i believe i am back....for good

well, it has been long enough since i blogged.....jeff is actually telling me "too much information" and asking me if i have blogged yet. i barely have time to brush my teeth, my elliptical machine is covered in dust (not really the ladies do clean it) but my trash mag from over a month ago is sitting on top waiting to be read, our pup looks at me everyday like when will you walk me, the girls well, they are surviving by clinging to each other and me i am trekking through my days half in an i must get all this shit done and half a brain numb fog. i did manage to accomplish something in the past few weeks.....i successfully through izzy a 2nd birthday party and well, i must pat myself on the back because i think i did a damn good job (of course, with the help of others).

when i know i am going to throw a party i tend to start at least a month ahead with the planning, including the invite list, menu, decorations, etc. i have been planning her monkey theme party for awhile....actually before i watched tori and dean and saw that they were throwing a monkey party, however, i did get the idea of bringing in a live monkey from the show....jeff immediately squashed that one!

anyhoo with weeks of prep and many last minute hours, we pulled off a successful party.

these are the papier mache monkey heads my mother and i made. in all we made seven of them...i am not sure these pictures do them justice but it was fun to do. i have not papier mached in years so i was very grateful for my mother who happens to dabble in all sorts of artsy fartsy things. the third one apparently did not have enough paper on it because it dried a bit deformed so we just added some bandaids and dedicated it to baby bang bang.

of course i had a bounce house delivered for the festivities. this year i found this one called the "toddler house" and it was so much better than your typical bounce house because it was an open arena of different things to do....the kids had so much fun bouncing, running, sliding and well, whatever they do in bounce houses. not to mention annie had a blast....she thought she had finally been given a room to do her thing that was padded for protection. for being almost 10 months old this child is all over the place. she is actually taking a few steps between land objects every day.

on the left is my m-n-l and on the right is my mother (i know for some reason i call her mother....who knows) but, thanks to them this whole thing came together without my losing my cool. i think they really enjoyed helping and spending the time with the girls. i am not one to usually ask for help, however, i came to the ealization last weekend that it is okay to ask them for help.

we went to a birthday party for a friend down the street not to long ago and she had this amazing cake....a huge wine bottle with cheeses and grapes surrounding it, plus it was so so moist and yummy! well, to find out, the cake was made by her s-n-l who happens to do this sort of thing on the side for fun. izzy's cake was the barrel of monkey toy and absolutely so cute....not to mention moist and yummy. if you are in the need of a special cake anytime soon, please send lety an email...her price is really reasonable too. cakesbylety@yahoo.com ps...let her know i passed along the huge recommendation...i need to more cakes in the next few months! and as for the dad's and friends without kiddos that graciously came to yet another toddlers' birthday party....we provided beer, cowboys game and yummy food. you know the moms are always expected to attend every party, but thanks to our dads that parparticipate too.

after a busy sunday...izzy went to school on monday, by the way she is doing really well and did not even cry last week when we left her. at the end of the day, i brought cookies for her classmates and we sang happy birthday again....izzy has taken on the role of "mother hen" at school and is taking care of the smaller children in her class. she sets the table at lunch and sits at the head of the table to be the leader. she is the leader when they go for walks and makes her teacher a nervous wreck on the playgrounds. i am loving the school and all of its resources and can not wait until annie gets her spot (not just for my sanity, but because i know she will love it).

oh and here is a picture of izzy's first sleep over....our friends needed a sitter last minute and we volunteered to keep there 15 month and 3 1/2 year old for the night. thanks to jeff and his participation all went really well and both of their kiddos slept over an hour later than ours the next morning.

well, better get back to my list of things todo today...laundry, laundry, laundry and starting my notes for my sister's baby shower at the end of the month.

i am back and will be rambling on and on and on again.................