Luckiest little girl

Last Saturday, we were about to head out on a bike ride.  That is amazing enough, for February.  The weather lately has actually been in the 60's on occasion, so we are trying to take advantage while we can!

While Daddy was getting a tire pumped up and ready to go, a neighbor called and said that their daughter was done with her old Easy Bake Oven.  "Would Kaitlyn like it?"  That was a big yes.  In fact, I just sent Kaitlyn down the street to pick up her surprise without telling her what she was bringing back.  Those things are hilarious- the cake that she made with that light bulb was not totally edible in my book, but the girls had a blast trying out the fondant tools.

And then, the very next day, another friend told me she had something Kaitlyn might like.  She was going to post it for sale for $10, but asked me first if I wanted it.

The Hello Kitty line from Janome has always made me laugh.  They have a $30 one for sale in Jo-Anns that Kaitlyn asks for every time she sees it (and which I wouldn't trust to last five minutes).  But they range up to $500 machines with Hello Kitty still all over it.  This one was a mid-range one, and has fantastic reviews.  Of course, I snatched it from her before I even found that out.  Kaitlyn is on my sewing machine constantly now, so of course I was buying this little one.

As I headed home with the new purchase, I couldn't even decide what else to do.  She just barely had her birthday, with the usual new stash of toys.  This was a big gift to just show up with randomly, but I couldn't wait until next Christmas or Birthday to give it to her.  All I could do was come home and hold it up, watching her eyes go big.  She wanted to take it out of the box and sew with it immediately.

While still wearing the Elsa costume, clearly.

I can't remember exactly what Daddy said (after he picked his jaw off the floor), but it was something like "can you wish for a new four-wheeler next?  I'd like one of those to just show up too, please."

And then today, we got to go ice skating again.

She has been looking forward to that forever.  I wish that the rink was closer to us. And that the $3 kiddie rink time wasn't during school hours.  I am tempted to put her in lessons someday, but we'll see.

She had to re-figure it out a bit, and then by the end she was just about faster than me.  When I showed her that someone had left behind their "walker", she decided to use that to try out tricks.

The arabesque turned out to be very tricky, but she managed it a few times.

Neither of us had a clue how to skate backwards.  I just don't know where to put my weight.  She made it a few feet, but it wasn't easy!  She just is naturally pretty good at figuring things out, though.

What a lucky, sweet little girl.

One last birthday . . .

I have to admit that I am still not fond of my own birthday.  I actually don't care at all about getting older.  In truth, it just comes down to being a socially awkward person.  I get nervous about attention, I panic about people giving me presents because maybe I don't usually give them a present, etc.  I've had plenty of bad luck on my birthday that makes me try to avoid it when possible.  I even tried to change my birthday on Facebook to avoid all of those messages, but it turns out they won't let you!

As birthdays go, however, this one went pretty well.  In my world, that means that I had a quiet day at home and got to do a few fun things with my family.  The company my husband works for had a "holiday party" in Wendover the weekend before my birthday.  There really is nothing in that city but gambling, but a hotel room without the kids is always a good thing.  On the way home, we stopped at a warehouse clearance center and Christopher got me a very random birthday present - an inflatable hot tub was a quarter of the price is it on Amazon, so he snagged that up.  I was nervous that it wouldn't be as good as we hoped, but it has actually been really nice!

We took the kids to see Big Hero 6 that night.  The kids all loved it, including Jasmine, who loved every second until she fell asleep.

I have also been working a bit on what I consider a birthday present to myself.  Or maybe just something that I needed to get done.  For years, my spare fabric has all been stored in a broken dresser in the basement.  I had to rifle through the drawers to see it all, and of course it didn't even all fit in there.  So it started to get piled on top, and slowly started to take over the universe.

Not good.  So I looked up fabric storage ideas, and found that a lot of people wrap the fabric around a stiff cardboard sheet designed to protect comic books and the put the mini "bolts" on a bookcase.  Perfect!

I found a bookcase that I liked on a school surplus sale, and measured to make sure it would fit in the low ceiling of the basement.  But unfortunately, the guy who measured the bookcase to sell it measured wrong and labeled it 85" when it was 95".  Christopher was muttering angry things about that guy while we cut the top off the bookshelf and then put the top back on it, but thankfully I don't think anyone could tell.  If it was summertime, I might have painted it or something, but in the winter, I have no interest in being outside longer than I have to.

Two orders of comic book cards and a few hours of folding later, I am in love!

You should have seen Christopher's face when I had to order a second 100 pack of the cards.  "You have HOW much fabric?" At least I am a selective hoarder! And I do use my stash a lot.  Not to mention that a good portion of what you see in that picture was given to me, or found at a garage sale.

My sewing area makes me very happy.

The day after my birthday, Christopher and I went to a concert that our friends were playing in.  I love bagpipes and Celtic dancers, so it was a great concert!

Happy birthday to me!

Kaitlyn's 7th Birthday

As soon as Tyler's birthday was over, Kaitlyn was anxious for her turn.  "Do you think it is time that we should plan my birthday party?"  In fact, I think she asked me that every single day until I caved. I spent time pricing out all of the options, but when we decided on one and then she tried to add to it I had to remind her that I can't actually transport 7 seven-year olds.  If the party started at a business, we all stayed there, and there would be no going home for cake or out for ice cream or sledding afterward.  That was unacceptable, and thus we planned a party at home.

I'm never sure if I am grateful that I don't have to pay for overpriced parties at that point, or overwhelmed that now I have to plan everything by myself.

Anyway, I always fell better when I have some sort of theme or direction.  Since she was hoping that we would have snow to go sledding a short walk from our house, we called it a "Snow Day Party".

And of course there was no snow in sight, with a high of 50 or so that day.

I follow a blog that I just adore.  She is an amazing seamstress that makes really fun things for her girls, but she also throws amazing birthday parties.  At first I thought she was nuts, but she said something that stuck with me.  She said that the reason she does it is because she enjoys creating and planning everything with her daughters.  In her mind, the party itself was barely important.  She loved that her girls made all of the props with her and imagined all the games and THAT was why they planned the elaborate treasure hunts and such.

With that goal in mind, I let Kaitlyn lead the way on games.  Well, we were both guided by Pinterest.  But she had the final say.  My favorite part was the Penguin toss.

I outlined a penguin in marker and handed her the box of crayons.  I made a pattern for the felt "fish", and she cut them out and sewed them.  She really liked making those beanbags!  It turns out, actually, that tossing the fish is not as fun as climbing under the penguin.

I think the entire party crammed in there together at one point.

I'll admit that Kaitlyn wasn't involved in every project fully, but sometimes I just had too much fun.

The warm weather turned out to be a great bonus, because the kids zipped through all the games I prepped really fast and then just headed outside to play on the playset.  Parties are always a bit of chaos- in fact, this year I was excited to serve sno cones with the machine we got for Christmas, froze half a dozen ice blocks ready to go, and then had the nagging feeling I was forgetting something until everyone was gone and I found it buried behind sprinkles and pizza boxes on the counter.  Oops!  But Kaitlyn had a great time with her friends, and that is all that matters.

On her birthday itself, I told her that I could make anything she wanted for dinner or we could go anywhere, and she picked Arctic Circle of all places.  They are cheaper that McDonalds, but my kids love the play place and the free, tiny ice cream cones.

As a bonus, her class started taking home Ponko the Penguin and writing in the book about their adventures with him, and she got to be the first one to take him since it was her birthday.

So we had to make sure and pose with him all over the restaurant.

My goofy Tyler.

Kaitlyn was in heaven because the nice manager (truly, she is an awesome little lady) saw the birthday hat and told her to pick out any sundae she wanted for free.

We also had cake at Grandma's house that Sunday.

I really should have brought my good camera.  She picked out a Phineas and Ferb cake largely because Agent P popped out from behind the tree when you pulled on one of the branches.  Amazing!

The last part of Kaitlyn's birthday has been postponed a couple of times, but I promised her it would happen soon.  She is really looking forward to going ice skating again, but the "small and tall" ice times are during school hours.  (I would really like to know who on earth planned that.  They didn't even run it during the summer.)  The day after her birthday, we ended up all going to a space center with Tyler's class field trip instead.  And then the next Thursday was the 100th day of school, which has somehow turned into an exciting holiday.  So hopefully this week we'll pull her out of a nice, regular day of school and try skating again.

In the meantime, here are my annual thoughts on Miss Kaitlyn:

*I am constantly amazed by how much she picks up quite naturally.  She can add and subtract two digit numbers, read chapter books, and is pretty good at almost everything she tries.  But she also doesn't have any competitive or driven spirit for it all.  She just floats over to things, does pretty well, and is perfectly content with that.

*She is still a talker!  All day, every day, she wants to talk to friends and tell stories.  Her class has been working on comprehension, but she certainly never has a problem with that.  When I ask her any question after she reads a story, she proceeds to tell me every single detail in the entire story nearly word for word.  Her stories do tend to wander a bit, and sometimes I have to hurry that poor girl along because I need to keep moving, but I do love listening to all of her tales.

*She is truly a wonderful person who wants to be a good friend to everyone she knows.  She does her best to help me and her siblings.  I'm trying to remember the last time she got in trouble for something, and all I can think of is talking when it isn't time to talk.  We took her out of dance class because we realized that she was only there for social time with friends instead of become a better dancer.  And we have a structure with her piano teacher for how she will pay us back if she goofs off and doesn't focus while she is there.  But she isn't doing it out of bad intentions!  She just honestly wants to play and be silly with her friends.

*Sometimes she is amazingly brave, and then sometimes she is my sensitive little girl.  She has no problem performing piano in front of dozens or even a hundred or more people, or gymnastics, or anything else.  But every once in a while she comes into a new situation with people she doesn't know and she just snuggles into my side with these sweet little tears.  I always remind myself to try and see things from her perspective, because often the things that break her seem inconsequential in comparison to things she does without batting an eyelash.

*Her current happy noise is "da!"  It usually means "yes", and she always has a huge, open grin after she says it.  I'm not sure where she got it from, but it cracks me up!