The Princess Birthday Party

The party is over and all went well. This week I have something to do for the party every day this week. Monday I sewed the felt crowns, Tuesday I sewed the purse party favor bags, Wednesday I made the birthday banner and all the ribbon stars hanging things, Thursday I got the supplies for the craft, bought some extra paper plates, bought some flowers, Friday I picked up some dress up clothes, borrowed a couple of chairs from my friend and from 6pm on (too late in the morning to tell you!) I cooked all the food for today. 4 batches of calzones. 16 Mini ones that I used a tea cup cookie cutter for the girls and 24 regular size for the adults. I made sugar cookies and use a tea pot and tea cup cookie cutter, make a dozen cup cakes, sewed the top of each of the doll's princess dresses, iced the cupcakes and placed the doll in the middle, make some pink lemonade, set up all the tables (small table for the color sheet/craft time) and the larger one for lunch.
On top of all the party prep I changed from my teacher at the school to my tutor of the past 2 yrs. She lost her job and I needed a teacher who would actually teach me and not cancel class all the time. (In the past 3 weeks I had class 3 times!) So I started with my tutor and added an hour every day, meaning I am taking 12 hours now. That isn't including travel time so that means I am basically gone from the house from 8am until noon.
I had a couple of things to do out side the house on a couple of the days. So I am pretty worn out. It was worth it to give Ev a special birthday party.

Pre Party Prep

So I have been working like crazy to get things done for Ev's party this Saturday. Last week I was working like crazy on the baby shower. My fingers and hands are a little tired.

Yesterday I worked for several hours to make 7 felt crowns. I have seen various versions of these on the Internet so I came up with my own version. Since my sewing machine is NOT working I chose to make them out of felt. So I took Ev's plastic crown and went from there. I used 4 colors and made every princess crown different. My mom had sent me a package of elastic headbands so I used those to attach the crown to so they can be worn. I really like the way they turned out. I put on Ev to see if it would look okay or not and Elijah wanted to wear it so I ended up making him one too. Then I picked a font that I liked and enlarged, turned it into an outline, cut it out and then put it on the felt and cut out the first letter of the girls names. After attaching them to the crowns I got my finished product. I think they are pretty cute.

I am envisioning the table to be set and each crown on a plate with Ev's tea set as the center piece and so on. I really like the tent and stars that hang down from the inside of the tent from one scene in the movie "The Holiday". So I cut out several stars out of pink vellum, foil and card stock. I hung them in the doorway of our kitchen.

Today I am going to try to make a paper purse treat bag. I have a few that my mom sent with all the fun princess party ware but I don't have enough for each girl. So I am hoping to make some. We will see if it turns out. I can't forget to make the cupcake doll dresses and figure out what food we will serve. I need to run to the grocery store to pick up some thick colored drinking straws . I was going to cut them up into small pieces and have the girls make necklaces out of them. I need to pick up a couple of dress up dresses that my friend is handing down to us. We are going to have a game to see who can put on their dress up outfits the fastest. I'm having fun planning and creating for Ev's party, don't get me wrong. There is just a lot to do. What do you think of the crowns?

Three Years Ago...

Three years ago we were waiting for Evangelia's entrance into the world. This was one of our last pictures of just the two of us. I can't believe it has been almost 3 yrs.

Baby Shower

We had our surprise shower for my good friend in town. I have been wanting to make a diaper cake for a while and so I finally was able to make one. I bought large diapers since my friend won't be coming back here until her little boy is almost 6 months old and because I just wanted to use one package of diapers I only had 2 tiers to the cake. I think it turned out fine anyway.

My friend loves to scrapbook so I thought I would use a lot of scrap book type items so they could be used as decoration and then go directly into the baby book. She was thrilled about that.

I made a double layer cake this time. After making the Elmo cake a few weeks ago this cake and next week I will make the little doll cupcake dresses I think I am done with cakes for a while. My friend joked with me that I should have a little business of making cakes for expats. :)

Overall I think my friend felt loved and enjoyed her shower. It was fun to create and plan for it.

Both kids bat left handed because they see their daddy do it that way. :) More cuteness playing baseball.

Because Daddy Loves Baseball

Elijah has started walking around the house with his baseball bat and ball in hand. You can also find him walking around with Todd's Sports Illustrated Magazines -which he loves to look at the pictures as much as his books these days. When I go and get him from his crib in the morning the first word he says to me is "ball". Today I heard Ev ask to play catch with our helper. Elijah loves to throw the ball to Todd. Ev is learning how to hit the ball with Todd pitching to her. They really love playing baseball, I really don't know where they get it from! :) I guess starting early never hurt anyone.

Gifts Ideas

So I worked like crazy for a couple of days and produced some baby boy gifts for my friend and some gifts for her daughters to play with while on the long plane from here to America.

I ended up making a couple of felt finger puppets, a felt tic tac toe game, I added some play dough, a couple of princess notebooks, an activity book to the gift. I am hoping they will enjoy it for at least some of the 13+hour plane ride. :)

I also worked hard to make a baby gifts to give at our surprise baby shower this Friday. I made a couple of bibs that are reversible, a reversible burp rag, a small taggie blanket, and a lap pad that is all out of the same matching material. I would have loved to do more but I had to do sew all of these items by hand. After about 8 hours of sewing my fingers were sore. (I'm not going to get into why my sewing machine isn't working AGAIN!)

I am making a cake for the baby shower and bringing decorations. So this week has been busy with making all of these gifts, making a cake/decorating it (work to be done tomorrow afternoon) on top of life in general. I am also going to a lady's thing tomorrow night so I have to make sure everything is done for the shower earlier that day.

My teacher cancelled class for the second time this week (yet another frustration!) so I went out today to buy some small dolls that will be used for Ev's doll cupcake dresses. After several places decided to hike up the price of the dolls I found a place that had them for the price I have bought them for. In the process I found a Christmas present for Ev so that is one thing off my list.

So here are some pictures of what I've made this week.