Birthday Bash

Megan's party was a mass of screaming girls in fancy dresses...just what Megan wanted.

Megan wanted to wear her fancy dress from Auntie Al, but we convinced her she didn't have to have a princess party to do this - so we had a My Little Pony Party, with a request in the invitation to "Wear a Party Dress!" My general rule has been one invite per year of age, but I learned that social politics start early and not wanting to ostracize anyone, we sent out seven invites and all RSVP'd yes.

The party started calmly with some coloring. Then we moved on to pin the tail on the donkey (which is kind of like a pony, right?), where I awarded the prize to a girl who cheated because I didn't know the right way to deal with the incident involving somebody else's kid in a roomful of their peers - more of that 5 year old politics stuff!The calm before the storm

Then the girls all got to decorate their own mini-cupcakes. This activity is a big hit, plus I didn't have to spend any time decorating a cake with horseshoes and pink unicorns and other Pony things.Then, to make sure the girls were good and sugared up we had the Pony Pinata! This was a special safety pinata where everyone pulls a string and the pinata breaks open, thus removing the danger of some kid getting bashed in the head from another blindfolded youngster who is wildly swinging a big stick (ask my sister about the chick she took out at her party with a metal baseball bat one year!). Well, guess what? Some kid got bashed in the head! Ok, maybe not quite that serious, but one girl made a dive for the first piece of candy when all the rest of the candy fell on her head - very traumatic to a five year old!

Beware of the Pony in the rafters!
Blissfully unaware of impending tragedy.

Then on to the gifts, where all the girls fought over having Megan open their gift first. What is the deal with that, anyway?
So it was a full agenda of activities...except...Uh, oh! Crap - all of the planned activities were done and we still had 35 minutes to kill before pick-up time when we could be done with Pink Pony's for the day. So it was back downstairs for some "free play" and another round of pin the tail on the donkey. Yeay!

At one point, I went up to the bathroom. I didn't really need to go, but it seemed like the best way to get away for a couple of minutes. The clock in my room said 4:15 as I left. I walked slowly back down the hall and the thermostat clock said 4:13. Oh, my God - time was literally moving backwards! But I made it through the last 15 minutes just fine and all the Moms were on time, which is good because if they had been late their kid would have been off the list for next year - politics be damned! ;)

Ok, yes, it was a lot of chaos, but it was fun, too especially because I don't get to be involved in a lot of these multi-kid events with my job. And Megan got some great gifts. In fact, I was inspired to get a haircut the next day, because I was a little embarrassed that Polly Pocket had a much cuter 'do than me.You better watch it, Polly. You may have stylish clothes, perky boobs, and cute hair, but this is still my house, and I can ship you off to Goodwill anytime I've had enough of your fashionista ways!

Happy Birthday, Megita.
Love,
Your Un-stylish Mom

Meg-o Turns Five!

Today was a big day: Megan turned five! She was super excited all day long but that may have been because she was totally hopped up on sugar, as we started the day with M&M pancakes (with whipped cream, of course), then there was birthday cupcakes and a pinata and after dinner there was an encore of cake and more candy.

At bed time, I gave my special BIG girl an extra hug and she was still brimming with excitement.

"Hey, Mom, you wanna know something cool?" she asked me. And of course, I did.

"Only 52 more weeks until I turn six!"

The New Year

We were fortunate to have babysitters (Mac's parent's) staying with us on New Year's Eve, sowe got to go out and be adults. We had dinner with some friend's for a 9 o'clock reservation and I don't think any of us had intentions of making it to midnight, but after several courses we were winding up our meal just after 11:30 and we figured we were too close to call it quits. Plus the restaurant started handed out free champagne, so why would we leave?? We've celebrated at our house or other people's houses and stayed up till midnight on New Year's, but I can't remember the last time I was actually out on the town for the big night. Yeah, I guess we are pretty lame, but look at us turning over a new leaf for 2010!

That Sunday after New Year's (Jan. 3), I decided to find out if we could go to Zoo Lights over MLK weekend. Good thing I checked, because that was the last day! So we bundled up the kids and headed to the zoo after nap. We got there around three and pretty much saw everything in the zoo before the lights came on at 5.
Liam made friends with a penguin (you can kind of see it in Liam's reflection). Liam wanted to talk to him and the penguin was very attentive, but mostly because he wanted to eat Liam's fingers!

We also checked out the new lion exhibit. Not sure if you can tell, but Mac is growing a bit of a mane himself. Just call him Captain Red Beard, Arrgh!


And of course, we didn't leave without riding the train.
Happy 2010!

Christmas At Last!

We spent the week of Christmas down in Southern California. The week started with a beautiful memorial tribute to the life of Grandma Smith, who finally succumbed to her melanoma. She was an amazing lady who touched the lives of many.


Later in the week we took the kids to Kidspace, to hang out and play. Lots of great exhibits and all my kids wanted to do was ride the tricycles! Ok ,we did get a bit of climbing in, too.At the top! You can't really tell, but this is us at the top of the three story high glass platform climb. Each step was like a large, transparent drum surface.

Christmas Eve was a raucous gathering as usual. Lots of rowdy cousins and after 2 bottles of Jagger, lots of Rowdy adults, too. I was so wired from all the Red Bull (House specialty=Jaggerbombs) I was up till 3 am! Or maybe I was just excited to see Santa!
The ornament tradition is still holding strong, only lots of people bring hideous ornaments now, including this gaudy peacock feather insect. But when it was my turn to choose, I asked megan if she thought we should steal the cute snowman, but she had other ideas: "Oh, Mom, can we please get the butterfly?" Yeah... we can get the butterfly...Merry Christmas! Add that to Megan's new princess dress and we had true couture fashion on our hands!

Christmas morning brought a whole new round of excitement:

Fireman jackets and boots,
Dora band-aids,
and the coveted Snuggie!
And then just some post-holiday, snuggling.

Ready Or Not!

Christmas Is Coming!

Eventually, I plan to put up some Christmas photos from our trip to So. Cal at Christmas, it just hasn't been a high priority.

Kids Say The Darndest Things

Mac's parent's were up visiting and signing papers to build their new house last week. Mamaw (Mac's mom) came up with lots of new intriguing beauty products.

Megan: Can I have some of your lotion?
Mamaw: No, its only for adults.
Megan: What does it do?
Mamaw: It gets rid of wrinkles.
Megan: But it's not working.