St. Patrick's Day

Since this has basically been my ode to myself, my mom shamming extravaganza, and in all other ways tooting my horn blog, I will continue it as such.  And I will say this: one thing I am good at is preschool.  I come up with (with the help of Pinterest of course) a lot of fun, educational games to play with Alice.  Though if, we're being honest, I think my more flash-card, direct instruction approach I used with Rex was more effective, but also required a more mean mom, and I didn't like that.  

Moving on.  

For St. Patrick's Day a few years back when I was bored and depressed, I made Rex a leprechaun scavenger hunt, which I now must repeat every year, despite my current lack of boredom and depression.

Patrick (our leprechaun) always leaves a box of Lucky Charms for breakfast with a note.

Then the kids have to complete a series of tasks to get clues to find their treasure (candy).

Here, Alice had to make a rainbow by matching capital and lower case letters.

 This is actually from a few days later.  Alice and I made the game board together.  She told me a sound and I wrote down the letters that made that sound, then we rolled a die and moved that many letters/letter combinations and had to say the letter we landed on.  The winner got a handful of candy.

Then we practiced our fine motor skills and drew a few leprechauns to hold our treasure while we raced there.

 Alice, obviously, had to dress for the occasion.

 Back to St. Patrick's day.  This is an idea I stole from somebody on Pinterest.  She has to match the pennies to the number on each pot of gold and then add them together and choose the correct number.

 Self-explanatory.

 She had the help the leprahan get from the forest to his house by drawing a path around the obstacles.  I made her do it 3 times.

This was my real genius of the day:  

The clues she earned at each station were on the back of paint chips, which she then had to sew together to make a cute little banner.  Man, I'm good at this, I should make a blog about it...

 And then she stuffed herself full of candy.

And we could't  forget Henry because he's pretty cute.

I also really liked Rex's scavenger hunt this year.  Because he is now in kindergarten, I, I mean Patrick, gave him a list of things to do while at school--pick up five pieces of trash, say hi to someone new at recess, give someone a compliment.  After completing each task, he scratched off a clover lottery-style to reveal the location of his treasure.  It was much less time-consuming than Alice's that's for sure, but I forgot to take a picture of it before I sent him off.

Now, I'm done singing my own praises.  If it makes you feel any better, I turn into a complete witch of a mother the night before any holiday as I get so stressed about everything being perfect for such holiday so my kids will love it.  Can't wait for them to finally put the dots together on that one and then mock me with their college roommates for being so mean to them while trying to be nice.  Family, isn't it about...time?

Birthday Week Part 3

Saturday we made it to our final birthday.  This time, unlike Rex's, I knew I was making a bigger deal out of the birthday than I needed to, but I feel bad for poor third-child Henry.  I know it was only his first birthday and that he didn't care, but he will care when he gets to his baby book and sees that we still had a party for him. 

I wanted this party to be just about Henry and not about all the other people at the party,  so the only invitees were Rex and Alice.  But I made the balloon invitations I've been eyeing on Pinterest for a while.  The theme was "We're going to have a BALL" since Henry super likes balls.

I used gum balls to make these super cute ball cupcakes.

While Henry took his morning nap, we got everything ready.

Then we had family lunch because Greg had church meetings that night.  We had Henry's favorite food--chicken nuggets and cheese cubes.  Tasty.  We also wore more party hats because that's what you do at parties.

After lunch we played a few rounds of hide-n-seek because that's Henry's FAVORITE game.  Then we did a little craft.  We made bubble hitters.

 Then the kids had a ball (hehe) bursting bubbles.

Next, we had a ball (aka dance party--another one of Henry's favorite things to do)

(Notice how Alice and Henry actually dance and Rex just lies on the floor and whines--that kid is so white.)

 Then Henry had a I never get attention because I'm the third child and now I'm getting lots of attention and I don't know what to do melt down, so Greg and the kids opened Henry's presents for him.

 FINALLY, we had cake.  Do not be deceived, Henry didn't like the cake and mostly just smashed it all over the tray.  Me on the other hand...I made 24 cupcakes and they were gone by Sunday night (to be fair, Greg ate 3 for breakfast one morning)

 Then we pulled in our pool and dumped the bag of ball pit balls Henry got for his birthday in.  I knew I didn't get enough to completely fill the pool, but I thought they would at least cover the bottom.  Oops.  The kids, who have never been in a real ball pit before, thought it was the coolest thing though and played for about 45 minutes.  Success I'd say.

Henry now refuses to play in our makeshift ball pit because he discovered that I stick him in t when I don't want him getting into stuff.  So now he just cries unless someone else is in the pool with him.

I'd call it a successful party.  The kids had fun.  Henry now has pictures of his birthday for his baby book.  So good for me and Happy Birthday to my perpetually hungry and thirsty boy Henry.

Birthday Week Part 2

Rex turned 6 on March 13th.  And all my thoughts that day: I've made a huge mistake.

Mistake #1: Decorations.  Since I made such a huge deal decorating for Greg's birthday, Rex insisted on having decorations for his.  And lots of them.  So I spent Thursday night hanging up all my birthday banners (most useful banners I have by the way, making them was probably the best use of 2 hours ever--I use them all the time)

BUT Rex was pretty thrilled in the morning with all the decorations and his presents.  We let him open one to wear to school that day, but it ended up being too big.  Nice try.

 Mistake #2: The rest of my day.  I did nothing but Rex birthday on his birthday.  As soon as I go him on the bus, I did a few dishes and made beds, put Henry down for a nap and sent Alice on an adventure with Dad so I could frost Rex's cake and make his birthday dinner--salmon with asparagus and mashed potatoes (at his request).  

BUT I like the way the cake turned out--easy and cute.  Thank you Pinterest.

 As soon as Alice and Dad got home, I was going to run down to the nearest Krispy Kreme 20 minutes away and then run back to take them to Rex's school.  Luckily, Greg stepped in and said the gas station 2 miles down the road has Krispy Kreme, so I went and picked those up instead.  Then we rushed off to Rex's school to take him Bojangles for lunch and donuts for his class.

Mistake #3: Bowling.  I got home just in time to welcome his friends who we were taking bowling.  But I overestimated the size of our van and underestimated the size of 6 car seats, so Greg ended up taking Alice in the truck and I got to drive 40 minutes to the farthest away bowling alley we could find while listening to Rex and three friends go crazy and holding the cake with one hand.  Did I mention we got in the car at exactly the time I usually put Henry down for a nap?  I thought he might sleep in the car.  I made a huge mistake.

When got to the bowling alley, I was in full teacher mode.  I made the kids line up and stay single file.

BUT the kids had a great time.  They shared; they took turns; they didn't fuss; they tried hard to follow the rules as much as their excited little bodies would let them; Rex got a spare; Derick got a spare; Alice got a spare; and Jack got a strike.  Henry wondered around in a half-asleep state with Grandma Libby.

Rex insisted on bowling somewhere he could wear the special shoes.

Rex bowling a spare on his first frame.

The kids trying really hard to follow the "Don't get your head knocked off by a returning bowling ball" rule.

Alice doing a victory dance.

Rex was very concerned about the score.

Jack after he got a strike.

Rex was a little upset that he didn't win.

Mistake #4: Bowling (yes, I said it twice--we just did too much in one day) After bowling we hustled home for dinner, and by hustle I mean it took an hour.  I had to take all the kids home--45 minutes to one neighborhood and then another 20 back to our house.  We really did pick the least convenient bowling alley.  Luckily, Greg drove separately so he got the dinner I'd made earlier in the day in the oven and all ready by the time Rex, Henry and I got home.   We had dinner and Rex discovered he doesn't really like salmon but refused to admit this because he'd been asking for it for so long.  Finally Henry had a no-nap melt down so I put him to bed around 6:45 and then Rex opened presents.

AND for once, he liked and played with everything.  It was a birthday miracle.

Rex got snap circuits--he's building a light in this picture.

He got a marble run from Grandma Pattie.

 So while I'm pretty sure this is the last full day birthday this kid is going to get because it just wore me out, Happy Birthday to Rex--the nerdiest, smartest, sweetest, kindest, most gregarious, and most inquisitive boy I know.  I hope he stays sweet and sensitive to the Spirit and even though I get annoyed daily by all his questions, I hope he keeps asking them.  He's to another year with Rex.