Scarry’s Cars and Trucks and Things That Go book.  We were going to do a Richard Scarry theme, but it was easier to make it the generic “Cars and Trucks and Things That Go.”  The colors would be primary.  Red, yellow, green (for a traffic light), and blue (Daniel’s favorite color.)

I found these super cute “Birthday Traffic” invitations on Tiny Prints.  Once the invites were out, it was time to plan the fun!

I found this city directional sign on Oriental Trading.  It was for their camp VBS program, but it worked out great as our front door welcome sign. Hubbie found the glitter letters at Michaels.

I made this birthday wreath with a foam base that I wrapped with colored ribbon and decorated with painted wood cars that I also found at Michaels.

Okay, let me say here that I love coming up with the party ideas more than I love the actual execution.  I got the idea for the door wreath HERE and I loved it because it seemed so simple.  And it WAS simple until the ribbon started unraveling and the wood pieces started falling off five minutes after I hung it on the front door.  It’s my fault because I used double sided tape instead of glue. It looked great as a finished product on the table, but once it hit the hot door and the Florida wind, forget it.  I managed to keep it together with pins for 20 minutes, but once all the guests arrived, I brought it inside.  The same thing happened with the directional sign.  Every five minutes, another glitter letter fell off.  I should have used super glue to adhere the letters instead of relying on the stickers alone.

The rest of the decorations remained intact.  Thank goodness.  Etsy is my new favorite website for party ideas and party orders.   Here is the snack table.  The banner is from Etsy’s Keekers Crafts.  She used our party colors and some really cute cars and truck printed paper.

There were cups of popcorn and pretzels to make it easy for the guests to grab and go.  The red tins were filled with red apples.  I found transportation lollipops from Oriental Trading and the #5 car cookies were from Etsy’s Andrea’s Goodies.

Hubbie is AMAZINGLY creative so he helped me with the displays.  For the lollipops we used small green tin pails, plant foam, and green gift filler from Hobby Lobby.

We stayed with the theme for the dinner buffet.

There were “Peanut Butter and ‘Traffic’ Jam Sandwiches” which I made with white and wheat bread and a car shaped cookie cutter.

Next, some “Vroom! Vroom! Veggies.”

The “Truckin’ Chicken Nuggets” were from Chick-fil-A and displayed in two plastic sand trucks found in Target’s summer clearance aisle.

Here’s the “Stop Light Fruit” and I should have snapped the photo the other way so it actually looks like a stop light.  Ha.  We had red strawberries, yellow pineapple, and green grapes.  The large white pasta bowls are from Target and we used black felt to mimic a stop light.

We had green salad and potato chips to fill in the rest of the main table and on the side island was “Zoom! Zoom! Ziti” which we ordered from our local Italian restaurant.  It was super yummy and a great way to fill up some bellies.

I had three craft stations set up in our enclosed patio area which I decorated with red pennant flags from Amazon and transportation vehicle cut-outs from the Michaels clearance bin.

1. Design-A-Ride. The kids pick out their favorite wooden truck and decorate with markers and stickers. The trucks were, again, 0n-sale at Michaels.

2. Bike License Plate.  The kids pick their favorite plate color.  They personalize with their name using foam letters and decorate with foam stickers.  Everything was from Dollar Tree.  I made the plates with foam rectangles and pipe cleaners.

3. Car Photo Frame.  The kids decorate a car cut-out photo frame.  I found the frames at Dollar Tree.   I was only planning on two crafts, but then I saw these frames and could not resist including them in the party.

We ordered a tent for outside with tables and chairs.  We also ordered a cool mist fan.  It really only cooled down half the tent, so I’m not sure it was worth the money.  I decorated the tables with balloons attached to construction cones (which I found in the Target dollar bin.)

We already had the outdoor play set that we knew all the kids would enjoy and Daniel really wanted a bounce house.  I was concerned that the inside of the bounce house would feel like an oven, but we parked it in a shady spot and it was not bad at all.

We threw every play car and truck we own on the grass and, at the last minute, decided to fill two large metal bins with sand so the kids could play with car and truck sand toys.  It was HUGE hit.

The crafts, however, were not a big hit.  Some of the girls enjoyed them, but the boys just wanted to bounce and play outside.  We were blessed with no rain so the party fun was outdoors.  The kids would just stop for water and a little relief from the mist fan and then it was right back to playing outside.  I was just happy everyone had a good time.

Daniel does not like cake so I found a great idea on-line for a donut “wheel cake.”  We ordered four dozen chocolate donuts from Dunkin’ Donuts and Hubbie created this masterpiece.

Tomorrow I’ll post about the goody bags and everything I learned about hosting my very first kids party at home.  And MAYBE  I’ll tell you how the bounce house deflated halfway through the party or how our lawn sprinklers went on unexpectedly toward the end. But that’s for another day. I’m EXHAUSTED.

It’s been a rough couple of weeks adjusting back to “normal” after our beach vacation.  Plus, add the fact that Hubbie went away for the weekend to attend Queen’s funeral and then, we both got sick. Yeah, good times.  It was some nasty stomach virus and the only up side was that the kiddies did not get it.  THANK GOODNESS.  But, needless to say, the house has not been cleaned and there is laundry piling up.  It took all my energy yesterday to get the house refilled with groceries and toiletries.  Today, I feel much more “normal.”

I was also able to FINALLY download all our beach photos!  We go to Myrtle Beach, SC every summer with my parents and my sister’s family.  They all drive south.  We drive north.  We meet in the middle.  It’s the best case scenario for everyone.  It’s so awesome for all the cousins to hang out together.  They are all around the same age and they love each other so much.  We spent loads of time on the beach, in the waves, in the awesome indoor/outdoor pools, and at Broadway at the Beach.

July 4th is one of my favorite holidays and we threw a party in our beach hotel room to celebrate.  We decorated the windows and had crafts for the kids.  Hubbie made some mean hot dogs and chicken fingers and my sister was in charge of the red, white and blue ice cream treats.  We watched A Capitol Fourth on PBS and danced along to the live performances.  Even Grandma and Grandpa. The night was perfect.  (Although Annabel did miss the flag painting because she was so exhausted. You can see her in the background just snoozing on the sofa.  But, don’t worry,  she was awake before dessert and the fireworks on the balcony.)

Happy Father’s Day to the most awesome Daddy in the whole wide world.

Love,

Bean and Annabelly

My Mother’s Day celebration started early.  I went to Daniel’s preschool for a special Mother’s Day luncheon on Friday.   Daniel gave me a homemade vase and the teacher read aloud questionnaires filled out by each child about his or her Mother.  When it was my turn, I learned that (according to Daniel):

I have silver/yellow hair. (Note to self: Book hair color appointment pronto.)

I am 40 years old. (Many kids said their Mom was 18 or 21.  I guess I should be glad he has a good memory, right?)

I like to vacuum. (At least everyone knows I’m not a Hoarder.)

My favorite color is pink. (I’ll take it.)

I don’t like to cook ALL of the time. (Understatement of the year, kid.)

But when I do cook, I cook fish sticks the worst.  Because I let them get black in the oven that one time. (???)

Okay.  I have NEVER cooked fish sticks.  Not once.  Hubbie cooks homemade tilapia fish sticks.  On the STOVE TOP.  And he has never burnt them. Not once. Daniel has an amazing imagination.  He loves to make up stories.  But, COME ON!  I would have rather he imagined me as a 25 year old who never, ever cooks.  That’s okay.  He made it up to me with the yummy lunch buffet and lots of hugs.

Speaking of cooking, Hubbie is the Top Chef of our family.  He made me an amazing Mother’s Day breakfast on Sunday.  I had french toast with bananas and fresh berries.

My gift was a morning at the spa for a 90 minute massage.  HEAVEN.  Then, I was back home for my yummy poached salmon lunch.

It was a day of eating and relaxing – my two favorite things.  I read magazines in bed.  I watched a lot of  television. We all went to the bookstore for coffee.  I got the best Mother’s Day cards from Hubbie and the kids.  I got this beautiful spring bouquet of flowers.

But the best gift of all was this:

A 15 minute window in the afternoon where both kiddies were getting along.  They were reading books together.  I couldn’t have asked for a better day. I hope your Mother’s Day was awesome too.  You deserve it.

PS:  I just realized today is the TWO YEAR ANNIVERSARY of PopMommy.  Time flies! Thanks to everyone who continues to visit me here.  I appreciate it so much.

We had another eventful Easter with Daniel’s ER visit, but OTHER THAN THAT, it was a beautiful day.  The kids woke up to find their Easter baskets filled with goodies from the Easter Bunny: the traditional chocolate bunny and jelly beans as well as a cool garden magnifying glass and sticker sheets (Thank you Target dollar bin!)  Daniel opened his chocolate bunny in 5 seconds and took a bite.  The perfect breakfast appetizer.

Then we were off to Sunday mass where we could show off our Easter ensembles.  Annabel’s beautiful dress is from The Children’s Place.

After church, we came home to find a visitor in our backyard – one of Easter Bunny’s helpers!  (We named him Brownie.)

Hubbie made a delicious Easter dinner.  GG came over as well as Hubbie’s radio co-host and producer, Miss Anna and Miss Ashley.  We love having the singletons over for holiday dinners.  It’s fun to listen to their stories and it’s just more festive to have extra people around the dinner table.  We had ham, Polish kielbasa, dill potatoes, asparagus, green beans, corn, hard boiled eggs, and a cheesecake dessert.  We were all having so much fun (and drinking lots of white wine) that I forgot to take more photos.

And one final note: Annabel won the annual hard boiled Easter egg cracking contest.  She kicked my butt.

 

 

This was Daniel LAST Easter.  (Please note the enormous blue and purple Easter egg bump on his forehead.)

And this was Daniel THIS Easter.

 

Please note the ginormous laceration across his cute forehead.  It’s the annual Daniel Easter curse.  This was the THIRD Easter we took Daniel to the ER.  The first time was when he was 7 months old and we were visiting my parents in Maryland.  It was Easter morning and we were all getting ready for church service.  I was changing Daniel’s diaper on the bed.  I turned around to grab his Easter outfit from the dresser and in that one, two, three seconds, BAM, he rolled off the bed and fell on the floor.  Luckily it was a short twin bed and there was a carpet, but I was a first time Mama. I panicked and so did Hubbie.  I had images of scrambled egg brain in my head.   I told my husband if Daniel ended up with a learning disability I would never forgive myself. That was an extreme reaction, yes, but I could not believe this was happening to ME.  I mean, I was not that Mama who let her kid just roll off a bed onto the floor.  And here I was.

We took Daniel to the ER.  I think one of the scariest moments was when the doctor separated us to get the story of how Daniel hit his head.  It was to rule out child abuse and I found out later that it’s standard procedure.  I was crying pretty hard so Hubbie handled most of the questions and the examination.  They felt Daniel’s head and checked his eyes and all the other vitals.  He was fine.  He was just a tired little baby that wanted to take a nap.  We felt justified taking him to the ER because we had to board a plane back to Florida that afternoon and what if he passed out while were were miles in the air?  I held him in my arms the entire flight.  He slept with a smile on his face.  I fought back tears the entire 2 and 1/2 hours.  It traumatized me for about a month.

I guess we were in the clear in 2008 and 2009.  Then it happened again in 2010.  Daniel was running around and fell on our hard kitchen tile.  I don’t think he put his hands out because there was just a slip and a fall and a cry and it was so fast.  When we ran to him I just saw the giant blue bump form before my eyes.  I had never seen something like that in my life.  We grabbed ice and asked him a million questions to ensure he knew who he was and where he was.  Hubbie took him right to the ER. The doctors checked him out and said he was fine and he came home in time for Easter dinner.  But then I had to stare at that yucky bump for over a week.

Last Friday was Good Friday and Daniel had off from school.  He was invited to a play date at a friend’s house.  I dropped Annabel off at her GG’s so I could have some girl chat with the ladies. We took a quick tour of the beautiful home and then the three boys went to play.  The moms camped out with drinks in the living room.  The boys moved from the living room to the bedroom playing with all the cool toys.  There were stairs.  Daniel refused to take off his Crocs.  I always insist “no shoes in the house” but the nice Mom said it was OKAY.  LET HIM BE.  HE’S HAVING FUN.  LET HIM BE.  Sometimes I don’t trust my gut.

I don’t know if the Crocs were to blame, but on the way down the stairs for the third time that morning Daniel missed the last step.  I didn’t see this, but that is what he told me.  I heard someone fall on the hard tile and then I heard Daniel’s cry.  I felt like I was moving in slow motion and then I saw it. Blood.  All over his face.  His hands.  Down the front of his shirt.  My heart fell to my stomach.  We thought he broke his nose.  But after wiping him down with wet paper towels and baby wipes we found out it was a big cut on his forehead.  We took him to the ER.  AGAIN.  I know this wasn’t exactly EASTER, but close enough for me.  I could not believe it was happening AGAIN.

Hubbie met us there and I did the hand off.  He’s better than me with this stuff.  He’s calmer.  I really was proud of myself though. I was pretty calm.  I was urgent, but I was calm too.  The ER doctor put Daniel’s forehead back together with skin glue.  It’s pretty amazing stuff.  Daniel was ready to leave the moment we got there.  He kept saying, “I’m FINE.”  He’s a brave kid.  And he has a very high tolerance for pain. He just wanted to go home.  He said it didn’t hurt.  Well, I sure felt a little broken inside.

Easter Sunday was actually really nice and drama free.  I’ll post photos and notes tomorrow.  Unfortunately, yesterday, Daniel had an allergic reaction to that glue adhesive.  The cut became puffy and red so last night at 8 PM we went back to the ER.  The same doctor took off the glue and replaced it with four steri strips across his forehead.   The doctor said he was healing well.  Now we just have to watch for the scar.

SO, Easter 2012?  I’m considering a three day movie fest.  On the couch.  All day long.  No one moves.  No one gets hurt.  I’m breaking this curse, darn it.