My Karalee turned 9!

Karalee's 9th birthday was on Saturday. I asked her if she was surprised to wake up to find her gifts and balloons. She said, "Not really, since you do that every year". So I guess I'm not as fun as I'd like to think.

Our morning was kinda busy. Luckily, she wanted pop tarts for breakfast, so that was quick, and then Evie had swim lessons and Kara had a basketball game. Her team lost pretty badly, but she said she still had fun, and I did notice she played more aggressively than normal. She wanted Jimmy John's for lunch, so that was also pretty quick, and then she opened all of her gifts before heading to her friend's birthday party. I actually almost forgot about the other party, because I got caught up in watching her open everything. Luckily, she was on top of things and reminded me in time to get there just a few minutes late.
Evie was very excited to have bought her own gift for Kara with her own money this year. She gave her something to put colored stripes in her hair and some barrettes.

Kiersten also spent her money on a gift. She gave her a leopard print hairbrush, which she loved.

She always gets mostly clothes for her birthday, since it's so soon after Christmas. But I tried to get things I knew she'd be excited about, and she seemed pretty happy with everything.

She was really happy about this leopard balloon. She clipped it to her pants and wore it all around the house. I was going to tie it to the mail box, but she was too worried about the possibility of it floating away.

For her "big" gift from us she got her own sewing machine. She's so excited to use it, and wants to make a shirt. I'm not sure she's ready for a shirt yet, but I guess we can try.

She also got a jewelry armoire, which I intended for her to keep in the closet, but she insisted she wants it by her desk so she can stare at it from her bed.

This is a rando, but I wanted to include a picture of the girls with their balloon animals they learned to make in their magic class. Kiersten really wanted to take another after school magic class, but it was going to be canceled due to low enrollment. So when the coordinator told me that they were only shy by one student, I went ahead and enrolled Kara as well. She's pretty busy right now, but seems to like the class.

I was overwhelmed with all of the things she wanted to do at her birthday party, so I made her help out with a few things. She wanted to have a fishing pond, so Ben bought some long dowels, and I had her paint those. I also cut out a bunch of fish for her to decorate.

She wanted to make cat cups, so I had her do most of that as well.

Making cat-pops. These are just oreos dipped in chocolate, and we pre made eyes and ears, so it was easy to put them together. Then I used some pink melting chocolate for the nose and mouth. I thought we could use shredded coconut to make whiskers, but she thought that would mess up the flavor.

The first one didn't work out, so I practiced my piping on it. She had to leave for basketball practice, so I had this waiting for her when she got back.

They were still cute without any whiskers. I made enough for all of her party guests to have 2, and Kiersten and Evie to have 1 each. There were lots of left over eyes and I planned to use them to make some other fun animals for the little girls, but they ate all the extra eyes, so that didn't happen.

I helped her with some of the faces. They turned out pretty fun, but I thought some looked more bunny-like than cat-like.

I had a fun idea for a cat face cake, but she saw a silhouette cake idea on pinterest, and really wanted that instead. It was actually really easy to make. Especially compared to the over the top smurf cake she requested last year. She also wanted it not to have a face, which Ben and I both disagreed with, but I wanted to make sure she got her way. This is just made from 2 round cakes. One of the easiest birthday cakes I've had to make.

She loved putting together this "litter box" with rice krispies, Hershey kisses, and tootsie rolls. She was able to do the whole thing herself, so that was great.

I laminated all of her fish, and we used paper clips so they could be picked up by the magnets on the poles. I wanted to use my eyelet setter to put some metal grommets on their mouths, but didn't have time. I wish I had because the paper clips kept falling off. I still might do those, so they can play with this game over and over. She refused to use the fish that Evie and Kiersten decorated, but I laminated them anyway so they could play later.

She was in bed, so didn't get to help me make these cat headbands. My friend showed me this idea on her phone when I told her I had to throw a cat party. They turned out pretty fun, and were cheap to make.

I made this big mouse hunt board to attach balloons for a dart throwing game. This was Kiersten's idea, and Kara was so excited to do it. I was less enthusiastic about it, but did it anyway. I did make her help with the coloring, because that took forever. Is it strange that I had to google a "wedge of cheese"  to figure out how to draw one? I also googled "cartoon mouse" for ideas, and you can imagine, that pulled up tons of Mickey and Minnie images. I didn't think she'd appreciate that.

Just a warm January weekend

Since it was so cold the first few weeks of the year, we were all very excited to have a nice, warm weekend. It was even better that it fell on a 3 day weekend. The girls played outside every day, and boy did they need it. On Sunday we decided pick up lunch and head to the park.

I was surprised we were the only ones there, being the first non-freezing weekend for quite a while, but we did pick a less popular park.

My favorite thing about this picture is the look on Evie's face. I tried this out too, and it's pretty hard not to let your feet drag on the ground when you're taller than the bar.

Evie didn't want Ben to let go of her. She was elated as she rode to the end, then let go and cried when she fell to the ground. She stood up and immediately asked to ride again, like kids do.

I was asking Kara what was so fun about this toy, since she kept going back to it. It looked lame. So I tried it out, and was surprised it was actually pretty fun. Who cares if you look like a weirdo while playing on it?

Kiersten was nervous to slide down the pole, though I'm certain it's something she's done several times in the past.

I'm glad we were able to get out while the weather was nice. It's still pretty warm this week, so we'll have to try to take advantage again while we can.

KC Chiefs Basement Makeover

Ben has wanted to paint the basement for quite a while. I happened to like the way it was painted, but I do want him to have his space and be happy, since the rest of the house is the way I like it. When he first started talking about it, he was determined to paint the lower part red, the top half black, and the chair rail yellow. I just couldn't get behind that idea. I tried to talk him into black on bottom and white on top with all of his red accessories, but we had to come to a compromise. Here are a few shots of the nice colors we had down there before.

Kara was happy to get to help me with the white coat. The paint we got was not what I'm used to working with. It took 3 coats of white, 4 coats of red, and at least 4 coats of black, and in some places, 5 coats of black. It took 3 entire days, but I did get it done eventually. I originally thought it would take maybe 7 hours. But I wasn't anticipating having to do so many coats.

All finished. Well, I still might paint the baseboard, but finished enough. This is Ben's favorite wall. That is a fathead arrowhead. I was not willing to try to freehand paint one myself.

A shot with his new TV. The old one stopped working a few weeks before Christmas, so he took the opportunity to upgrade. Since we no longer needed the base we were using for the old TV, he got that fireplace to put below. It actually does a pretty good job of warming the basement.

As soon as we get his Joe Montana poster in the correct size frame, everything will be perfect.

Now he's just dreaming of the day when the girls are done keeping their toys down there, so he can tear out the closets/play area and build out a bar. In the mean time, it's still a pretty fun place to hang out.

I was really concerned when I finished painting, before we put the furniture back. It looked so much like Mickey Mouse's clubhouse. I was horrified. I was ready to redo all of it, even though I was pretty tired from 3 days of painting all day. But now that the furniture is back and his accessories are up, it's not quite as bad as I thought.

For Christmas he got these red cubes for the shelves, so we can fit more toys and things, and you really don't have to see any toys when the girls aren't down there playing.

We didn't fill every inch of space, so if he gets new things here and there, it wont be too much trouble to find places for them.

Notice the yellow stripe on the column. He wants to do the same thing on the front/arrowhead/tv wall. But I just think it's too much. So that is still undecided.
He loves it, and that's the most important thing. I wouldn't want to spend my time and energy on a basement he didn't love spending time in. So mission accomplished.

New Year happenings

I wanted to get a few pictures of Kara riding her new electric scooter. She loves zooming around the neighborhood, though it seems to go a little too fast, and has caused me no small amount of anxiety watching her ride it.

We had some nice days at the beginning of the month, but it's been too cold for her to ride the past week. She's just itching to get back out there, though.

A hospital picture of Evie waiting to get her stitches. She was the sweetest little patient, and quite well behaved for being there for 5 hours.

On New Year's Day the girls made some gingerbread men. They turned out pretty cute.

On the last Friday of winter break Kara and I had appointments with the eye doctor, so I took the girls to lunch afterward.

When we got home, they wanted to do makeovers. So I pulled out a bunch of old/rarely used makeup. Kiersten did Evie's.

I got to do Kara's makeup, and it was kind of funny how concerned she was about what I was doing. When she saw the final product, she was pretty happy with it. Maybe too happy, because she attempted to give the same makeover to Kiersten.

Evie had a great time drawing on my face with eyeliner. That's pretty much all she did, so it didn't take much to wipe it off afterward.

You can sort of see some of the scribbling. It was hard to get a picture, she had such a light touch, and used mostly brown eyeliner.

Kiersten was really happy about her makeup before she looked in the mirror. When she finally saw herself, she was upset that Kara made her look like a zombie.

She wouldn't even smile for a group shot :( I added some color to her eyelids, and removed the makeup under her eyes, and she was happy after that. I had to be sneaky so Kara wouldn't see me fixing her up.

After makeovers we played board games while we waited for Daddy to come home. It was a pretty fun winter break, and we're all a little sad that it's over.