The Right Stuff - or Teddy's ROCKETSHIP Party

My kid was born in February. You know, coldest, darkest, stinkin'est month of the year February. Lounging around on my balcony in the sunshine and warmth - which is totally what I'm doing now -  I can barely remember how lousy it is to be cold.

So Teddy's parties will probably always be of the indoor variety (unless he adopts an official birthday, like the Queen. Which actually isn't that bad an idea, come to think of it).

Without the option of bouncy structures and water-based outside shenanigans, themes are where it's at. His first birthday was a Mustache party. His second was  Monkey V's Robot. And never happened on account of copious amounts of sick (yay for birthdays in flu season. No wait, not yay.) And his 3rd was a ROCKET SHIP party. And it went a bit like this:

There were magnetic invitations to stick to the fridge, like this:

'Member the magnetic photo-backing stuff from this post? I loves it (in fact it might be my new favourite medium. It's my new clear plastic chopping board or contact paper) 

And star cookies like this:

And planet-decorated water bottles like this:

And an extraordinary cake, (made by my good chum Sarah, whom, it turns out, is a bloody genius cake decorator) like this: 

 This lousy picture doesn't do justice to the extreme awesomeness of the thing, or the fact that it was three different flavours of deliciousness and had marshmallow fondant and a picture of my kid on it.  For reals.

There was a photobooth wall, like this:

Made out of a plastic dollarstore tablecloth; with white stars and red planets -cut from plain white printer paper and recycled (as in, from the recycling pile) card - and double-sided taped onto the tablecloth.

There were (dollar store foam-core board) cut-outs of astronaut helmets, like these: 

 And a felt helmet for the birthday kid. Like this.

There were COSMOnauts  for the grown-ups (see, like cosmonaut, but with Cosmopolitans, see? see?You guys, that still makes me smirk) And Cosmo-NOTS for the non boozing crowd (that makes me smirk too! hearts for puns.)

We made the cocktails by the pitcher, using  large slugs of vodka, triple sec, lime cordial and low calorie cranberry juice, over ice, the cosmo-nots were orange juice, cranberry juice and a dash of lime cordial over squished up ice.

There were, I vaguely recall, other decoration type things too, and food maybe? But I (of course) forgot to take pictures.
At any rate, Teddy was fairly thrilled, and hijinx were had and the photobooth pictures turned out well. So I'm calling it a win
My sweetheart turns 40 (!) in a months time and I'm scrambling for an idea for that (his last two parties were superfuntimes, with secrets and red balloons and Grumpy Old Men).

Surprised? YAH I was!

You guys! I totally got HAD. I got surprise birthday partied and I had NO IDEA. And it was the most fun ever.
First some back story...
My last two birthdays, through nobodies fault really, have been pretty lousy. Last year there was super fun swine flu, and the year before that turning 30 was a non-event.
So this year I asked my sweetie to take me for High Tea at MoRoCo, (MMM CAKE!). The plan was to get all gussied up in a tea dress and make my sweetie wear a tie.

Any how. On Saturday my sweetie told me he had booked a haircut and did I want to come and lurk around the Anthropologie store next door I was all "HELL YAH I DO!" (dude! Anthro!). So there's the hook.
So on our way there Andy pulled the "oh hey, can we stop here? I have to pee" card and dived into a mall entrance. And that would be the Line.
I was all "of course". And I followed him down some step, through some doors and past a few arcade games. I was still pointing to the washroom sign while I did a total double take at my chums shouting SURPRISE. There's the sinker.
I was totally surprised and so happy I almost lost it and howled like a baby right there. But I didn't instead I...
BOWLED!
Andy had organised a vintage Americana themed bowling party. The alley was perfect and he roped my very good chum Sarah into balloon decorating duty. And there were animal noses! But most importantly of all there were a bunch of people whom I love. Kicking my ass at bowling.




And here's the man himself, examining the score board.150? Yah, that would be my guy. (Also his hands in this shot make my palms sweaty and my mouth dry. yum.)
And lookit here's my kid, who's score was DOUBLE mine.

After bowling we can home for chili dogs and beers and noisy fun times, then went on to my brother's OWN surprise party. Which was EXTRA fun too.
I know I say I love this city a lot, but I think what I really mean is that I love our lives here and our extraordinary friends and how lucky we are.

Lucky. But not at bowling.

P.S. You guys, I'm really glad that a trip to Anthro is a wear-something-niceish occasion for me. Sure it's dorky but there could have been sweatpants.
x

Grumpy. Old. Men.

A while back I dropped a teaser for the Grumpy Old Man party that I threw for my sweetie's birthday. Now I'm finally getting 'round to the rest of it. Firstly of all I wanted to site my sources, I totally stole was completely inspired by this idea here.

This is the invitation I threw together (but in the interests of full disclosure I should say that nobody actually got these, everybody knew the plan before I could so much as turn my printer on, and the guest list kept growing, which was awesome) BUT, If you do your own grumpy old man party and you want to use these just shout.
The plan was to print these on cardstock and line basic dollar store envelopes with newspaper print paper ( real newspaper is a bit grubby).

The inside text read:

Wear your pants THIS HIGH
Order the prunes
Say "whippersnapper" and mean it
But most of all come and celebrate (My Sweetie's) 39th Birthday like a

Grumpy Old Man

The Plan was for everybody to dress up as grumpy old men then meet up at the local 24hour, all-you-can-eat Breakfast Buffet for brunch and hijinx, then go on to play a spot of mini golf (in deference to the bear and my lousiness at actual golf!)
Our brilliant chums outdid themselves on the dressing up front, here's some of the gang

The transformations were pretty incredible, this gent is actually my very pretty friend Sarah

Mr. And Mrs. Turd Ferguson gave the performance of the day.
And it turns out that my brother is actually probably going to look pretty good as an older man.

Are you wondering about the birthday boy? Well, the day's theme was surprise for him, and while he WILL dress up under duress (because he's the best ever) I didn't make him this time. So he and his bestie (who had to come from his nightshift) looked like adorable whippersnappers!


If you've got a powerful curious about the rest of the pictures you can see my facebook album here.

Counting Down to 32

So. Today would be the 7th of October. Which means that in 'sactly one month I will be 32. Which, aside from setting off submarine klaxon noises in my head, is actually OK. Really. I mean, 32 beats the hell out of the alternative doesn't it?
So, I've given myself a blog-based birthday present. See the shiny? With the flashing? And the Orange? (LOVE orange!)
That's my to-myself birthday present.
This is what it's all about:



12 years old. Which was 20 years ago for me, 20 brilliant, shiny years for which I am immensely grateful. SO.
I'll be leaving it up until November 7th. (And hey fambly of mine, if you were wondering what I wanted for my burfday, then VOILA!)
You can find the rest of the skinny here, and the rest of the videos here, and the check out the stuff for passing the message along right here.
x
P.S. smooches at these girls here for passing this along.

Aprons Aplenty

Today was my chum Ali's birthday. This is funny, beautiful, zombie walking, deliciously quirky, baker-of-mind-blowing-desserts, Ali. Everyone in this house ADORES her.
I wanted to make her a something. And the something I decided on was an apron, for a few reasons;

• I've just made one for myself and am kind of in love with it.
• Ali bakes, and her baking is to be warmly encouraged. (What? You were expecting an UNSELFISH reason?)

I happened to have a spot of fabric in my stash in her signature colours Black, White and Red.


The fabric started life about 15 years ago as a little dress. That I wore MAYBE three times, and the last time was at least a decade ago.
I have no idea why it has moved with us 3 times (once internationally!) but it has. Maybe it was always hoping to be an apron.
The red is leftover from another version of Vogue V8615 that I made. (It turned out REALLY badly, but that's for another post).
I also used three tiny heart shaped buttons that I might have compulsively bought about a year ago, with no set project in mind.
Here's how it turned out:


And this is what it looks like on (bearing in mind that Ali is MUCH slimmer than me)


I'm being sneaky! Shhhh!
The skirt part is pleated at the top and the straps are long enough to cross in back and tie in front. The little buttons are placed pretty randomly in the center of the flowers, just for because. Here's what they look like:


I wrapped it up in brown paper and red ribbon and left it on her door when I knew she would be out (See, sneaky!). She says she likes. I hope she's not weirded out by it's ancient, refashioned origins.

Wow this is a LONG, picture-heavy post. So, lastly here's the apron I made for myself a few days ago. My mama bought me the fabric as a giftie last week, so while it's not technically stash, I didn't exactly buy it either.

It's literally two rectangles and a few pleats, but if anybody is interested I could throw together a tutorial.
x

The Birthday Bear

Here's what the bear got up to on his birthday...


But NEVER FEAR... dun dun DAHHHH... Monkeys V's Robots is a GO for Saturday 20th. Come hell or high water. I can't wait to show you guys the STUFF. (I have a squillion cupcake flags all ready to go and banners and bunting and yadda yadda yadda!)

Hey, stupid hats aside; the sight of my sweetie's hands on the bear's funny little almost-bald head just makes my heart chirp like a happy bird. I really am a lucky.

Sad Monkey

Holy cats am I ever feeling sorry for myself.
My bear is a sickie fellow, with snot and hack hack hacking and a fever. And waking up every two hours on the dot.
It's rubbish when little people are sick but it's p'ticly rubbish because it means we're rainchecking his party.
He doesn't appear to mind (one of the joys of being almost 2 I guess) but I could cry. In fact I might have already cried. His Grammie is going to be here, but she'll be gone again by next weekend.
I have spent the week making decorations one handed whilst snuggling the bear and hoping he'd be better in time. I've had honey in my hair for 3 days without getting the time to wash it out and blah blah blah... I know, boo hoo right? There will be other birthdays.

I think the fact that he's turning two is what's really making me sad. Two! I know that he is still just a little fellow and that he'll ALWAYS be my baby but he seems so big now. My arms practically ache from missing holding his tiny newborn, freshly hatched body. And they actually do ache from holding his 28lbs/36 and a bit inch self now.

I've been informed that feeling this way means it's "time for another one".
I don't know if we will have another baby, but even if we do, the experience will be different. I don't just miss random baby stuff. I miss Teddy's baby stuff.

His first few weeks were tough. Like bootcamp tough, with the waking up 3.30 AM and having someone scream at you whilst you preform difficult tasks. Teddy wasn't nursing and my boobs were not so much with the milk production, and I was second guessing my every move, (wait... is there one up from second guessing? Like fifth guessing?) but everyone kept saying
"Enjoy it, it goes so quickly" and at the time I secretly thought DUDE, I HOPE SO.

But it does. In the length of time it takes a bad haircut to grow out my baby was out of swaddling, sleeping through the night and no longer nursing. It's a blink. A finger snap. A broken heartbeat.
And I know that there is SUPER exciting stuff to come and that he's completely awesome just the way he is. But right now I'm feeling dented by the passage of time.

The Invites! Squee!

The invites are all ready to be handed over. Remember the guys from this post? Well here's where they ended up:



And you guys! I'm kind of in love with them. The slightly skewed angle of the monkey's smile gives me a happy. It was a complete accident so I can't really take credit for it.

I printed them out at the photo service in the pharmacy/drug store. The yellow behind the robot ended up way more yellow than the orange that it looked on my screen. Which almost caused me to wig out, but I think I like it better like this. So YAY!
Finding yellow accessories and paper napkins and balloons and STUFF looks to be easier than finding orange ones. So also YAY!

I came home with my printouts in my sweaty paws and stared at them mumbling "what to do what to do what to do?" with a slightly glazed look; until inspiration struck and I decided to make a double sided sammich board style thing.
Like this, see?



I did a bit of cutting and sticking using the blank cards I picked up at the dollar store a while ago and my brother's VERY expensive glue (which Elliot if you're reading this, I haven't seen. uh uh. Nope. Maybe goats ate it? Or warthogs? Maybe?).

Anyways, the whole shebang fits flat in the envelope and useful information stuff is on the other card.
Teddy and I are going to go give them out tomorrow and I have to say I am THIS excited about the party. You guys should totally come! There'll be CAKE!
x

Monkey Magic, Robot Wars

Versus

Confucius, Aristotle, Nietzsche. Luminaries throughout the ages have all pondered the same immortal question...

"DUDE? Would you rather have a MONKEY or a ROBOT?"

Now that question is the theme for Teddy's second birthday party. And you guys are, of course, all invited.

I whipped up these fellows to grace the invitations, once again reminding myself why graphic designers go to university to learn that stuff. I'm still not completely happy with the monkey's eyes but I think that they look OK ish overall. For a rank amateur using free software. I mean, you can tell what they are right?

I had to restrain myself from giving the robot scorching laser eyeballs and pointy, ripping/crushing teeth. As you might have gathered, I'm on Team Monkey (simian 'til I die bro). My sweetie is a robot guy. I'm pushing hard for Teddy to be a monkey guy, but it's not looking promising. He says "'BOT", I don't really know where he picked it up from, and my sweetie swears blind he hasn't been coaching him.

Teddy Hearts Antiquities

My birthday giftie from my mama was membership to the R.O.M. The Royal Ontario Museum. I LOVE the place. In fact I am a big fan of pretty much all museums (even the tiny bizarro ones with someone's lint collection).
But the R.O.M is a p'ticly good museum. It's just had a massive revamp, and a new wing built. I feel weirdly proprietorial about the new wing, because I watched it being built. When we first arrived in Canada in October '06 the metal frame was going up and I watched it grow every day as I walked to and from work. I was unconvinced, it was an ugly baby, all pointy and awkward, but by the time it's shiny skin went on I was madly in love.

I watched it go from this:
To this:

Photo Credits Jcoop on flickr and Here

It turns out that The Bear loves the ROM as much as I do, we try and get there once a week, even if it's just for 20 minutes. I let him loose (with the priceless artifacts) and he is squeallingly enthusiastic about everything; he particularly loves the fishies and the bear and eagle ("BEAR! BURD!") in the foyer.
Here he is cooing over a pottery horsie:

NO mama, it's a HAN dynasty burial piece. Obviously. GAH!

and copping a squat by a pavilion:
and playing in the playroom:
My pictures are pretty lousy, but The Bear actually got paparazzi'd by a tourist that day. The chap asked and I didn't mind but it's brought up some interesting points of view amongst our chums.
Folks seem to be divided between "well he IS cute" and "dude, kind of creepy".
I am mostly in the first camp, but I think that it's not so much that he's cute (though I believe he is), it was more the completely rapt expression on his face. I don't think I have ever been as enthusiastic about anything as Teddy was about the little arctic fox that he was staring and woofing and cooing at when the tourist took the shot.

A Piggie Wheeze Birthday

Everyone in my house got the bacon lung. First me then my sweetie then the bear. It was not the most fun ever but it wasn't the GERM APOCALYPSE (run! run! save yourselves!) that our media has been promising.

I felt a lousy and went to bed early for a few days, and took some meds to keep my fever down and some honey for the cough that eventually turned up. Not fun. But not the end of the world either, and no time off "work" for me. (Why yes, I am bragging about my immune system a bit.)

My sweetie got sick the day before my birthday, (the Friday) we had some chums around for a few drinkies and had a nice time, and also accidentally infected them. OOPS. Andy groaned quietly into his beer.

By Saturday, he was in full swine swing, laying around on the couch and groaning like a consumptive Victorian. On my birthday.
Now, bearing in mind that we didn't really know it was the piggie wheeze and that I am kind of a monster, I was pretty horrible to my sweetie.
I was all, "Oh hey look, you have exactly what I did but with roughly four times as much whining. Poor you."
He was all "Hack. Groan. Whimper"

So I took my bear out for sushi and felt a bit sorry for myself. Le sigh.
BUT
I did get the to open and coo over my hat (again) want to see it?

And then my Bear got sick. Which is a whole 'nuther post.

Oh HAI!

Turns out when I said "tomorrow", in that last whiny post thur I actually meant "In exactly one months time".
Yep.

(oh hey an awkward silence!)

So, how the devil are you? Been doing anything fun? Like turning 3-stinking-1 and having the bacon lung?
I only ask 'cause that's mostly what we've been doing.

Firstly though, Dapper Hat Day! It was fun, there was ice-cream and enough sugar to induce slight nausea and the shakes.
That morning my chum Kate and I went shopping for chapeaus at Wildhagen, a hand-crafted hat joint on Queen st. It's lovely and it just happens to be above a ribbon shop, making it pretty much a perfect storm of establishments-that-I-am-into awesomeness. You should go. Right now.

Dapper hats were found and purchased. and lookit here they are in ACTION. The action of being hats...
Doesn't everyone look fine! and can we take a quick moment to observe how cute Kate is in that hat? See, ador-ibble!
there are a few more pictures here.
Notice that there's no picture of MY dapper hat? Well, here's why... my hat was my bird day present. So after I'd worn it that night I made my sweetie HIDE it. For reals.
I know it sounds a bit stupid but this way I totally got to SUPER enjoy it three times. Firstly with the shopping for it. Secondly at the D.H.D ice cream slurping and thirdly with the whole anticipation/present opening thing.
So dapper hats... fun times.

After dapper hat day came... THE TORONTO ZOMBIE WALK! Which gets a whole post all to itself. Because hey, it's my damn blog and I have a hour to kill while the bear is napping and I am avoiding cleaning the bathroom.