Pony Party

Our girls both love My Little Pony. Their cousins gave them some this summer, and they have enjoyed them for months now. I thought I would try something new this year and have their parties together. Instead of doing one in September and one in November, we just did a combined party in October. There were some things I liked about that: one, it was cheaper to just buy food, decorations, and treat bags one time; two, more time to put all the toys away before Christmas; and three, people didn't feel like they had to buy an "unbirthday gift" to all of the other children. But still...I felt a little guilty for cheating them of their own party. Big Sissy was very confused because she's still not 5 despite the fact that we celebrated her turning 5, she had 5 candles on her cake, etc. I'm not sure what I'll do next year, but it was a fun party.

My mom was planning to make a rainbow cake and I was planning to make cupcakes. In the end, we both had the same idea and both showed up with these coordinating store-bought cakes.

Ummm...this is as close as we came to a good family picture. The kids' outfits are cute though, yes? My friend Amy made them and I love them.

Big Sissy sporting My Little Pony glasses while she prepares to blow...and blow....and blow...and finally just let Mommy blow out her candles.

Still blowing...

Pin the rainbow on the pony (with a fancy dishrag blindfold).

Let gift opening commence!

This is a game called "Please don't beat the pinata because Mommy has to hold it."

Just one more candy, please?

Thank you for the sugar high!

Little Sissy looooooves her new robe and matching slippers. She wore it the rest of the day!

Now I have 4 months to rest before we do a little boy's 2-year-old party. I love parties!

Don't We All Want a Pink Garage?

Sorry I haven't posted lately. We were on vacation for a week, so those pictures will be coming soon. Before that I was just busy or lazy. I get those confused sometimes.

In the meantime, I'll share the Brimm family adventure for today. On nice days I often leave the garage door open and let the children play in the driveway or front yard while I make lunch. That way they can play, and I can watch them from where I stand in the kitchen. Today I left them alone for 10 minutes. I could hear them and tell that they were near, but I couldn't see them. When I went outside to check on them, there were HUGE piles of beautiful rose petals in our garage, in our driveway, all around Little Buddy's basketball hoop. Unfortunately we don't have a rose bush. Our neighbors, however, have a beautifully manicured lawn which includes a large rose bush still in bloom. Or at least they did.

Little Sissy's story is that she wanted to crush the petals to make dye, then use the dye to make everything in our garage pink. "Wouldn't that be so pretty, Mommy?" It sounds lovely...except for 2 things: (1) That would require destroying our neighbor's property and (2) I'm pretty sure Daddy doesn't want his garage pink.

I love how creative they are, but I'm not looking forward to the looooong walk next door for the apology to the neighbors. I guess we can at least offer them the dye, right? Maybe they would like a pink garage too.

My mother has a similar story about me picking all of our neighbor's green tomatoes when I was little. I thought I was being helpful. At least our intentions were good--me helping out with the gardening, her beautifying our garage. This truly is why I can't wait for Little Buddy to start talking. I love knowing what's going through these little minds when they do these bizarre things.

Stay tuned for vacation pictures.

Apple Pickin'

Driving down "The River Road" and going apple picking is one of my favorite fall traditions. We went with friends who don't like fish this year, so we skipped the Beasley's Fish Stand tradition and opted for cheeseburgers and BBQ right on the grounds. That was good, too, and allowed us to listen to the Garth Brooks wannabe croon while we ate.

Last year Little Buddy slept through the whole experience, so this was essentially his first time. I have no idea how many apples he ate or how much dirt he ate (after repeatedly dropping his apples on the ground), but he had a great time. Please ignore his leotard. I'm pretty sure that this outfit fit him at the beginning of the summer when we packed it in the diaper bag. Apparently all that Vitamin D has made him too big for those tiny little clothes. Unfortunately we didn't notice this until AFTER the poopy blowout as soon as we got there and the discovery that the "restroom" is really a johnny on the spot. The good news is that we got a really good view of the ponies while we changed diapers & clothes on the grass.

My New Job

I have a new job. I alluded to it in an earlier post, but now I've actually started. I'm an independent consultant for a company called Thirty-One Gifts. That's a fancy way of saying I do home parties. (I've been reading a little too much Fancy Nancy in my spare time.) So far it's going GREAT. I've met my first 30-day goal (to have 3 "qualifying parties"). I have 7 more booked in the next 90 days, and 3 more who have said they will do parties in later October or November. I feel so blessed! I think it will take all those parties to break even on what I've spent in supplies and items to show, but I should be making some money by next year. :)

Here's what I love about my work:

1) I get to still be a stay-at-home mom. My kids barely notice I'm gone because they get to hang out with Daddy, and that is a big treat for them.

2) I love the products, so I'm excited to talk about them.

3) It's a faith-based company, so I feel free to be honest about who I am and what my values are.

4) I get to meet lots of fun new women.

5) It has caused me to think more about how I can use this job as an opportunity to celebrate and encourage other women. One exciting thing is that I get to do a fundraiser in November for Arms of Love, a pregnancy resource center in Godfrey, IL. It's one of my favorite charities, and I can't wait to do it.

6) I get to help contribute to the family fund. That just feels good. My husband is a wonderful provider, but everyone can always use "extras" now and then, right?

7) Last, but not least, I get to pull a black rolling luggage bag to work. I feel very cool when I do that. I secretly wanted to be a pharmaceutical sales rep. or a court reporter so I could do that. It's the little things that make me happy.

What I don't love about my job:

1) I don't know everything yet, and the perfectionist in me wants to hide in a cave until I can memorize prices, catalog page numbers, embroidery fonts, etc. This is not realistic, so I just show up and have to be honest about the fact that I don't know everything about it yet.

2) I miss my dear blog friends. I haven't logged into Google Reader for a month. I can't imagine the number of CNN news updates that are waiting for me. Hopefully I'll be back into a rhythm once I figure out what I'm doing.

So far that's about it. I think I was REALLY ready to start getting out a little more. I was trying to think of ways to make money writing, but I wasn't getting anywhere. This opportunity came along at just the right time. I never thought I would be doing this. As my Arbonne friend says, I crossed over to the dark side of direct sales. But somehow it seems like God is in it. At least for now. I'm kind of excited to be in the working moms club!

I Do Believe

It's barely September, and I'm already tired of hearing about Santa. We purposely did not push the idea of Santa last year, so I don't know why the obsession. I think it started when we took Little Sissy to the toy store to pick out her birthday present (remember the vulture?) Well, Big Sissy also got to pick out a small treat--2 baby deer figurines. Of course she asks me every day if we can go back to the toy store because they really miss their mommy and daddy, who are still there.

I guess the deer remind her of reindeer, which reminds her of Santa. She's been making up songs about Santa for a week now. Her eyes water every time. She got that weird trait from me. My eyes water when I make up songs too. Anyway...I didn't actually tell her I was getting tired of hearing about Santa but she must have sensed it because after about a ZILLION times, she said, "Mommy, you'll like this one. It's not about Santa. It's about God."

Oh good.

And the song begins..."We are reindeer of the Lord..."

It's going to be an interesting season.

Got Sleep?

I was still laughing about this (how many halves does it take to make a whole banana?)...

when I got out a glass to pour myself some milk and proceeded to pour a whole glass of milk into a dirty cup. I've GOT to try to reset my body clock. This 2 a.m. thing isn't working out so well. That means I have 20 minutes before bedtime. Too bad I still have to finish a newsletter. Baby steps to a new bedtime.

We Made It Through the Terrible Two's!

Although I have to say that the two's weren't really that terrible...comparatively. Enough about that. We can't compare personalities, right? I'll just say that I'm glad both girls made it through, and we're all alive and still love each other.

I can't begin to describe the guilt that I feel because I put so little planning into this day. Usually I have a creative theme, a huge guest list, a hall rented, and lots of party favors ordered weeks in advance. This year I decided to combine the September and November birthdays into one party in October. I'm already regretting that, so I probably won't do it again. Even still, I couldn't let today go by without SOMETHING special. So I invited my friend Amy and her two little girls that my girls love to play with and our friend Lydia to come hang out. We played outside with water balloons, then cleaned up and had "pigs in a blanket," strawberries, and Dora cupcakes (which I made at midnight last night).

Look at all these cute girls!

Poor Little Buddy. Don't worry...he got half of a cupcake.

After naps, we let Little Sissy pick what she wanted for supper. Cheeseburgers won, and we "helped" decide on Johnny Rockets instead of McDonald's. The girls put on lip gloss and sparkly shoes, and off we went.

This is the new gangsta sign for "I'm 3. Don't mess with me!"

Then we played on the playground.

And ended up in the toy store, where we let Little Sissy pick out what she wanted for her birthday. (See? I didn't plan a thing!!!) She chose a rubber banded frog that you can shoot across the room, a figurine of a polar bear, and a figurine of a vulture. It's a GOOD thing I didn't plan this, or I might have gotten her something silly like My Little Ponies or a Barbie car.

We topped off the night with a bunny chase outside the mall. Perfect! I couldn't have planned that even if I had tried. I think Little Sissy had a great day, and I learned to relax and go with the flow. I may try it again the next time a birthday rolls around!