Naomi's 7th Birthday Tea Party

Naomi turned 7 yesterday!! She had a great 2 days! But then last night she threw up the entire night (probably because she ate too much popcorn and slushie at the movie with daddy!)

Friday I spent the entire day prepping the house for her tea party. It was quite a busy day!






The Little girls did a lot of TV time.

Then the tea party began! It was fun! Each girl received a hat and boas and gloves. Then they served themselves mini-sandwiches and fancy little desserts, while I poured hot chocolate for everyone. They all sat nicely and told each other jokes! So sweet!



Then they opened presents and afterwards we had cake.




All of the guests are in Naomi's French class so when I started to sing happy birthday I was overpowered by these sweet girls singing happy birthday in French!! How Cute are they?!?

Saturday morning Naomi woke up and came downstairs to find her present. A nice new acoustic guitar! She loved it and played on it for a very long time. I didn't get any pictures yet and can't get one right now because she is still sleeping it off from being sick.

We headed out for the day and took the train down to Gardner Village.



They got a pony ride and then we rode on a hayride to a little witch's village. Naomi was pretty stunned at the witch's. She wouldn't talk to them. And they sang Happy Birthday to her there.












Then we had the girls get their faces painted.










Last night Naomi had her daddy daughter birthday date. They went to the Copper Onion for dinner. Naomi apparently loved the mashed potatoes, and she does not like mashed potatoes. Naomi and Brian went to see Kung Fu Panda 2, and they both loved it!

When she was going to sleep last night Brian asked her if she enjoyed her birthday. She said it was great! And then 2 hours later she was sick. Sad!

2 Birthday Parties in 2 days!

My mom and grandmom came to visit us for a week! We had a great time. Since it was so close to Bianca and Gwen's birthdays I decided to do both parties while they were here. It was a crazy idea! I think next time I will just let us visit with family instead of doing the parties while they are here. I'll just have to take better pictures of the parties, which we all know I seem to be very very bad at doing!

So first off we did Gwen's party with her preschool friends on Friday. She had a great turn out! We did an ice cream party in lots of pink. Gwen is such a cutie girl! I always find it funny that she wants to have kids around all of the time, but she spent most of the party downstairs with the grown-ups cuddling with someone. She loves friends, but has a very limited amount of time she can be with them. I also notice that she would rather dig in the sand by herself at the park rather than run around with everyone. I am also always amazed at how generous people are at parties. I always put on my invitation, "no presents needed" because I don't want people to feel obligated or stressed about another birthday party kid present/money wasted/whatever, but Gwen got tons of stuff! I did not have the presence of mind to take a before picture of her ice cream parlor set up. Here are the pics for her party:

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Clearly, I have lighting issues!

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Oh big 4 year old!
This one is a little bit more clear:

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From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

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On Saturday, yes the very next day, I took on Bianca's bee party! For this one we invited our friends. I think that until the 4 year birthday party, the parties are still for me! Age 4 is when they suddenly want all their friends there. The plan was to just do cupcakes, but I had so much left over from Gwen's ice cream party, I put out the ice cream bar again! I actually got pictures of the decorations this time, but the sun was shining in through the curtains so they look all glowy and weird. I bought a better camera to do this stuff with, but the first time I used it, it broke. Gotta get that figured out still. So here are the pics:

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I didn't even get a picture of Bee on this day! I think Brian has some on his phone though - so I will have to check.

Quick Look for less Bathroom Redo

I was feeling like our upstairs was a bit too pink. Pink, pink, pink. Perhaps we could call it pinkalicious! It was pink and grey with princess stuff everywhere. I was tired of it. So I found a color combo I liked on CB2's website.



Only problem was that one towel cost $24.95!!! Not going to pay that. So I went to HomeGoods and Target. I definitely found the Look for Less!!

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From New Album 5/14/11 10:15 AM

I want to put up a shelf above the toilet to put the rolled towels on. The awesome bath mat is perhaps the softest thing I've ever touched! So glad I got it! And looks just like the inspiration rug.

Have you ever purchased a tumbler rinse cup for your bathroom from the bath section? Did you notice that they cost like $10 sometimes?? I did not want a $10 tumbler! So I found my adorable cups in the summer section for $1.50 each!

This is my favorite find from HomeGoods:

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Some happy girls!

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The best and surprise benefit to this redo is that the girls will finally use the bathroom again. They have been terrified of it since our electricity went out when they were in there with the door closed awhile ago. This morning I wake up to, "Can you please put toothpaste on my toothbrush, and Gwen is in the potty." Woohoo! Finally I don't have to hold their hands to get them in there!!

Bad Dreams

I have certain things that I still have bad dreams about! Often they involve vampires, people breaking into our house, ghosts, something bad happening to people I love, sometimes high school stuff that haunts me. There are more things I have bad dreams about, but that is a fairly good list of things to be afraid of when it happens in your dream, I think.

This one, I don't think you should be afraid of.

Naomi came to me last night at 5am. Her eyes were wider than I have ever seen. So much so that I instantly got scared she was sick (or it was one of my bad dreams where my kids are possessed!). When I asked her what was wrong, she told me she had a bad dream.

Here is the dream: I was in the bathroom. I washed my hands 4 times, and then I used sanitzer one them so I knew they were clean. But then I left my water bottle in the bathroom.

Say WHAT? This is what traumatizes the poor kid? I told her to go back to bread and do some deep breathing. Normally when she has a bad dream I let her sleep the rest of the night on our floor. I understand the fear of a bad dream, but I tell ya, that one really threw me for a loop!

I dream of having a garden with all white flowers! Imagine that at night? I think it'd be gorgeous! Brian and the girls, however, want all the possible colors in it. I think I should win, but I doubt I will...

My living room needs an office.

Lately I have been realizing that I need an office space of some sort. I want a place where I can do the occasional craft, allow the girls to color whenever they want, do homework, house the computer, bills, printer etc. Currently we have the computer in the living room and all of the coloring craftings in the dining room. Having the girls use the dining room for crafts is quite inconvenient. They are never finished for dinner time so the table always has to be cleared. Additionally I tend to set them up to color and do homework while I make dinner. Then when dinner is done I have to clear off the table and THEN set it. So I have been dreaming up a solution to have a bigger office space in the living room.

I want to have at least two work spaces. I need quite a bit of storage for the craft stuff and coloring books and office supplies. I have it all dreamed up from the pottery barn catalog, but obviously I cannot afford a pottery barn office. I want something that is able to be out in our living room though; it can't look too officey. It has to have a little class and be totally organized. So I am asking for some tips or advice on what might work.

Here is the location for the future office set up:

From Drop Box

Here are my dream offices:

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One of my dilemma's is that I am always drawn to a white office. Every one of my dream offices is white desk and storage etc. However, we don't have any white furniture in our living area. I don't know if I can mix it properly to get a good look or if it will totally stand out against the rest of the room and look awkward or worse, cheap! We plan to paint the walls a blue grey. And we are keeping this tv stand:

From Drop Box

Because of the price point I am turning to Ikea as my most possible solution. They have a corner desk that will fit right in there. Any ideas? I am worried that I am looking at this from just my view point and not seeing the whole picture.

I am planning on these to use as legs for the desk:http://www.walmart.com/ip/Bush-Stockport-Collection-3-Drawer-File-Pedestal/13062139

Any ideas??