London's Friend Party

I spent a lot of time planning, cleaning, and decorating for this party, but not much money. I was very proud of how frugal I was, and how nice everything turned out. I tried to make a cannopy above the main party area with purple tulle, and then some pink streamers and balloons in the other room. London thought it looked really cool, and I guess since it was her party that is all that really matters.

When the guest arrived they decorated there own crowns. I had some stickers and glitter glue. The kids all loved this part. I made my crowns out of card stock that I had on hand for my scrapbooking.

After everyone's crowns were made we played pin the lips on the frog. I also made this game up with some card stock. I love the internet. I found a great picture of a frog, and all I had to do was make it bigger and trace it onto my card stock.

Next we sang to the birthday girl.

Then we opened presents.

The girls then had time to play dress up while I got things cleaned up and the cake and ice cream served. I think this is my favorite picture from the party. A big thanks to my friend Laura for helping me out with some extra dress up clothes.

Everyone enjoyed some cake ...

... including Guinevere. She does not like to be left out when it comes to food.

I did not get any pictures of it, but after cake the girls made princess play-dough. Each girl got a ball of pink and purple play-dough, and then they kneaded fine glitter into it. This was my first attempt at making homemade play-dough, and I thought it turned out really well. (Just a side note, if you do the cook play-dough, don't warm the mixture up too much. The recipe just said to warm it, and I got it hot. I ended up burning my palms and finger tips trying to knead the flour in. Not really bad, but learn from my mistake.) The girls loved adding the glitter to it.

As each girl left she got a party bag with her princess play-dough, and this cute princess hair tie. I forgot to take a picture of them all make up before the party, so luckily a couple girls did not show up, and I was able to take a picture the next day when I remembered. I did not plan it that way, but Joseph, London, and Jacob's crowns that they made are in the background. These bags were supper easy to make, all you need is some card stock, a hole punch, and some yarn or ribbon for the handles.

I thought that the party went really well, and all the girls seemed to have fun. Hopefully since I have one childrens party under my belt I won't stress out as much for the next one.

London is 5 now

My little girl is 5. London is helpful, sweet, sensitive, smart, and very talkative. She has a wonderful memory. I am constantly amazed at all the things that she remembers. She loves going to preschool, and she enjoys being a Sunbeam, so that she can be in Primary with all the older kids. She definitely got Rob's outgoing genes, she is not afraid to make comments in class, or at church, and she will volunteer get up and say prayers in from the the whole Primary with out any help. Don't get me wrong, she is a typical 5 year old, we have temper tantrums and plenty of crying, but for the most part she is a joy to have around, and I simply could not imagine life without her. It will be a little hard on me when she goes to kindergarten in the fall.

We had a family party and friend party this year. I will talk about the friend party in a different post. She was really happy with all the gifts that she got. She got some harder puzzles (she was breezing through the ones that we had), some games, 3 new dresses, and some ponies.



She has really enjoyed playing with everything that she got, but she loves her ponies. They came with combs and lots of hair accessories. Don't you just love the holes in her leggings. I stitched them early on, but she wears them so much that they just kept ripping. I have tried to get her to throw them away, but she "loves" them.

Christmas Morning

They are a little late, but I wanted to make sure I posted some pictures from Christmas before we got too far into the new year. We enjoyed a nice Christmas at home. My mom and sister came over and enjoyed the festivities with us.

We don't have a fire place, so the stockings were hung from the stairs. Santa worked extra hard to get the toys popping out so that I could have this wonderful picture.

And here is a picture of the tree after Santa arrived.

This remote control motorcycle from Aunt Barbara was Jacob's favorite toy by far.

London loves the princess castle that she got from Nana. Since the gift was for both Guinevere and London, London lets Guinevere pull all the purple flags off the top and chew on them, but she really does not like it when Guinevere touches anything else.

Joseph liked most of his toys I think, but he plays with these cars he got from Aunt Barbara the most.


These large dump trucks were gifts for the boys from Nana, but we quickly found that the babies enjoyed them the most on Christmas morning. After being pushed around in them Guinevere and Jalynn were both content to just sit in them and play with other toys they were given.

The kids were fairly well behaved, and enjoyed playing with there toys all day long. In the afternoon we all went out to help London learn to ride her bike with just two wheels, and so London could show off her new helmet. We enjoyed a nice dinner that evening, and all went to bed pretty early, Christmas is exhausting.