January happenings 2014

Here is a recap of the little, fun (and not so fun) things that happened during the month of January.

Graham... he is growing up. Don't let this picture fool you.  He looks cute and sweet, but he is not.  Terrible Twos have hit full force and he is one feisty little dude.  But he is cute.  So, I'll keep him.

The kids have gotten very involved with Family Home Evening.  They love giving the lessons and be in charge of everything else.  So, Hannah made our FHE chart wheel and this thing gets used all the time.  They are now in charge of FHE each week and mom and dad just sit back and help when asked.  It is really the greatest thing to have them be in so involved... it allows them appreciate and love FHE and it makes me happy that they do.  I keep thinking I should get an official FHE chart, but I don't think it would have the same impact or love as this colorful, paper wheel.

We invited some friends over to watch Star Wars with us. It was the first time my kids were going to watch Star Wars and they were very, very excited. I made some treats to go with the movie and Hannah instantly decided they need to have names and labels to make it seem more official and party-like.  As you can see we had Wookie Cookies and Princess Leia Popcorn.  I guess I might be rubbing off on her just a bit :-)  Like daughter, like mother.

Chris had taken the kids to the park on day and they "worked out" on the exercise stations on the trail.  The kids loved it, so we went back as a family to "work out".  The kids loved it and it was a nice outing as a family.  Feel the burn!

Do you see that nice big black eye on Ella?  It was a monster of a black eye.  Even after a month, she still has some of it lingering.  We went to go and deliver a birthday present to her friend and we were all playing outside when Ella and Lincoln ran into each other (ella on a bike and Lincoln running to catch a ball) and POW!  Poor lincoln couldn't walk for the rest of the night and Ella had this gigantic goose egg under her eye which later turned into a massive black eye.  

Jake was in charge of Family Home Evening and we played Pictionary about certain scripture stories.  Can you guess what Jake's scripture story was?

Bubble Gum Party Extras

I forgot a few more items from the birthday party.  
First, was the invitations.  I decided to use gumballs of course.
It says "bubble gum, bubble gum in a dish.  A bubble gum spa party is Ella's birthday wish"

Then I got a picture of the necklaces we gave for the favors.   They look like just like gumballs.

Then the thank you.  I attached one of these to a little thank you card.

That is it!  On to the next party :-)

January 2014 Visiting Teaching Message

I know this is little too late, but I thought I would post it anyway because maybe you could use this idea for something else church related.  But here is the visiting teaching treat we gave our VT last month.

This is how I package it up... a tag, box and twine.

The inside had hershey kisses with a letter on the bottom that spelled out "ATONEMENT".

The I included a red wooden heart that I got from Michaels and painted it red and added some red glitter.  And then included a quote from Sister Burton that was included in the message.

And there you have it.  A simple treat with a wonderful message.  

Bubble Gum Spa Party

Ella had her 7th birthday party last weekend and boy oh boy.... there was a lot of Gumballs to help celebrate.  Like I had mentioned in another post, When I asked Ella what kind of birthday party she wanted, she said something with bubble gum and painted nails. So, of course the only logical theme was a Bubble Gum Spa Party.  This girl loves bubble gum and always wants her nails painted, so it was a great theme to capture her at this age.

So here are the details of the party.  I have gotten into a groove when it comes to planning birthday parties for my kids.  I know they different areas that need to be decorated and what I need to do for each space and now it just works so much easier.  Not to say that it isn't a lot of work, but it is planned work ... I usually have a plan which helps out a lot :-)

I will go through the details and hopefully share some tips that help if you so choose to throw a similarly themed party.

GUMBALL CLUSTERS: You will notice the gum ball clusters I used throughout the tables.  I painted styrofoam balls in gum ball colors and glued them together while added some 1" gum balls to the cluster.  I love the way they add to it all.  Giant gum balls!

BUBBLE BLOWING CONTEST: We had a bubble blowing contest.  Since not all the girls could blow bubbles with their gum, we used bubbles for the contest.  that they could all do.  Who ever blew the biggest bubble won a prize.  You can see in the pictures I hot glued a 1" gum ball to the lid of each bottle of bubbles.  

THE FAVORS:  I didn't get a picture of necklaces (darn it).  But I had a friend make me some gum ball (giant bead) necklaces (you know the kind that are all the rage right now) for each girl and packaged them up in the treat bags with tag, ribbon and note that said "Thanks for "Popping" by my party!".  And of course I filled it with more gum balls.

THE GAME PRIZES:  I got some gum ball machine at the Dollar Store and filled them up with gum balls as the prizes for the winners of the games.  On the tag it says "goody, goody gum balls, I'm a winner."  

OTHER DECOR ITEMS: you can't have a gum ball party without an old fashioned gum ball machine.  The perfect decoration and keepsake for the birthday girl.  They love putting in the pennies to get a gum ball.  I use it as bribery :-)  I made several gum balls garlands.  One made out of real gum balls and a punch made out of paper circles and sewn together to string it across my entry way.  I added a little white bubble onto the paper and it made all the difference in making it look like real gum balls!

GUESSING GAME:  One of the games the girls played was guess how many gum balls are in the jar?  I made the sign and a little backdrop to make the table/station festive and part of the decorations.  They girls wrote their guess and name on the little paper and plopped it in a dish.  There were 338 gum balls..  Ella wrote 240 as her guess, but since she couldn't win, the next closest was 190.

Some other major decorations for the party were:

ELLA'S BUBBLE BLOWING GARLAND:  I took lot so different pictures of ella and printed them as 8X10 photos.  I attached them to card stock and punched a hole at her mouth and stuck a blown up balloon through the hole to make it look like she was blowing a bubble.  This was probably one of my favorite decorations of the party.  And again another real gum ball garland underneath.

HANGING PAPER GUMBALLS:  more paper gum balls hanging from the ceiling.  Such a cheap way to add some color and fun!

THE GUMBALL WREATH:  This was the more expensive decoration, but so worth it.  I put 2 big jars of gum balls at Walmart and started hot glueing the balls to a styrofoam wreath.  It took a few hours to make and was super heavy when it was all said and done, but man it was the cutest thing and a great item for people to walk up to when they arrived at the party!

HAPPY B-DAY GARLAND:  You can really tell in the picture, but the birthday garland had really gum balls between each letter and lots of ribbon.  I included a string of paper circles and more paper gum balls.  Again, just paper and ribbon and string.  So easy and cheap, but makes a statement!

CENTERPIECES:  I cut out a gum ball machine from card stock on my Silhouette. I put them in a glass a vase filled it up with shredded paper I got at the Dollar Store and then put some gum balls at the top.  I made some tassels and glittery "7"s. and put it all together to make the centerpiece.

TABLES:  I bought white tablecloths and then bought  roll of wrapping paper from the Dollar Store and used it as my runner downy he middle of the tables and throw some circle confetti on top for some pizzazz.  

THE CHAIRS:  I tied some wreath ribbon on each chair and hot glued a cluster of gum balls to each ribbon.    Then I tied a clear ballon to each chair.  I filled the balloons with circle tissue paper confetti and then took it to our Party City and had them fill them up with helium.  I tied some tissue paper tassels on to each balloon.  NOTE: the tassels started weighing down the balloons, so I eventually had to take them off.  But they were cute when the guest arrived :-)  I loved the confetti in the balloons, such a cute detail!

The Nail Polish Station

NAIL POLISH TRAY:  i used nerds to cover the tray and add color and fun.  I save them and use them over and over again for thins like this.

I included all the goodies for a nail salon.  Lotion, nail files, cotton balls, polish remover, nail clippers, glitter and nail stickers.

and there you have it.  The first birthday party of the year.  And it was a lot of fun. So much bubble gum, we will be chewing and blowing bubbles all year!

Ella's 7th Birthday Party

When I asked Ella what kind of birthday party she wanted, she said something with bubble gum and painted nails. So, of course the only logical theme was a Bubble Gum Spa Party.  This girl loves bubble gum and always wants her nails painted, so it was a great theme to capture her at this age.

There she is.. the newest 7 year old in our family.

And here are just some pictures of the girls and the fun they had at the party.

Since Ella can't yet blow a bubble with her gum, we decided to have a bubble blowing contest with bubbles.  The girls had a lot of fun and really loved showing us their BIG bubbles.

And this little girl right here was the winner of the bubble blowing contest.  She consistently had the biggest bubbles.  She was a pro!

The girls got to do a craft where they made their own gum ball machines.

And here is the final product.  A gum ball machine with suspended gum balls.  Brillant!

Another game we played was pop the balloons to find the one balloon with a gum ball in it.  This went a little too fast because all the balloons started popping when they hit the grass.  bummer, but they didn't care... they still had a blast.

And of course the spa portion of the party.  They girls loved being able to pick out 2, 3, 4 colors of nail polish to put on their nails.  And they loved choosing the pattern of the colors on their nails too.  They were all very particular about their nail painting :-)  Don't they look so grown up and mature at the nail painting station?

And a picture of Ella opening a present.  Always the funniest part of any party.  It is always so much fun to watch all the girls get excited about the birthday girl opening up their presents.

There you have it, my girl is 7 years old.  I can't believe how old she is getting and what a wonderful girl she is growing into.  She is a ball of sunshine and truly such a great daughter and sister and friend.  I love her to pieces!

FYI - I will post more pictures of the details of the party soon.

christmas 2013 and the end of the year

Here are the last of our holiday photos.  Just some quick memories to be shared and captured.  Here are the kiddos in the Christmas jambes.  They get to open them on Christmas Eve and they love matching and getting new jammies.

Here are the girls with the rainbow loom kits.  It took a few weeks to get into these little things, but now they are going full-force in our house.  I have even gotten in on the action.  They are addictive, those little rubber-bands!

Jake got a few things Spider-man related and he loved them.  He has decided that his next birthday party is going to be Super Heros.  I think we are all set for that!

Ella got this cardboard Sweet Shop and it has been the best present ever.  So much time spent coloring it and playing in it.  It is on its last leg now, but still a favorite of the kids.

We went to see Frozen finally!  The kids loved it and we have been listening to the Soundtrack everyday (all day long).  Luckily the music is great, so we aren't tired of it yet.  

We spent New years Eve with our friends.  We celebrated EST NYE.  The kids loved it... all the noise-makers, silly string, glow sticks, hats, confetti, etc.  What's not to love.  It was a blast and the kids had so much fun together.  Than we went home, but the boys to bed and the girls and us stayed up for the real NYE.  

It was much less exciting.  Hannah was ready to party again, but the rest of us just enjoyed the show!