Mario (Pizza) Party 7

This year, we celebrated Oliver's 7th Birthday with a Mario-themed pizza party at California Pizza Kitchen.  The party started before the restaurant opened, so we had the whole place to ourselves for a little while.  It was perfect and allowed the boys to amp up the silly - chasing balloons and playing games - without disturbing anyone else.

One of Oliver's silliest faces.

When each boy arrived, we handed them their own Mario hat.

(Hat + Fabric Paint = Mario Baseball Cap)

We played a Minute-To-Win-It style game with ping pong balls and cups that was a HUGE hit with the boys and a party classic: musical chairs to Mario music.  Truthfully, we couldn't hear the Mario music well over the piped in music but our CPK host was wonderful and got all of the kids and parents to sing along with my iPhone speakers.

After the games, it was pizza time!

The kids loved designing their own pizzas.

Me, being goofy and modeling one of the extra hats.

Let the kitchen tour begin!

They must be very organized in the CPK Kitchens because it was small space.  The giant oven was the most impressive part, in my opinion.

 

Oliver seemed to enjoy the whole thing.

The pizzas were awesome!

Evelyn got one too!

Ice cream sundaes for dessert.

 

And a few goodies for the boys to play with at home:  bubble gum coins, fake mustaches, Super Mario fruit snacks, a marshmallow shooter and marshmallows (just because)!

 - GAME OVER - 

Oliver's Thanksgiving Feast

Last week, I volunteered to help with a Thanksgiving activity in Oliver's class and it was so much fun.  Love spending time with my little guy.

The class watched an air-popper pop some popcorn and they were amazed.  Most of them had never seen one in action and in their eyes I'm pretty sure it was an antique.  So funny.  Um, I have an air-popper so I guess that makes me ancient. When it started to pop the popcorn . . .

THIS was the reaction from most of the second graders.  The teacher explained about how the corn kernels get really hot until they POP into popcorn.

 We mixed up the popcorn with dried cranberries and the kids put it into some cute turkeys that they'd decorated.  I'd never tried the two together and it was a great combination, salty and sweet.

Do we look related? :)

Oliver helping to make the class' hearty harvest soup. All the kids brought in vegetables to contribute and it turned out great.

But my favorite part was the pumpkin pie pudding - Oliver's too!

The kids helped to make it and the teacher explained that, scientifically, pudding is a mixture.  Here's the recipe, in case you'd like to make your own.

Pumpkin Pie Pudding Recipe (food.com) – Serves 4

1 3/4 cups cold skim milk

1/2 cup canned pumpkin

1 (1 ounce) package instant vanilla pudding mix

½  teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

Nilla Wafers (I put one on the bottom of the cup and one on top of the pudding with a dollop of whip cream as a garnish)

1.     Stir milk and instant pudding together until smooth

2.     Stir in pumpkin and pumpkin pie spice until smooth

3.     Chill, then serve

The Reluctant Mermaid

Doesn't that sound like an old-school romance novel . . . or a Lifetime Original Movie (like you've never secretly watched those)?  Nope, just everyday life around here with a mercurial two-year-old.  Happy. Sad. Happy. Sad.

About a month ago, Evelyn announced that she wanted to be a mermaid for Halloween.  I waited to see if the idea would stick and it did - yay!  Problem? Evelyn doesn't really like The Little Mermaid.  She can't get past the terrifying Sea Witch AND there are hardly any non-Ariel mermaid costumes for toddlers.    I checked the local Halloween store, online and pretty much all my normal shopping haunts with no luck.  Enter Costco (love!).  They had an awesome mermaid costume with lots of accessories that I never even imagined that a mermaid would need:  a headband, bracelet, necklace and teeny tiny cape.  Hilarious!  Evelyn was smitten with it too.  The smallest size was way too big, but I decided to take it home and see if I could 'make it work.'  I really had to do some significant alterations to make sure that she wouldn't trip over that darn tail all night while we were Trick-or-Treating.

It went from this (wrong color but you get the idea) to

Wait for it . . .

Wait for it . . .

This!

And after all my hard work, she HATED it!  Maybe she'll calm down?

Nope.

 

Here, Evelyn is trying to hide.  But it doesn't work, mwah ha ha!  She's inadvertently showing off the cute ruching on the bum.

 

What if big sister tries it on, making it cool by association?  Yeah, no.  Also, you can tell by the drooping shoulders that Abby was not happy to get dragged into this mess.

Oh well.  I figured that if she didn't wear it on Halloween, we'd pull something from the dress up cupboard.  But remember what I said about toddlers?  Happy. Sad . . .

Happy Halloween!

Testing, testing . . .

This is the second or third time that I've started writing a blog update and probably the twentieth time that I've thought about it in the last week.  I've just been really, really busy.  If you want to keep life interesting, just agree to take on a new project (with a deadline) the week before Halloween.  Cause that's what I did and it was interesting!

I've always thought it would be fun to be a pattern tester and I got the chance when Kate (of See Kate Sew) contacted me to test her Sugarplum Top + Dress pattern.  I love her blog and I love sewing for my girls, so I was super excited to get started.  I tried to avoid fabric stores as much as possible until Halloween was over (because they are INSANE the week before) - and didn't quite succeed - but other than that it was a great project.  The instructions were clear and the dress was fun to put together and my client (ahem, daughter) was happy with her new dress.

The dress has a ribbon closure at each shoulder and I love the collar.  I am a sucker for a Peter Pan collar and has anyone else noticed them popping up all over?  I heart them and they are so in right now - hooray!  I blew the dust off of some of my embroidery floss and added a simple running stitch around the collar before I attached it to the dress, quick and easy.  I also opted to leave off the center bow in the front and replace it with a decorative button to mimic a brooch.  If you use a safety pin or pin back to secure the button, you can easily switch it out.  Maybe even for something funky like this skull.  It's kind of Monster High inspired, I would say, and she loves it. 

I was very deliberate with my fabric choice because I wanted it to feel like a shift from the summer dresses that we've been wearing around here for the past six or seven months. If it weren't still so stinkin' warm right now, this dress would also be great over a long sleeve shirt with some tights or leggings.  The generous fit absolutely allows that kind of layering.  

If you're wondering about the fabric, I *think* it is a moleskin print from Jo-Ann's.  I do remember picking it up on clearance a couple of years ago and loving the rich colors and the soft, brushed texture but it didn't have any more information on the selvedge so that's my best guess.  It doesn't really wrinkle (bonus) but can be difficult to hem (for the same reason) so I used the ribbon hem technique found in Oliver + S's Lazy Days Skirt pattern on the inside of the dress to make hemming it a breeze.  And voila!  A funky and feminine dress for my five year old fashionista.  Now to tackle one for my two year old.