It's My Life

Recently, we hosted a Glow Party for our friends at our annual family camp-out . We had over 50 people attend ranging in age from a year old to 65 years old.  I am not kidding for one second, it was a blast! Somewhere between black lights, glow sticks, and killer play list every guest let go, relaxed, and had a great time. Creating a Glow Party is actually pretty easy. Here are my 6 simple steps to follow to help you create a Successful Glow Party!  1. Venue We had our glow party outside at a local state park. You may have your party in a house, or basement or even a party room.  The size of your venue will determine the type of size of your black lights.   2. Black Lights Black Lights are almost a necessity for a successful Glow Party. Small venue's need small lights but if you have a larger space, you will need larger lights. Imagine the disappointment if you are trying to use black light-bulbs in a large area. They will be too small to hav...

I have known Jenn K for a while now but I recently discovered a passion of hers. She loves educating people about animals and loves to share her passion for animals with others. Jenn K is a Wildlife Education Exhibitor and owns and operates Exotics-R-Us . She has a crew existing of  human helpers as well as phenomenal animals that make up Exotics-R-Us. Exotics-R-Us has been showing animals for a decade. You might have seen them at many local schools, hospitals, 4-H camps, local businesses, training's, retirement facilities, Boy Scout events, Girls Scout events, as well as fairs and festivals. They are even regulars at Mid-Continent Public Library educating young crowds about these animals and their care. I recently caught up with Jenn and her Exotics-R-Us crew at a private birthday party. At this party Exotics-R-Us brought nine different species of animals and ten total animals to the party. The animals are just as involved as the staff at Exotics-R-Us when deciding w...

Bonjour!  The weatherman threatened us with snow all weekend but once again we got very lucky and the sun shined on our birthday girls party. This year we selected to have our birthday party at a local social painting place. For those of you who are local, we selected  Blanc Palatte  in Liberty Missouri. I really liked the party package. They offered instructor lead painting, personalized photos or the ability to select from their library, as well as the space is amazing!  Our host for the day was Jamie and the girls loved her. The Mommies loved her. The birthday girl selected the painting she wished to paint, an Eiffel Tower no doubt. I did ask the instructors before I booked if 7 year old could really paint and I was assured as long as the Mom's let go they could. I took that as code for keep the Mom's busy. The birthday girl got all dressed up for her birthday party. I purchased her a new black dress and a strand of pearls. We were hoping to look l...

I am so excited to finally be able to show you a small project I have been working on. My daughter, The Short Chic, is about to have her next birthday and her invitations are ready to be shared. In the "olden" days I came up with the theme for her parties but those tides have turned. I am not sure how she comes up with her ideas. Sometimes they reflect her current passion  and other times it appears as if she just grabbed a random thought. That is what she did this year; grab a random thought.  They say an invitation sets the stage for the party. I truly hope that is the case. The Short Chic is madly in love with the Eiffel Tower and wants an entire party focused on it. Finding the right invitation was difficult. I personally did not want the words "Ooh la la" anywhere on the invitations so that eliminated most of the printables and store purchased invitations.  I made the decision to make my own. To create the invitation I used pink  5x7 cards, black card...

Six candles on her cake. Six wishes she gets to make. My baby girl has turned six. Somewhere I blinked and she went from being a cute baby to a little girl. A little girl with an opinion! I use to tell her what the birthday theme was going to be. Now she tells me. This year she wanted demanded a Monster High themed party. This was my year to simplify her birthday party. I am not sure how I did on that end. You will have to share you thoughts on my "success" at scaling back. We opted to do a few things different this year. We did not have the party at our house. Instead it focused around an activity. We chose swimming {one of The Short Chic's favorite activities}. So we had the party at a local hotel that has a public access swimming area. The Decor: The decor needed to be simply as we are lugging everything to a hotel. The Husband and I added ribbon and tulle to water bottles.  I found the Monster High logo's on the internet and printed them out. I had hop...

Here is the birthday cake from my Short Chic's birthday party this past weekend. Before you ask, yep, I decorated it. Yep, I made the "headboard". I can't believe she is FIVE already. I am linking up! Wordless Wednesday Hardly A Housewife Mama to 3 Blessings Tales From A Mother Tots and Me

When The Short Chic asked for a sleepover party I knew I was going to make it as "grown-up" as possible. We decided on three activities for the party: painting fingernails, decorating pillow cases, and facials. I briefly looked at mask purchased in stores. They just felt too processed for little girls. I then started exploring the internet for ideas. One mask kept popping up over and over again. The Avocado-Banana-Yogurt Mask. I liked this mask because the ingredients were things I already had in my home. It smelled really good (which help convince the girls it was okay to put on their face! It was simple. And boy did it really work! To make this mask, you need three ingredients just like the name suggest: an avocado, a banana, and a container of plain yogurt. My daughter invited 12 girls to her faux sleepover. I knew I was going to need a lot of mask. To make this mask: 2 very ripe avocado's 2 very ripe banana's 1/2 cup plain yogurt Mix it a...