Fairy Party: Progress thus far

Invites - check! 

Tutus - check! (well, five of them at least...)

Wings - yeah.... gotta work on those! 

Game idea - check! (We are going to us our "art-talent" to paint terra cotta pots, then our "garden-talent" to plant seeds, and finally our "water" and "light" talents to help them grow.  Maybe we should add an earth worm for the animal talent?  hehe, JK!)

Photographers - CHECKish! Setting up a photo booth and have one to shoot the party.  This is the part that I'm seriously stumped on.  I can't for the life of me figure out what kind of background to use for the photo booth.  I want the set to emphasize the tiny size of the 'fairies', but I also don't want it to be too overboard and difficult.  I also do NOT want a white background - too many sessions at the picture people have turned me off of white for quite a while!  

So I need some help with the decorations.  My sister is much better at this than I, but she's pretty busy and I don't want to bother her.  Any suggestions? 

Happy Weekend

Originally, I thought I would be getting some well-deserved R&R this weekend, but since when is life how you expect it to be?  Through a quick turn of events, the kiddies did not land at Gram's house this weekend and I did NOT get a day to sit around, watch SciFi, and make Fairy wings for up-coming birthday festivities.  Boo!

There's always a back-up, however... 

Friday night - Mexican Food and R & H's The King and I.  Oldest loved it.  So did DH. I mean, really, who wouldn't?

Saturday - DH made muffins, I took oldest daughter out and about for a little bit of girlie time, naps, movies, and then wonderful family outing to Coldstone and Target.  We got new glasses! DH's have wood-grain sides - mine are purple - we're such nerds! Chick-fil-a for a quick dinner (mostly because we didn't realize how late it was when we left Target!) and then family viewing of Hercules. Oldest was a little scared, youngest just wanted to crawl all over us the whole time!  DH and I were amused by the amount of sarcasm in a Disney children's movie.  Guess we didn't pay too much attention to it the first time around... 

Sunday - Snow Toast for breakfast!  DH and I somehow managed to clean our whole place, save our bedroom, in about 30 minutes flat this morning - because we are rockstars! Marine brother came into town to go to church with us.  He brought Bojangles.  I heart him! We had a nice little afternoon hanging out, playing checkers, and went to the park.  

THEN to top off our wonderful weekend - MEATBALLS!  Oldest has been asking for them for quite a long time, so I finally gave in and spent two extra hours in the kitchen today making the WS three-meat meatballs, homemade tomato sauce, pasta, and salads.  Someone better love me a little more this week! ;-) 

Just goes to show that sometimes the best times are not the ones you plan! That and my family rocks!  Oh yeah - and when things don't work out the way you planned, eat a bunch of good food and you'll forget all about it! 

It's hard to find good help

So after the last childcare disaster, we decided to have a younger family member fill our once-a-week childcare position.  Basically, it's just a few hours one morning a week for me to take care of all the errands and house "stuff." 

Well, today was her first day on the job - start time 9:30.  It's not 10:15 and she is at least 30 minutes away! WTH? I started calling her phone when she was 15 minutes late, thinking... Ok she's just running behind, maybe I can get an ETA and reschedule my morning.  But NO! Her phone is off.  So the eternal mother that I am, I'm starting to freak out about all the things that may have happened to her - car wreck, extreme traffic, alien abduction - and I can't find anyone who has seen her all morning.  Crap! She's 30 minutes late - something has definitely happened.  I call the brother-in-law (whose house she was staying at) and wake him up (cop, weird hours, NEVER wake him up unless it's an emergency) and he informs me that she is still asleep on the couch! WTH?????

I tell her that she was supposed to be here half an hour ago - "Oh man..."  

Hells yes, it's "oh man!" You have just given me a heart attack because I thought something had happened to you and really you just can't get your lazy ass out of bed?!?! You went to sleep at 10:00 last night!  Wake up, and smell the coffee, sweetheart!  No adults get to sleep for 12 hours - don't care how tired you might be - but especially not when you get 10 hours of sleep on a regular basis! 

Needless to say, moral to today's story, it's hard to find good help.  Maybe it's a good thing that we got into preschool for the fall!  We'll leave it to the professionals! 

Pre-School Registration

Today DH and I took the girls to check out our church's preschool.  We were looking for a social and physical outlet for them, not so much a traditional "school".  (We will probably home school later down the road, but that's another post for another day.)  Basically I can teach them what they need to know, but I can't be their friends.  They need to get used to dealing with all kinds of different people - so preschool for a few years! 

So here's the story - last week it snowed in NC.  Fantastic, Open House at preschool was supposed to be that day, but everything was closed.  So they rescheduled for today.  

9:30am - We are there, right on time.  We walk into a room with about 6-8 other families sitting at tables.  Now I'm thinking that we should be in line somewhere to register - returning students and families get to register first for classes of about 15, so I knew that there couldn't have been much space available.  I was hoping to at least get my oldest a decent space on the waitlist.  

So the director starts chatting - giving us all detailed information.  We're going to register, then take a tour, would anyone like a snack, etc... 

We were sitting at the back of the room and I could not figure out how in the world they were going to work the registration process.  

Well, the director started asking for 1yr olds for the Mommy's Morning Out class - no takers. 

Then Two's - myself and one other lady raise our hands.  Other lady wants to tour and discuss with her husband first.  Falls to me.  (We had decided that we would put all our eggs in the church preschool basket and if it didn't work out, then I would just keep lining up playdates like I do now - so I knew I wanted to register BOTH of my kids.) 

I go up to talk to the secretary while the director continues to talk to the other parents.  

I hand over my completed paperwork and answer the secretary's questions - then I hear, "Ok, does anyone have threes?"  Everyone else's hands shoot up.  Director keeps talking...

Me to secretary - I have a two and a three.  

Secretary - OH. Um... Oh... Well, hang on a second, I need to talk to her about that! 

Now, as you can imagine, all kinds of horrible situations are running through my mind here - what?  did I do something wrong?  Can you only send ONE child to preschool?  I don't want to send the baby and leave the oldest at home.  Oh my goodness, what if there is some rule that I didn't read?  I'm about to be embarrassed in front of all these people.  

By this time the secretary has gotten the director's attention and she has stopped talking.  

Secretary - She has a two and a three.  

Director - Oh, well then, she gets priority.  Sorry folks, there are no longer an spaces left in the THREES class! 

I'm pretty sure that my mouth fell open at this point.  I quickly got out my purse and paid the registration fee.  Go sit down next to DH, who looks over at me and says, "AWKWARD!" 

Apparently while I was registering the first child, the director had been explaining to everyone that there was one space left in the threes class that would be filled by lottery and that your spot on the waitlist would also be determined by lottery.  So here everyone was thinking that they had a fighting chance to get into this preschool and I totally swiped it! 

I mean, it was all "fair" according to their rules, but I still felt bad.  To make matters worse, none of the other parents would even look at me or DH the whole time we were touring the facility.  

Such an awkward experience! I couldn't feel excited for us because I was so sad for the other families.  So, yeah, strange morning! 

Time for a positive!

Bad news about no raise for DH, but he still has a job and that's much better than a lot of people right now! So onto happier subjects - 

We're having a Pixie Hollow party for our oldest daughter's birthday.  I've come across a few good ideas and thought of some of my own, but I would love any more suggestions!  

So far... 

All the little kids get to dress as their favorite talent.  (According to oldest daughter, youngest daughter is a mess-talent!) I'm going to make the table into a map of Pixie Hollow and place corresponding food in each section.  Then I was trying to think of some way to put water, flowers, and grass all over the place... you know, make it as authentic as possible?  I really want it to feel like they are 5" tall.  

Hopefully, it won't break the bank!

Recession has become REAL

 in our house anyway!  

DH's company announced a salary freeze yesterday.  This after we've been waiting about 8 months for a promised promotion.  

Good news:  They are still getting annual bonuses.  

Bad news:  No new house for us! 

BOO!!!  I can't even express how disappointed I was, not in DH, but in his bosses for letting his promotion be a low priority long enough to let this happen.  Of course, I'm also disappointed about no house... it's getting WAY too cramped in our apartment and I'm not sure how much longer I can handle it.  

Hearts in my eyes...

...for lingerie!  I think I would be comfortable in jeans and a T-shirt for the rest of my life provided I had matching undergarments!  I'm not talking about wearing a teddy everyday, but there's definitely something to be said for that smirk you hide in the back of your head that says, "oh yes - underneath all this MOMMY, I'm still a very sexy woman!" VS carries an italian line of lingerie called Intimissimi.  Recently it's been my favorite.