Happy Easter!

This year we had a quieter holiday than usual – our usual plans changed and we decided to do something a little low-key for a change of pace! We tend to run from place to place trying to make the rounds to visit all of the family, and while we are blessed to have so much family to get together with, this year for Easter, we thought it would be nice to do something on a smaller scale. On Friday, the girls and I had our weekly visit with Great Gram at the nursing home – we brought her some sugar-free candy, a calla lily, and a couple of bunnies to decorate her room. We had a nice visit with her – my 6-year-old read two books to us and Gram was so pleased to hear her read. 

Saturday we did some house-cleaning (my 12-year-old even voluntarily cleaned her room!) and Saturday night I did some last minute prep for Easter – I made a cute “Peeps” candle that I saw on Pinterest (where else?) and I filled eggs for my husband to hide for an Easter morning egg hunt. The girls got up early and searched for their baskets and eggs, and we went to church, had a little brunch, and spent a quiet afternoon coloring our Easter eggs and watching Easter videos. We normally try to do both of those things before Easter, but we had a lot on our plates this past week and it was actually quite fun and very festive to do it on Easter! My mom is coming up from Florida this week – we can’t wait to see her!! – and I’m planning to make a ham for a belated Easter dinner with Nana!

Out of the Mouths of Babes...

Our little 6-year-old just constantly keeps us in stitches...  Tonight's classic was "I'm buying lunch tomorrow!"  And my husband and I looked at her and said, "Oh really?"  And she said, "Yes, because it's Friday, and I always buy lunch on Friday!"  (Which is actually true, she does not like homemade pizza or most pizzeria pizza, but school pizza on Friday is apparently fabulous to her!)  So I said to my husband, "I have no cash on me."  And he said, "I have no cash."  And our daughter (who was sitting there holding Mabel, our dog) said, in a very dry tone, "Don't look at me!  I have lots of money in my piggy bank but I'm saving up for a CAT!" 

Good to know, apparently we're getting a cat!  And we need to run to the ATM...

Family Tree Scrapbook

This past weekend we went out of town to visit my husband's family.  On our way to dinner at his uncle's house, he took us on a little tour of the area that his parents grew up in.  He drove us by his mother's schools, the church his parents were married in, and both of his parents' childhood homes.  My mother-in-law was with us, and she definitely enjoyed the drive down memory lane, and the girls -- particularly our 12-year-old -- enjoyed seeing where Grandma grew up.  I have always tried to instill an interest of our family history in my girls.  They love visiting relatives, they love seeing old pictures, they love hearing old stories.  On the way home from dinner that night, I had an idea for a new project that I'd like to work on.  We have various family trees from different "branches" of our families, and while those are wonderful treasures, to my kids they are just names and dates on paper.  I have been wanting to create more of a family tree scrapbook with pictures and stories about our family members.  Before we left my mother-in-law's house yesterday, I went out into the street and took a picture of the house -- this is the house that my husband grew up in -- I'd like to add that into the book for future generations to see.  The next time we go to visit, we are going to take the same little tour and stop and take photos of all of the places that we saw the other day.  We'll also stop by my husband's high school which is in that area and take a photo of that.  We plan to do the same thing here in town, where I grew up, and when we go to visit my mom's family in New England -- hopefully this spring or summer. 

My daughter (12) is so excited about this project, that she went through two drawers worth of pictures today on her school vacation to pull out pictures of our family for our scrapbooks.  In her estimation, we're going to need 7 scrapbooks...  She will definitely carry on the role of family historian -- I have no worries there!

Happy 12th Birthday!

Happy birthday to my beautiful daughter!  Twelve years ago today you came into our lives and we became a family.  Daddy and I couldn't be more proud of you -- you are beautiful inside and out -- sweet, funny, goofy, talented, kind, smart and just an all-around great person!  We are so blessed to have you in our lives and we can hardly remember what life was like before you were born!

Lots of love - today and always!

Mommy

"Art-y" Party w/ Artist's Palette Cake

My eldest is turning 12 this year (sniff, sniff!) and for this year's party she decided to have an art-themed birthday party.  As you can probably tell by my recent posts, I've been all about Pinterest lately!  I wanted to find a creative cake for my daughter's birthday, so I went to Pinterest and found lots of ideas, but this was my favorite!  I bought this great artist palette for $4.99 at Hobby Lobby.  I baked cupcakes yesterday (even found paint-splattered cupcake wrappers!) and then this morning I took 1-1/2 tubs of vanilla frosting and in 7 bowls I added different food coloring and mixed up 7 different colors of frosting -- red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple -- and pink for my littlest girl!  I arranged the cupcakes on the artist palette to look like paint and put a paintbrush in the middle to finish it off.  Then I placed the whole thing on this mirror that I have on my dining room table.  It was an inexpensive wall mirror and one day I decided to put it on the dining room table with all white candles on it for a centerpiece -- and I decided I like it better on the table than the wall!  Everything looks better on it!  Candles reflect on it, flowers in a glass vase look beautiful, and this cupcake palette looks like it's on the frame of a painting - perfect! 

And the extra cupcakes are in my new cupcake holder (I've been longing for one and my husband bought it for me for my birthday)!   

We found some really cute invitations on Walmart.com, and for $0.28 a piece, I customized them with a picture of my girl and I ordered 8 cards -- 1 for each girl and an extra for me!  I love getting photo cards -- they are personal, they are a great keepsake for my girls' scrapbooks / baby books, and you'd pay more for a regular package of invitations! 

"Bright Circles" card from Walmart.com

To keep the girls entertained, and of course, to go along with the art party theme, we came up with three craft ideas.  My daughter had the idea to use black craft paper and to have the girls dip the end of a toilet paper or paper towel roll into paint and use that to create different designs on the paper.  We also bought each girl a little wooden easel and little canvas (3" x 3") from Joann's so that they could each paint their own little masterpiece.  And for the third art project, we bought a wooden letter for each girl's first initial (about 6" tall) and had them paint them with acrylic paints. 

Tiny canvas & easel - "Sunset" by the birthday girl!

Pink & Orange Polka Dot "M" - by my 6-year-old!

My girl loves art and this year we cleaned out our basement and rearranged it to make an art studio for our girls.  She wanted to host her party down there, and I decided that since I have off-white carpet in the dining room, where the big table is, that the art studio was a better idea with all of the paint!!  My husband set up a long folding table next to the little round table in the art studio.  My daughter covered both tables with newspapers which made for super easy, super quick clean up after the party! 

The "Art Studio"

We're still working on the art studio -- at some point when we have time, we'd like to paint the concrete wall and the floor.  For now though, we are extremely happy with the huge berber remnant that our friend Michael gave us from a job he was doing -- it covers a huge area of the floor! 

One of my favorite elements of the art party?  My daughter's outfit!  Never one to shy away from a theme, I suggested that she take an old pair of jeans and paint them to wear to her party!  She had fun doing that on Friday night -- I think she did a pretty good job!

My daughter had a great time -- she had fun with her friends, and I think they had a fun time too.  I loved that she is old enough that this year we just set everything up and she took over -- my husband and I relaxed in the living room until they called us for cake and ice cream.  Even our 6-year-old was like one of the big girls today -- she hung out with the girls and her sister never came up to complain about her once!  (Amazing!)