Maeson’s 4th Birthday Party–NINJAGO!

 

(let’s pretend  this was published around October 1st, 2012…thanks!)

Since I am new to this blogging business I didn’t ever take the time to document any of Maeson’s birthdays/parties, so I would like to start doing that and I guess I’ll start with the most recent since it’s fresh in my mind.

Every year we say “It’s not going to be as big as last year” but you know what, it’s kind of impossible when you have so many people that love your kid!  Maaaybe his 5th birthday party won’t be so big, because he will have his own school friends to invite and we can make it a kid and family only party..but like I said, it’s so hard.  After saying it’s not gonna be big this year, we had 2 covered pavilions at the park, about 60ish people, and LOTS of food. 

So, for Maeson’s 4th birthday party he wanted the NINJAGO theme, which is totally super awesome except for the fact that stores don’t sell ANYTHING Ninjago in the party supply section.  Luckily, there is Pinterest.  Thus, there is my NinjagoBirthdayBoard .  There are so many great ideas out there, but I am not the most artsy person, and when I am, I want things to be PERFECT so I take FOR EV ER !  I got pretty much all “my” (totally not mine) ideas from the amazing Jaimee at Craft Interrupted who threw an amazing Ninjago party for her son.  She gives step-by-step tutorials for all of her decorations, it’s awesome! 

I made Ninja headbands for all the kids, all 26 of them + 2 for me and Daddy (he’s the sensei) so 28 all together…that’s right 28.  A friend of mine agreed to help me out by sewing them while I traced all the names on.  This project took about 8 hours, but it was totally worth it!  Here’s a peek

  

For the goodie bags I ordered these Ninja eyes on Etsy and printed them on sticker paper to put on the bags ($ tree) and the balloons but I didn’t get a picture of those.  I just put tattoos, stickers, skull rings and a wooden animal (for boys) or frame (girls) that they could paint.  I also printed out the Happy Birthday banner from Craft Interrupted but it was a windy day and that didn’t work out so well.

Maeson, Jaime and Corina helped me with our ninja cupcakes and the green ninja cake (we made our own frosting so it was a bit runny and our black wasn’t working so well and we ended up having to use the glittery pen found in the baking bag …but in the end we were all pretty happy with how they turned out)

these cell phone pictures are the ONLY ones I have of the cake/cupcakes =(

We went out looking for a piñata and found a Power Ranger one that we thought could be transformed into Kai…here he is =)

1.  I don’t know why they make the piñata so big when it really can’t be held up by the built in hook thingy once it’s all filled up with candy..which is why he is wearing that special harness =)

2.  ALL the kids wore their headbands during the piñata and cake part, and it was so precious!  They couldn’t really wear ‘em for most of the party because we had it at a park with a water playground…which was so fun and PERFECT for a birthday party, and we got lucky with beautiful weather!

Time for cake!

 

Then time to attempt a decent group picture of all the [remaining] cute little ninjas =)

I have a bunch of good pictures that our friend Phil took, but they are on a disc and I don’t have the energy to retrieve it at the moment

All the adults had a great time too, I’m so sad I didn’t get a huge group picture =(

^^The big kids like to make funny faces too =p

Our presh family <3

Maeson opened a few presents at the park, but saved most of them for home, I think you can understand why…Hey, has anybody seen Maeson!?

The party was amazing, and, as always, it went by way too fast!  Again, we are so lucky to have such amazing people in our lives and we appreciate everyone who was there, and all those that would’ve been there if they didn’t live states away, too!

aaaand…this is how Maeson ended his day…

 

 

 

ps…I still need to write about our Six Flags trip on his actual birthday, oh and birthdays 1-3…we’ll see if that ever happens … but I’m hopeful so stay tuned =)

 

 

 

 

Welcome to the Pet Shop

 

Every morning when Maeson wakes up, he opens up his pet shop.  Some days nobody buys anything, but he ALWAYS opens it and tells us (yells out) “THE PET SHOP IS NOW OPEN!”  so I thought I’d share one of my many great experiences at the Pet Shop..kind of like you would on Yelp.

He got this idea after a day of playing with his creative cousins Jazzy and Kaylee, and when we got home that night he said he needed to make a sign for HIS pet shop.  So he did and it’s sooo cute….

So this is how it works, I tell him I need to buy a new pet, so he tells me to wait at “home” (the living room) while he cleans up the shop and he will tell me when he’s ready.  So he runs into his room, closes the door and starts cleaning.  If you break the rules and sneak over to listen by the door you will hear him sweeping, “swish, swish, swish.”  So then when he’s done he will tell you “THE PET SHOP IS READY!” Then I go, I knock on the door, he says “we’re open.”  I walk in…

“Hello, welcome to the pet shop…is this your first time here?”

It’s always my first time there.

“Yes, it is…what kind of pets do you have available?”

“Well…we have a lot of different kinds, you can take a look.”

“We also have an aquarium…” *Maeson waves in the direction of the aquarium”

I carefully inspect each animal and then tell him what I am interested in…today I wanted a bear, a unicorn and a puppy.  He told me there were 3 dogs but only 1 was a puppy, I chose him.  After my selection I have to pay him.  2 gold coins for the big ones, 1 gold coin for the puppy. 

 

Maeson hands the money to his assistant, Doc McStuffins, and she puts it in the register.

(Side Note: it is SO cute to me that Doc is one of his most cherished/loved items.  When I first bought her I hid her in my backpack and asked Maeson to get a paper out for me so he would be surprised.  When he found her in there he was SO excited, he picked her up and then just tackled me into a hug and started kissing me all over my face…he didn’t even say anything he was just hugging and kissing me.)

Okay, moving on…

“Would you like to pick a name for them?  They need names because I have to put it in the computer”

Of course I do! So I tell him the names and he starts up his laptop (which doesn’t even have batteries in it) and gets to work.  On this particular day he said he was having some issues and had to ‘reenter his password.’  So he’s talking while he’s doing this, "oh, something’s wrong..okay…back space…gotta hit the spider button. Ugh..I just have to reenter my password.” (he looks like this >>)

 

So he types the names in for me, I chose Button, Freckles and Curly.  THEN, he writes them on a paper for me to keep so I don’t forget their names.  I don’t help him spell the names I just tell him however he wants to spell them will work for me.

Before I leave he says, “WAIT … don’t forget their food and water!  Since you have 3 different kinds of animals you have to get the food that says ‘MAESON 3’ on it…Maeson is spelled M-A-E-S-O-N and then the number 3…does this one say that? ….oh, good it does. Here you go.”

I say Thank you, I’ll take really good care of the animals.  He says, “Thanks, make sure you visit again soon.”  We shake hands and I leave. 

Of course before bed every night he flips his sign over so it says CLOSED.

I would definitely give this Pet Shop a 5 STAR rating !  Feel free to come visit anytime! And don’t worry – Maeson provides the gold coins =)

Valentine’s Day pt.2 / 52 Things I Love About You (LEGO edition)

So I decided to do the ‘52 things I love about you’ Valentine’s gift for Richie.  It’s quite simple, you just get a deck of cards, make a list of things you love, write one thing you love on each card with a sharpie, use a binder clippy thingy to hook them together or just give them in the box, whatever you prefer/have on hand.  So, that was my plan, I decided to start it the day before Valentine’s day because 1. I’m a procrastinator and 2. I didn’t think it would take very long.

So that night when I got home, I helped Maeson make a Valentine’s card for Daddy.  He has several Lego sticker books, some minifigure ones, a Ninjago one and a Star Wars one.  Most of the stickers are for filling in the pages of the book but at the end of each one there are lots of pages of EXTRA STICKERS!!!  So, I told Maeson we could use some for his card for Daddy.  When I got them out, I noticed the minifigure books had lots of random LEGO characters that totally went with a lot of the things on my list.  So of course I asked Maeson if I could use some of his stickers and he said yes =)

Maeson picked the snowboarder because it totally looked like Daddy.

Maeson chose the Dragon because Daddy always eats his food super hot and I call him a dragon. So cute that he thinks of those things when he’s choosing.

So, back to my present…it WAS a simple thing, until I decided to add the stickers.  They were almost the same size as the playing cards so I had to put the stickers on first and then write the words wherever they would fit.  AND, of course I saw a lot of perfect stickers right away ..but then I had about 30 other cards that I had to be creative with.  I didn’t finish until approximately 5:30 am and only slept about 2 hours before waking up and being a zombie all day on Valentine’s day.  Another thing that made it take so long is the fact that I had too long of a list, when I started the list I was thinking it might be hard to come up with 52 things (that sounds bad, I just thought I wouldn’t be able to think under pressure).  However, I ended up having a lot more than 52 so I was using the sticker compatibility to narrow down my choices.  Here is a sample of some of my favorite ones! 

(I think the Keurig one might be my very favorite, but it’s hard to choose)

When I finally finished, I filled up a candy jar with Kit Kats and Hershey Kisses and hooked the deck on there.  Below is how our table looked in the morning.  Richie and Maeson got me a perfume set and those gorgeous roses.

I’m pretty sure Richie loved the gift, so it was worth getting nearly no sleep.  I absolutely love my new perfume and of course the new vase and beautiful flowers.  Richie had school and I had work but when I got home from work the 3 of us ate a yummy meal prepared by my sweet love =).  Unfortunately I failed to take a group picture of us/a couple picture/pictures of our yummy dinner.  So instead just take my word on the dinner, and enjoy this picture we took last night while out celebrating a friends birthday…
we were very bright

I just love him so much. <3