Vegas, baby!

We are fully enjoying our first trip away from baby. I'm here for a boring conference, but that's only in the morning.
Then we get to pig out at the Cosmopolitan buffet (spectacular!), watch "O" (soaringly mind-blowing), and hang out with my new BFF, Larry King (ie Lare-dawg), who incidentally is a BIG Anthro fan. BIG!
(I actually just bumped into him at the Mirage gift shop. He agreed to take a picture with me and was very impressed that the iPhone was able to take a picture facing either direction--he had never seen anything like it. Go figure.)

Craft Corner: Anthro Baby Hair Clips

BEHOLD! Anthro baby clips!

If you're like me, you don't have a lot of downtime during the day, but still like to craft every so often and have SOMEthing to show for your creative efforts.
Other than producing a daily weekly monthly blog, I have found that making hair clips and other small things for baby SO fun and addictive.

Supplies:
Decorative Paperclips from Anthro or other paper goods stores
Small alligator/snap clips from Target, Michael's or Amazon. I got mine here.
Needle, thread


Step 1: Buy cute embroidered Anthro paper clips while they are on sale (in my case, they were $5 at the Black Friday sale). I got this idea from my supermom friend, Viv, who did this for her baby a year ago.

Step 2: Release the butterflies from their painted metal bonds. I.e. snip the paperclips off.

Step 3: Grab your alligator clip and stitch either in between, or through the top and bottom, securing the clip to the fabric.

And you're done! Wasn't that easy? And strangely satisfying? Don't worry. Now you can do 11-14 more (depending on the size of the box).

Step 4: Clip quickly and quietly on the head of the closest female baby you happen to see.

They will not mind at all, and they certainly will not tear it off as soon as they notice its presence. Nope, they sure won't.

Nor will they smear orange pulp into their hair as they try to claw it off after you've repeatedly played keepaway-with-the-clippy. It's fun. You should try it.

Happy Friday, dear friends--hope the sun is shining wherever you are.
xoxo,
shelia

Avery's Birthday Party

  ...was a lot of work. A lot of food. A lot of candy, cake pops, fondant, and banners. If you ever want to drive yourself crazy, look up all the birthday set-ups on Pinterest. Then try to reproduce everything you see.

 It was a lot of paper and fabric cutting, Jo-Ann's runs, Target runs, Pinterest obsessing. My lovely baby-sitter, Natalia, who is in culinary school, made all the baked goods by herself!

 Food chopping, list writing, hot-gluing, people-cajoling. I was so lucky my family came to visit--they surprised us the day before the party.

Who needs catering when you have a kitchen full of Asians wielding knives?

I focused on making the banners, which I'll have to show you later. I was seeing flags in my sleep. I had made Avery's crown a week before and we had practiced wearing it all week, so she wouldn't fling it off, like all her other accessories/food/various toys. 

The day of the party was warm and beautiful--80 degrees and breezy. Thank God, since there is no earthly way we could have fit 80 people comfortably in our house.

And the bubble machines, baby guitars, toddler drums, and cake.

 We did thankfully get to see spend time with some of our friends and family from near and far. Chris had told Gerry and Amber earlier that they were going to be the "whitest" people there. And boy did they dress the part.

 

Gerry even made that tee-shirt for the occasion. Amber always looks like Cat Deeley--on Cat's best day.  

Avery had a great time--'course, she had no idea what was going on. Chris and I are relieved and happy it's over. We probably won't be doing anything like this until Avery gets married. 

Til then, it's all about McDonald's for birthdays. Especially her sweet 16th--she and her teeny-bopper, Bieber-loving friends are gonna LOVE it.