Roar and Oink!

I picked a theme for Elliott's 2nd birthday party in about February.  There was a dinosaur birthday shirt on sale at Gymboree in a 2T.  I decided right there in the store that I would buy the shirt and we would have a dinosaur party.  I was just barely recovered from throwing his snowman 1st birthday party.

 

I bought some stuff for the dinosaur party in August when I was shopping for Spencer's golden birthday party.  Then I kind of forgot about it while we went about life.  Until last week, when I realized we were a month away from when I was planning on having the party.

 

Time to get cracking!

 

We took an uber-cute picture and made and sent inviations. 

I came up with a menu, printed recipes for when I shop and took a survey of supplies.  We always have left over plates, napkins, plastic silverware, etc. after parties and I always hoard it away for future use, so we're actually in really good shape.  There is very little left to buy.  Just all of the food, which can't be done in advance, some dinosaur paper for menu cards and clear plastic cups.

 

Yesterday I looked at a bunch of cake ideas on pinterest.  

 

I'm totally going to do something like this:

 

I love the idea of t-rex standing on a mountain of chocolate.

We also went to the candy store and bought 1.5 pounds of candy rocks- both jelly and chocolate.  They are hiding in Elliott's closet so that a certain 6 year old and another certain 36 year old don't eat them.

I also saw these on pinterest and am in love with this idea.  This is why we need clear, plastic cups.

We already had some cheap plastic dinosaurs, but I wanted to look for a few more for decorating the buffet table, the dessert table and the cake.  I also wanted to get tiny ones for the pudding cups and for goodie bags.

 

The kids and I went to Hobby Lobby, Dollar Tree and Walmart after school yesterday.  We found 2 really nice dinosaurs at Hobby Lobby.  I made Spencer pay for one of them separately so we could use the 40% off coupon for both of them.

 

We also found some "less nice" ones at Dollar Tree and Walmart.  They were all $1.  I also ordered a bag of 96 tiny dinos from Oriental Trading Co.

 

We're totally set on dinosaurs for the party!

 

We already had the yellow bronto, the blue T-Rex, the red stegosaurus and the green crocodile looking dino on the right.  The rest are new.

The baby T-Rex is from Hobby Lobby.  This is the one that Spencer "bought" using my money.

 

This frightening guy was also at Hobby Lobby.

As was this precious little oinker.

 

I mean, how could I say no?

 

He fits perfectly into our kitchen decor and he was 50% off too.

He may not be from the Jurassic period, but he was certainly needed for a successful party. 



Quick

1.

I was looking for a picture of this infant seat today (for totally unimportant reasons that would take too long to explain).  I knew we had some with a very tiny and brand new Elliott.

 

He was 3 days old in the first one and 4 days old in the second one.

 

These pictures make me want to simultaneously build a time machine so I can go back and squeeze him and vomit at the idea of ever having to care for another newborn. 

2.

It has been a while since I took pictures of my sleeping kids.  I took care of that on Friday night.

 

Spencer was rocking the underoos.  I added a privacy bubble for his sake.

3.

Elliott has been showing some signs that he has outgrown his highchair.  Sign #1 being, he doesn't want to sit in it anymore.  Spencer refused his highchair past 18 months, so Elliott lasted a lot longer.  We got the ol' high chair (2 words) out of the attic on Saturday.  He enjoyed a snack in it that afternoon and hasn't looked back.

4.

I love that I have a brunette and a blonde.  For one second I entertain thoughts of having a third boy who is a redhead and then I remember that I get sick to my stomach when I think about caring for a newborn.  Oh, and that we took surgical measures to prevent a third.  There is THAT little detail.

5.

Dressing them in the same outfit still hasn't lost its appeal.

6.

Elliott showing his left handedness.

7.

I left him outside so I could go to the bathroom.  When I returned he was sitting in my chair reading Entertainment Weekly.  I'm surprised he wasn't drinking my iced coffee.

8.

Ginger is a weirdo.

Mega Saturday

We had a very, very busy Saturday. 

 

It actually started on Friday night with the fall festival at Spencer's school.  Spencer had a blast with his best buddy, Paul.

 

Paul and Spencer could probably be fraternal twins.

On Saturday morning we went to Woofstock, which is a dog festival.  We went once before.....in 2009!  I can't believe it has been that long. Ginger was with us, but I managed to not take any pictures of the dog at the dog party.

 

They had free face painting and Spencer immediately picked the tiger for his face.

 

It was amazing.

 

He was just delighted.

 

I think this is my all time favorite picture of him.

After the face painting we went to the playground and took half a billion pictures of Elliott (that you saw in the 23 month post), and a few of Spencer.

 BTW, I wrote a post back in 2009 about our first time at Woofstock (You can read about it HERE).

 

When I went back to look at that post I saw we had a picture of barely 2-year-old Spencer on the same slide.  I had to do a side-by-side (slide-by-slide?) comparison.

BTW #2.  Elliott is wearing the exact same light blue onesie with the dog under his striped vest.  I did not do that on purpose.  I didn't even realize it until I saw those pictures of Spencer.  Apparently I'm so OCD about these things that I don't have to be OCD on purpose anymore.  My subconscious is taking care of things now.

Right before we left we went to pick up the free 5 x 7 print of our picture with Santa.  This is a picture of the picture.  I know it was difficult for the photographer, given the subject matter, but these are my chief complaints: Ginger has no feet, Santa's hat is cut off and Spencer's eyes are closed.  I'm pretty sure it is the only picture EVER taken of Spencer in which his eyes are closed.  Oh well, Elliott and I look like we could be on the cover of Mommy and Me magazine. 

After a quick stop at home to leave Ginger we were off to John and Maryellen's house for a turkey decorating contest party.

 

Maryellen is hard at work on her Audrey Hepburn turkey.

 

 

All of the finished turkey masterpieces.

 

I really liked Shireen's. 

I voted for Sydney's as my favorite.  I like how she added political turkeys around her big boy turkey.

I voted for Maryellen's as my second favorite, mostly because I thought that the Audrey Hepburn turkey looked like Ray Charles in lacy underwear.

Jaime's bride turkey proved to be my biggest competition.  We tied for first.  I was absolutely floored.  I wasn't expecting a single vote.

 

The winners

 

I got my absolute favorite thing as a prize: a seasonal straw cup! 

 

And a glittery Christmas ornament!

Back at home we hung our turkeys up so that we can admire them for one more week.  I should mention that Michael and Elliott did not decorate turkeys.  They ate at the party and came back home so that Elliott could nap.  Which he didn't do. 

 

My winning turkey.  He's pretty blingy.

And then, it was time for our big date night!

 

Michael and I were celebrating the 17th anniversary of when we met each other when I was 17 years old. 

 

We met each other on Saturday, November 16, 1996.  In 72 more days (yes, we figured out that I was 17 years and 72 days old) I will have known Michael for half of my life.  It will happen on January 27th.  We plan on going out again.  It's a Monday, so our babies will probably come with us.

 

Spencer took our picture.

 

Somewhat successfully, 

 

unsuccessfully,

 

and successfully.

Here's a side by side of our 17th anniversary of meeting and what we think is the first picture ever taken of us together (but was not taken that day).

We took the kids over to Dorothy's house and she watched them while we went to dinner and to a movie. 

 

She took pictures before we left.

 

 

 I think the 17 and 19 year olds pictured above have done alright for themselves.