Eli's Weather Party.

Eli is our redemption "rainbow baby", the baby born after our loss of Maelee. But he is a boy. So I can't, you know, dress him up in rainbows everyday and I couldn't justify having a rainbow party for his birthday. Even though I really wanted to! But then he started to get REALLY into the sky and clouds and wind and the sun and it dawned on me: We can have a weather party! Because rainbows are a part of weather!

Add in Pinterest and my own scattered ideas and you got our weather party for Eli's second birthday, which fell perfectly on Saturday the 27th this year. There are loads of things you can do for a weather party and I think especially for older kids. But we still had fun! I tried representing all types of weather, but rainbows DEFINITELY took over!

I wanted to keep the guest list small to minimize my crazy. I tried not going over-the-top. I did on a few things. But let me tell you, oh deary, I could have gone WAY WAY WAY more crazy. I recall walking through Party City and my mind in complete overdrive on all the things that could be done and created with all their colored items.

Appropriately for a weather party, I suppose, was it rained earlier in the morning and stayed mostly cloudy and overcast for the two-hour party. I was pretty bummed because I had loads of decor for the backyard that I didn't want to put out due to rain. And our umbrella would have fit with the theme! But alas, no sun to block.

I designed the invite, nothing too fancy.
You can see in the mirror the rain drop garland on the window. 

Snowflakes hanging, I quick drew clouds on the table.
White umbrella hanging up was one of the favors (kids/parents got to decorate them)

Random treat assortment: white meringue "clouds", sunflower seeds, skittles, lemon "sun" drops, lollipops, snowballs (yogurt raisins), yogurt stars, and gummy bears (they are rainbowy but mostly I just really wanted a gummy bear) 

The favor bags included sunglasses, rainbow star stickers, fruit snacks, and baggies of rainbow trix. The umbrellas did not fit in the bags!

The photo in the frame is Eli at the kids museum weather map!
Also, most all the bibs were used!

I planted some rainbow flowers, one of my favorite touches. 

This was supposed to be helium filled balloons displayed in a cool rainbow pattern. But it wasn't worth the cost. Silly streamers would just have to do. 

I love this yellow cloud shaped napkin holder from IKEA I found for less than  $2!
And the cute napkins are from there too. I heart IKEA.

The cupcakes turned out cute and were quite easy!
Boxed cupcakes, buttercream almond frosting, weird sour candies... wha-lah!

Of course, rainbow fruit kabobs! 

And rainbow veggies, too! With dill dip. 

Remember Eli's "1" from last year? Well, I guess it's a tradition now. Greg calls it a shrine.
Also, you can see the "sun chips" and rainbow chips-n-dip (blue chips with cowboy caviar).

Our main food was SLUSHburgers which is what we grew up calling Sloppy Joes. It was the best  weather-like named food that we could think of that was good for a crowd. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs was going to be served... but that didn't seem very easy to do for a crowd. No photos of the slushburgers because well, they are not pretty. We also had a pasta/coleslaw salad that was white and fluffy like a cloud. 

It's easy to find sun-themed drinks. Sun (un)sweet tea, capri suns, Sunkist...

Bam! I also had every color of the rainbow Powerade that I considered freezing into rainbow ice cubes.  I didn't. 

This is the "cloud jello" I forgot to put out on the table! 

I got a huge stack of books from the library on weather for the kids to read... but they stayed on the table for decoration!

We had a snowball fight! The older kids got into throwing them around... and cute Chloe just chomped right down since they were, indeed, marshmallows.

Some things that didn't happen that I wanted to included:

1. Snow cones. We had a little hand crank deal we could have used, but Greg's trip to Sonic to get ice that morning didn't happen and who wants to crank out twenty snow cones? I almost bought a machine on Amazon... but really, that I couldn't justify.

2. For the older kids I had a 'make it rain' activity with shaving cream and water and food coloring and the younger kids I had food coloring and oil and water in a baggie to make clouds activity... but I just didn't have the energy to explain and do these the day of... plus my tester baggie started to leak.

3. We had the amp out with music playing and gave the kids music toys to just dance around silly, which was good for the age group of kiddos we had. But I wanted it to be more like a goofy rain dance and have homemade rain sticks for them.

4. I was most excited about the thunder game... bubble wrap on cardboard shaped as clouds... the kids would stomp on it and cause it to thunder. Earlier in the week I made my first cloud and was quite disappointed when I couldn't get it to "thunder" when stomping on it. I figured out you need the really big bubble wrap and didn't have time to get enough to make these right. Also, probably better for a bit older crowd anyway.

There were other ideas pinned and thought of mid-shower that didn't happen but overall, everything turned out well, tasted good and fun was had!

Thanks to our friends for the help and for Greg letting me go crazy yet again! I hope when Eli sees photos of this party years from now, he will know he is loved and he had fun!

-Heather

PS Soon I'll post the hilarious group kid shot... my ideals meet reality.

Thanks AC.

Let the planning begin!

That's right. I decided on a theme for Eli's birthday party. Now please recall with me how I promised Greg I would never go overboard again on birthday parties for our little man. But well gee... I LOVE to plan parties! And so it begins.

Let's hope it won't be as extreme or detailed... but you just never know what I'll come up with. I decided this theme a few days ago but I should have done it weeks ago if I was smart. Why? Because a craft store in town went out of business and they had everything 50% off. Then 75%. Then 90%. And I went. Often. If I would have known it would have kept going up in discount, I probably would could have resisted at first. It officially closed Monday and I was quite sad I didn't go for the fit-all-you-can-in-one-bag-for-$3 day.

Oh but it was still loads of fun getting items for pennies (yes!) and finding stocking gifts and other treasures.  I learned that one of my weaknesses is definitely paper or cards. Paper makes me happy. But really most sections of a craft store will cause me to swoon (except sewing and yarn and other such really-need-talent areas).

Here's Eli enjoying a few buttons from one of the shopping trips. Yes, this is just plunder from one trip. See that bucket? It didn't have a tag so the dude just gave it to me for free. 

This is why I really need want a craft room!

Hopefully much of it will come in handy for Eli's party and  for gifts and pinned projects.

And if you need any cardstock, I'm your gal. Come on over and discover the stash hidden under the spare room bed!

-Heather

Hands Down!

Eli and I did a little hand print craft for his grandparents and great-grandparents last week (inspired by a Pinterest pin... but I made into a card form):

 

Indeed they are all the best! Happy Grandparents Day 2012!

-Heather  

PS - yes, that left hand print is mighty sad but hey, it's hard to do perfectionism-pleasing hand prints with a 16 month old... I say it just made each of the cards more special:)

Elephant Handprint Craft.

These are the elephant handprint crafts we made at Eli's birthday party. Aren't they just cute as can be? I used the template from this blog and made it a bit bigger. I haven't attached Eli's to the orange paper yet but my plan is to do that and then add his name and age.

I made different color birdies for Eli's friends. Lots of sweet handprints!

I thought it was the perfect craft because it had an elephant for Eli plus a little birdie that, to me, represents Maelee. Love it when that happens.

-Heather

Eli the Elephant has a PARTY!

First off, read my post from last Wednesday so you know some of the reason why I went ALL OUT and WAY OVER THE TOP for Eli's first birthday party.

Got it? Good. Okay, now here are some of the details of the day. I'll post more photos of the friends and fun we had later. Because we did have lots of fun! The weather was wonderful. The kids were adorable. Everything was great.

Here's the Eli shrine display. The best is the 1-11 month photo garland (I took a photo each month of the little man). I did the yarn letters but they wouldn't stand up so I had to use Eli's elephants for support. My orange tulips that were in the blue vase died this morning - whoops. So I stuck an elephant in there, too. The vest is from December but the two outfits are his newborn size. It's so crazy to think he wore those once! Plus his orange/blue shoes that usually stay on his crib:

Love watching this boy grow!

Greg designed a little "1" elephant for his invite so we used that throughout. We made labels for the water, orange powerade, propel... turned out so cute:

This was above Eli's high chair and boy did he like to look at them:

More elephants... and an Eli is One banner:

Loved this idea of a "one" made of photos throughout his first year (via Pinterest). We had a build your own sandwich bar plus blue and orange chips and carrots and dip (are their blue vegetables?):

Fruit kabobs but only with blue and orange fruit (grapes, blueberries, cantaloupe). And cupcakes and candy (all blue and orange, of course)!

The cupcake toppers (yep, I made everything):

We had an elephant craft that I'll post about later (the finished product is awesomely cute):

Five of Eli's friends were small enough to sit in bumbos... so we had a whole section for them!

Luke is showing off his elephant shaped peanut butter sandwich!

Eli looked really cute all day!

He enjoyed his cupcake... and his elephant bib I made:

And the onesie I made that I thought was going to be a bomb actually turned out super cute! Aren't you proud, Mom? I sort of sewed.

Pin the trunk on the elephant game... the kids weren't quite the right age but it was still fun!

Buckets of peanuts? Now they were a HIT with the kids. They could come and scoop some up, bring them outside... loads of fun. And yes, I did make sure there were no peanut allergies.

Eli's favors for his friends were bottles with goldfish for the big kids and blue/orange sunflower seeds and circus peanuts for the babies (for their parents, of course, since they don't eat anything yet!).

My talented friend Cindy made these for Eli, how perfect are they?!

We had a great time - wish you could have joined us! More photos to follow!

-Heather

Eli Hearts You.

Eli had craft time again last week. It's a holiday today, you know. We had to make a few cards to send to the family. And since you are in our extended virtual family, you can just pretend one of these is for you, too. I made up the sayings to go along with what we were doing...

I had an idea of putting a heart sticker on the card before Eli's foot stamp, then peeling away the sticker. I only had two heart stickers but it turned out great. I also did his name in stickers inside his hand print (thankfully Eli is only three letters so we don't have to wait until he's got big Grandpa Harold hands to fit his name in there). I think I'll use this peel-sticker-after idea for future hand/foot print activities... you know there will be many, many more. 

Foot prints are easy to do with Eli but the hand prints? Well, those are a little tough. Let's just say there is usually a lot of paint around. There is a certain time limit Eli has for these craft times, too. Then he hits his limit and enough is enough. (I have a feeling his sentiments on crafting won't change).

The owner of these adorable hands and feet is sick again with another cold. He's so pathetic you can't help but feel sorry for him. Now on to invent a little machine like the dentist has to suck water out of your mouth but made for small noses...

-Heather

Martha I Am Not.

If you know me at all, you know I love photos. And paper. And Christmas. And the post office. And writing.

So it makes sense that I really love the whole Christmas card and letter thing. I really do. We didn't do one last year. This year I wanted to do one that was so awesome when you opened it, you would see fireworks and hear angels sing.

At least that's how it sort of manifested itself in my head. I wanted to do right by Eli and make everything just so. Our friend started a photography biz and we hired her to take our pic the week after Thanksgiving. And I got a groupon last month to design and print our card (from a company I've never used).

Thankfully, everything went fairly smoothly. Eli was on the verge of a nap before our photo shoot but we got some good smiles (thanks Michelle). She got us the photos quickly and designing the card was fairly painless.

On to the letter. I had a great idea a few months back to "sew" stitches on our letter, for a cool, crafty addition to white paper. I could use regular 'ol paper, which I often get for free because of a sale at office supply stores (which I really like, they remind me of my old jobs and office-y life).

I wrote most of the letter a few days ago and finished it last night. I had Greg get the sewing machine down from the attic, which is no easy task. That thing weighs a ton. And it's up in the attic for a reason: I don't know how to sew. I have sewn in the past, but always with my mother right there (and most often taking over for me because I whined too much).

I don't even know how to thread the darn thing. I had written instructions on a yellow piece of paper that my mom dictated to me  a few years ago. Obviously I stared at that for a good fifteen minutes in wonder. I found some dated YouTube videos and learned enough to wind my bobbin. I accomplished that and felt like a rock star. I called my mom to brag.

I then tried threading the machine. I think I got it. It seemed to work, do what it was supposed to do. I was all full of anticipation and much pride at this point. I wanted to do a cool zig-zag sort of stitch. There are lots, way too many, levers on this old Singer machine. Some of them look like zig-zags so I was pulling levers and turning dials all over the place. My mom (on the phone) said I need to make sure my needle wouldn't break off if my whatchamacalit wasn't the right size. So I texted her a photo to get the okay on that (thanks, technology).

And I was off!

Problem was: it looked terrible. I tried many different types of stitches but none really looked that great. I think if I used card stock it would have been okay. But it looked dumb. And by the end, I think Mr. Singer wasn't too happy. The back of my paper was a red threaded mess! And even the few I thought could work, well, it would take waaay too long to stitch 120 pieces of paper. I don't have that time. Eli's naps are not that long.

I wanted to print the letter so I can try get them in the mail today or tomorrow. I didn't have any cool Christmas paper on hand, my stamp pads were dry, and we don't have a color printer. I had to improvise and quickly create a graphic matching our card. It looks grayishly alright but nothing, oh nothing, like the beautiful dream I had for my letter, all stitched and crafty and genius.

I say all that to say: often Christmas cards and letters just show the pretty outside of our lives. They most likely don't show what's really going on in our daily lives, in our hearts. That's the messy, the sinful, the stuff we are so desperately in need of God's grace for. A lesson for me, for us. Don't spend all your time trying to make your outsides flawless and perfect. You won't succeed. We are imperfect people, completely dependent on some amazing grace.

"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and plate, that the outside also may be clean." Matthew 23:25-26

-Heather

Oh, and if you want a card and I don't have your address, get that to me please! I promise no fireworks.

Created: Football Onesie.

I saw this adorable onesie pinned from etsy and I couldn't help but make one for Eli. It's brown. It's football. It's wearable for months of Sundays.

Supplies: brown onesie, white felt, fabric glue (because I'm not a sewer), scissors, pen, pattern...

I found an image of a football and copied the laces, made them black and printed it. I put that behind my white felt and overly traced (that means I traced bigger than what I really wanted) the pattern. I then cut it out carefully. It's not perfect but I think it's good to have small variations (at least that's what I tell my perfectionism). 

Then I just glued the "laces" onto the onesie using that sweet fabric glue. I really stuck that sucker on there.

Done! And here's the finished product (Eli wore this on Thanksgiving after he spit up on his other outfit):

Greg and his 'lil football (dreaming of the days when Eli will be big enough to actually play football on Thanksgiving):

Hilarious. Love it.

-Heather