Category Archives: celebrating

parties and/or holidays

Summer Blur :: Almost Wordless Wednesday

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Who knew that it’s been over a month since the last post? No one but my family and a few close friends read this blog anyway… so, it’s okay, right? No, no. I know friends out there are reading. I’m sorry I’ve been away. I always seem to let too much time pass between posts in the summer months. With the kids and husband home, every day is an adventure – except when outside feels like a sauna and we hunker down in our basement and play video games and ping pong. (Not very into the pool scene. I don’t buy pool passes. No chance to break even.)

Forgive me for the lack of posting? Facebook and Twitter have been easier to update on the road and on the fly.

Since I last posted…

For neighbor kids and friends, we hosted a week long art camp in our garage.

Made some great projects during art camp.

Ssampled Brazilian Brigadeiro – chocolate truffle with sea salt and lime zest

Made cake again to make sure the recipe wasn’t faulty.. happy to report that it was not.

Managed to sew some burp cloths for expecting mom friends

Found this little guy on a garden walk which inspired me to get back into my own garden.

Made some Model Magic baked goods with the kids on a “too-hot” day

Checked out the Lego Kids Club

Celebrated 4th of July with family :: cakepops by my cousin

Tasted roasted purple cauliflower at a friend’s home

Worked on a Subway Art sign for a friend

Survived my first t-ball season

Visited an awesome bed and breakfast

Got to hang out a little at the beach, too

… and turned 39.

Birthday Party Ideas: Game Night

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When my daughter turned ten (yeah – when did THAT happen?), we threw her a “Game Night Slumber Party” at home. She thought about having an art party at a local shop, maybe a dinner out, but the thought of a sleepover and plenty of games seemed to excite her. And for those of you who know her, she’s not that easily excited.

Favors and supplies for Game Night Birthday Party

While I normally make cards, I opted to go easy on the invitations this time and went with evite.  There are plenty of game night themed invitations there. That left a bit more time to work on a welcome sign – inspired by Monopoly. If you’re good with freehand, it’s not too hard to do. But, careful… those fumes from the Sharpies can get you good.

We broke out the plastic spoons and taught the girls how to play spoons the card game. Lucky us, we’re still “cool” enough to play games with our kids. 🙂

Yeah, remember that door sign? It can serve as a poster that friends can sign. Hang it up in your kid’s room after the party… fun memento.

Would you let me know if you’ve hosted a game night party or are thinking of having one? What games did you play?

Enjoy the weekend!

Rice Krispie Sushi Recipe Tutorial

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These are more like instructions rather than a recipe since you’re not going to cook a thing! We served these at a party where kids and grown-ups gave us great feedback about the rice krispie sushi. This might be something fun to do for a kids (heck, for adults, too) birthday party, a potluck? If you gave up sweets for Lent, this is a sugary way to break your fast.

What You Need

One batch of prepared Rice Krispie treats
Cooking spray (like Pam)
Candy: Swedish Fish, Fruit Roll-ups (fruit leather, preferably dark in color), cake decoration sprinkles

For the Nigiri (hand-rolled) Sushi

Spray or coat your hands lightly with cooking oil. Butter, magarine works okay too. Create an oblong mound of rice krispies in the palm of your hand. Top with a Swedish fish and wrap with a thin strip of cut fruit leather.

For the Maki (rolled) Sushi :: inside-out roll featured in first picture

This one is a little trickier. Make sure your hands are well coated. Using your hands or a rolling pin, you will need to press or roll the rice krispie treats to a thin thickness. 1/4″ – 1/3″ inch should work. Swedish Fish in a row along one end of your prepared rice krispie treat. Roll the end of the rice krispie treat up and over the candy fish until they are covered.

(I have to say, at this point, we forgot to add strips of fruit roll-up for the “seaweed”. Lay down some fruit roll-ups before the Swedish fish. You can see it better in the very first picture of this post.)

Trim away from the remainder of the rice krispie treat. Shake some sprinkles on the roll (like sesame seeds), and using a sharp, buttered knife, cut into circles – like you would cut cookies.

For regular maki

You’re going to follow similar directions as above, but save your strips of fruit leather, and roll it around the rice krispie treat after you’ve cut them into shapes.

If you attempt to make these, I love to hear how it turns out! Share your pics and links! Enjoy…

Valentine’s Day 2012

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Happy Valentine’s Day, friends.

I’m running around like the crazy girl I am. Valentine’s Day comes between my husband’s and my daughter’s birthday… and I tend to put Valentine’s Day low on the priority list. It’s not that I don’t care, I really like all the red, pink, flowers, candy, love-fest. I wish I could organize myself better so I could do all the crafts and projects I aspire to do. A crafty girl can dream, can’t she?

Well, I’m off to the store soon, and I have to finish a few things around the house. Last minute (story-of-my-life) pick-ups for the afternoon Valentine’s Day party at my girlie’s school. OH, and I ought to finish these cards… take a look. My little personal greetings to you:

 

Lego Birthday – Fun and Games

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Taking a cue from the parties my parents threw for me, I put together a bunch of games for the kids knowing that we might get to all of them, or maybe only a few of them. I found that the kids were really happy to play on their own.

Activity Table: Just for starters, I printed out a bunch of coloring pages from the Lego website. As the kids finished a page, I hung them up with clothespins. I also placed a box of Legos in the middle of the table for random building.

Fill the Jar (relay): Typically there are two teams, each with a spoon, and a bucket of Legos. At the other end of the room, there is an empty jar or box, one for each team. The object of the game is to fill the box as quickly as possible with only as many bricks as you can hold in the spoon, and not spilling any of them while traveling to the box. Since there were a handful of younger kids, we just made everyone part of the same team, and they filled a jar together. Team effort with kids between the ages of two to five – much better!

Where’s Lego Man? This was easy. I taped the cut-out Lego men all over our basement. Double purpose: decoration and game! (And, as the kids collected them all, they were actually helping clean up! Sssshhhh!)

Pin the Brick on the Roof (a.k.a. Pin the Tail on the Donkey): Clearly, a very low budget, last minute drawing on a big sheet of paper. This game is self-explanatory, right? Blindfold, tape, and paper bricks made from construction paper. I wrote all our guests’ names on the “bricks”.


Bingo (Zingo): It’s a game by Think Fun; bingo with pictures and words instead of numbers. The kids were on their own on this one. The older kids called out the pictures. While they were playing this, my husband and I were getting dinner ready.

Zingo - we love this game

We also had estimating while the kids were eating pizza. I filled a jar with bricks and the kids tried to guess how many were in the jar – closest guess won a little prize. Lastly, we had an impromptu building challenge between the girls and the boys. Interestingly, the girls built houses, and the boys built spaceships.

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All the work my parents put into birthday parties while my brother and I were growing up – I appreciate it so much more. Ice cream cake from Baskin-Robbins, and the party games my mom (and my friends’ moms) planned… It seems so old-fashioned now. Birthday parties. They are so much easier to host elsewhere. And it’s so nice to come home to a clean house. I know. We’ve had a few birthday parties outside of our home, too. But, the memories my kids have of their home birthday parties – priceless.

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