Maggie's sdrawkcab Birthday

Maggie's birthday was earlier this month. She had a fabulous backwards birthday party.

Maggie got a Webkins cat.

A backwards birthday party is where you do everything backwards. She got the idea from American Girl magazine. She greeted her guests by saying "Goodbye!" We started by opening presents and eating cake, upside-down cake, of course . Then we played backwards games.

Maggie playing Blindman's Bluff.

We played Blindman's Bluff--a sort of backwards tag. There was also pin the donkey on the tail and freeze dance--no dancing to the music, just when it's quiet.

Playing Freeze Dance.

At the end, the girls all painted their nails with Maggie's new finger nail polish. The girls had lots of fun. It was a pretty easy party, too.

Mom is Great...

Last night for FHE treat we had left over cake from my sister and brother-in-law's birthday party. This morning the bits that the kids hadn't eaten were still on their plates. Caleb and Katrina bellied up to the table and tucked right in. I made myself a big cup of Pero, got a banana, and a fresh piece of cake out of the fridge and joined them. Ahh, you know it's going to be a good day when it starts out with chocolate praline cake.

A Little Leprechaun

Sophie was so excited about St. Patrick's Day this year. She worried for several weeks about what she was going to wear. She's a little girl, pink and purple feature highly in her wardrobe, green--not so much. I ended up making a pin for her that I found on Family Fun.com. It was a rainbow with a pot of gold and some four leaf clovers. When she went to school the Leprechauns had been in her classroom. They put cookie crumbs all over the desks. Her teacher was confused and thought the class had done it. Then when they were out to recess, the Leprechauns made green foot prints all over their desks. It was a fun and magical day for her. She was disappointed to come home and find that the Leprechauns hadn't played any tricks at our house. Finally, they brought us green cupcakes after dinner, but it really wasn't as exciting as last year when they turned our tap water green.

Sophie's Leprechaun outfit

Probably the best part of the day was when she came home. She was wearing the Leprechaun outfit that she had made at school. When she came in, I was sure that a Leprechaun was making a personal visit to our house. But then she pulled off her beard and I could see that it was her. That was a really funny trick.

Silly Smalley Kids

I promised the Smalley kids I would post photos of their exploits at my house for Hannah's birthday party. Apparently Allison doesn't like to have her picture taken.

Can you guess who does like to have her picture taken?

Almost got her.

Mwah-haha! Her defenses down,
I got her decorating her cake.

One of our and the Smalley's favorite shows on Netflix is Man vs. Food. This guy goes around the country taking food challenges. You know the type--"eat this half a cow and it's free!" It's really a fun show. It kind of reminds me of the time that Homer is a food critic and everyone in town gets fat because everything is so good. You need a snack while watching the show. And afterwards you start reseaching your fabulous vacation to Detroit to sample the hamburgers.

So, Tim felt that he ought to have a Boy vs. Food challenge during our spaghetti dinner. He ate three very full plates of spaghetti in 15 minutes. I think he also ate a slice of homemade bread, but I couldn't see what he was eating through the carnage. I think he was a little sore afterwards.

This is the crazy grin of a boy who has eaten too much.

Then he collapsed into his plate. Luckily missing the actual spaghetti, that would have been messy.

Good thing the Smalleys are around. What would we do for fun otherwise?

Hannah's Birthday Party by Hannah

Hannah's masterpiece

Extreme close-up

It was my birthday a few weeks ago. My friends Jessie and Makylee came, and Allie came as well. My birthday theme was decorating cakes. My aunt came and taught us to decorate cakes. We learned how to do the crumb coat and how to change to different tips. We learned how to make easy flowers with cookiecutters and to write our name ( cursive is easiest ). We made dots and the shell. It was lots of fun.

We are decorating our masterpieces.


Another glitter ball for my collection

A page out of Harry Potter

My mom gave me an old clock of hers that didn't have any numbers on it. I wanted to use it in our bathroom upstairs to help the kids be on time, but with no numbers I wondered how it could be useful. We have been reading the second Harry Potter and I thought I would use the Weasley's clock as inspiration. Now our clock reads, at appropriate times, "Ready? You can watch TV." "Get your socks and go downstairs." "Aaah! You're late!" and "Mortal peril." It was so funny and effective, I thought the mirror should get in on the action too. Our mirror now says "Hey Scruffy! Comb your hair!" The kids laughed and laughed about the clock and mirror and they were even on time for school for about two weeks. This morning was the first time in a while that we have been late. Maybe the clock needs to say something else.

Lion Cookies, Anyone?

The other day I wanted something fun to do with Caleb. I also wanted to make delicious lime melt-aways. Caleb is always telling me that boys like to help their moms cook. So I asked him, "Do you want to help me make lime cookies?" He perks up "Lion cookies? Yeah!" I tried to convince him that the lime cookies would be great, but he kept going on about making the lion cookies and how he was going to decorate them and they would say roar and... Anyway, we ended up making plain old sugar cookies and decorating them together. Katrina was excited to help too. They both had LOTS of fun making and eating the cookies. We made about 3 dozen cookies and they were all gone by the next morning. Here are some pictures of us making the cookies. The kids were just so cute that I pulled out my camera and thought I would share.

Rolling out the cookies.

She hasn't quite got the hang of decorating with the squeeze bottles.
Who knew decorating could be so painful?

The master at work.

A finished cookie.
Somehow the lion thing went by the wayside, but green globs is just as good.

Katrina is having the time of her life. I love this happy face.

Nothing is better than a fresh cookie.