Jett's 5th Birthday Party

This year, Jett wanted a Ghostbusters themed party. I'm pretty sure most of his friends have never even seen Ghostbusters before, but Jett still loved it and that's all that matters, right?

So to begin...we have the invitation brought to you by MarysPartyDesgins on Etsy:

Jett originally wanted to go laser tagging for his birthday party, but he also wanted to invite his entire class and 4 neighbor friends as well...totaling 15 children. I can't afford laser tagging for 15 children. Which meant I would have to do a party at home, which is not my favorite since I have to not only set up, but clean up afterwards. So I thought I had this one in the bag when I said, "You can invite 4 friends and do laser tag, or you can invite everyone and have a party at home." I really thought he'd choose laser tag. In fact, I would've bet money on it, but apparently the kid just can't not invite everyone. So, a home party it was!

I started the cake on Wednesday, making the modeling chocolate and fondant. Thursday I worked on the sculptures of Marshmallow Man and Slimer. Hot dang those things were difficult! I kept trying and trying and trying. And finally, after three tries, I finished Slimer. Then I went to work on Marshmallow Man, and tried, and tried and tried until he came together as well. Halfway through I was really wishing I had taken a sculpting class in college. That stuff is no joke! And I'm just working in chocolate and fondant! 

On Friday after dropping Cruise off to school, I got started on the cake part. 

Jett wanted a pumpkin cake so I found a great recipe with a cinnamon cream cheese frosting recipe along with it. I made three 9-inch rounds and two 6" rounds and a dozen cupcakes with the leftover batter, which were gone within hours. I put the cream cheese frosting in-between layers and used buttercream to ice the outside. I've come to learn the cream cheese frosting tends to make the fondant slide off the cake. I covered the tiers in white fondant, made buildings out of grey fondant and used a black food marker to crudely draw on windows and doors. Then I made the slime. I mixed green piping gel, some neon green food coloring, and corn syrup and then drizzled it all over the cake to make a slime effect. Next came the sculptures. I was so afraid these things would fall off, but surprsingly they stayed on, even overnight! Then I finished it off with writing 'Jett' and '5' on the cake with green piping gel and voila! The cake was done! 

   

Saturday was the day! The day Jett has been bugging me about for months. We had 7 kids show up, so that was pretty good. I was secretly hoping not everyone would come because honestly, there really is no space in my house for 15 children. Random tangent: In my last therapy session, we discussed the upcoming birthday party and my anxieties about it because I had never done a birthday party where we invited kids whose parents don't know me and where the kids were all typically developing. In Autism Land, parents ALWAYS stay. You don't drop your kid off. You stay. Even if you know the family. You. Stay. So I was surprised to find out by my therapist that parents just drop their kids off and say, "Have fun!" Wow! That would be nice. It was equally surprising to me that I didn't have to constantly be worrying about other kids' sensory problems, or helping them return to the group, or constantly be giving them directions one step at a time. So man! This was not too shabby!

Okay, back to the party...so I had 2 hours planned out, but things seemed to go a bit faster than expected. But I did what my therapist told me to, and expected things to not work out how I planned and to remember the whole point of the party was to celebrate Jett and to make sure he had fun. So that made things a lot easier. I had a table set up to make slime aka "Ectoplasm",

another table to make marshmallow men,

and in the playroom I had a shooting range set up for the kids to shoot silly string at ghosts. Jett was particularly excited about this one. I found these awesome silly string guns online (which are surprisingly very hard to find) and thought that would be a nice way to make up for the lack of laser tag in the party. I got some foam board and drew Slimer and Marshmallow man, and then hit up the party store after Halloween to get a ghost 50% off, so that was cool. Each kid had ten seconds to shoot the "flying" ghosts which were actually tied to the hooks in the ceiling that we use for the sensory swings. So the rule was you had to shoot them in the front, which required the kids to run around. It made a mess, but it was fun. 

We still had a ton of time left, so we had musical chairs to the Ghostbusters song about three times. The first two times, Jett's friend Dylan won, on the 3rd Jett one. Cruise had a really tough time with losing and went and hid to cry because he didn't win and we were transitioning to the cake. So his awesome Dad set up a musical chairs for just the two of them and they played and of course, Cruise won and we finally got a smile out of him.

Then we went to cake! We sang, we ate, and the kids went nuts playing in the playroom while we waited to do presents. 

Jett got a lot of fun gifts that included a big batman, a couple Nerf guns, and some cars. Afterwards, Jett wanted to put on Ghostbusters since we had about a half hour left (all while praying I wouldn't scar someone's child for life) and those who wanted to, made more slime. 

Luckily my sister Abby was able to come and help out, which was awesome because I don't think Dave and I would've been able to do it very well on our own. So thanks Shmoopie! 

Jett was such a sweet heart and thanked me for his cake and his birthday party. He had such a great day and that is all I wanted to hear.  Whew! Now I can start stressing about Thanksgiving dinner! 

THE FLOOR! IT'S DONE!

This was a few weeks ago but I am finally getting to posting this. When we first moved into our house 2 1/2 years ago, one of the first things I saw that I wasn't a fan of was the hardwood floor. Not necessarily the floor, but the color. It looked like a basketball court. Well, we finally got around to refinishing it. We thought to ourselves, "This will only take a couple days, right?" Well, 3 turned into 8. It was a lot of work, but we are really happy with the results.

We had to rent a giant sander, and then a smaller one for the edges. The floor took 3 coats of stain and 3 coats of poly. And then we had to wait 72 hours before we could even walk on it.

Here are the before pictures, which were taken when we first moved in and started painting.

And here are the after!

Halloween!

Halloween week is always pretty crazy, but it's the first year I had to help with 2 different Halloween parties at the boys' schools. I decided to do Cruise's class party on Thursday since they had so much going on for Halloween. I asked one of the moms to do the craft and another to do some small snacks. I took care of an activity that was very 'Cruise' inspired. We did some "spooky science" instead of a game since last year the games didn't work out too well. With so many different functioning levels in the class, it's hard to plan activities and crafts that everyone can do. So for mine, the kids just had to watch. First I did what is pretty much the erupting volcano experiment, but in a jack-o-lantern. The kids all got a kick out of that. Then we blew up ghost balloons. We put vinegar in an empty water bottle, put about a tablespoon of baking soda in the balloon, attached it to the mouth of the bottle, and then poured the baking soda into the vinegar, which blew up the balloon. Everyone loved it, especially when I took the balloon off to fly around the room. 

On Halloween morning, Dave took Jett to go fishing at Deer Creek and came home with 5 fish!

I then got Jett ready for school and then headed off to Cruise's school to hear he and his classmates sing and then watch the school Halloween parade. Dave dropped Jett off at school and met me with Miles at Cruise's school. 

From there, Cruise went home with Dave and I ran to Jett's school to help with his Halloween party. On the way, I called Tenney's Pizza and pre-ordered dinner. I got to Jett's school to help out; I was in charge of the craft, so I had the kids make jack-o-lantern tamborines. I wanted to be sure they had something to annoy their parents with. Jett really liked having his mom come help in his class. It was pretty fun helping out and meeting all his friends. 

After school got out, we went home and met my parents who had come into town. My mom had prepared some experiments for the kids to do with her. 

We then cleaned up and I ran to get the pizzas for dinner. After eating, we got the kids ready (again) and took them trick-or-treating while my parents handed out candy. Cruise was Bumblebee, Jett was Optimus Prime, and Miles was Winnie the Pooh. Miles had no idea how this all worked, but he eventually figured out the routine and wanted to be up there on the porch with his brothers. He realized that you knock, someone opens the door, they give you candy, and then you move on to the next house. You could see his disappointment when we would get to a house that didn't answer the door. After three blocks, Cruise & Jett took over the wagon, so I walked home with Miles and we hung out with Grandma & Papa. The boys came home with their buckets full of loot! They even got a full sized Symphony from one of our neighbors. 

Halloween Day is fun, but I am glad it doesn't come again for another year. Whew!  

My 29th

 Well, I am onto my last year in my twenties, which is weird since I have no idea where the rest of them went. I'm pretty sure the kids ran off with them. It's no secret I hate my birthday. I love celebrating other people's birthdays, but when it comes to mine, I just wish it would not come. Ever. But this year was actually a pretty good birthday weekend.

On the Friday before my birthday, Dave's parents watched the kids while we got to go out. We ate dinner at Red Lobster and then checked out the movies at the dollar in Provo. We got tickets to The Giver, but had a couple hours to kill, so we went to Target to get a few things we needed at home. We really enjoyed the movie and had a great time having a few hours without the kids.

On Sunday, we went to the Ybarra's for dinner and to carve pumpkins. They were so nice to celebrate my birthday and I received quite a few wonderful gifts from the family.

On my birthday as I was getting ready, the boys each handed me something they made. Cruise made a paper airplane with a picture of him flying the plane and the letters H.B. on it, which of course stand for Happy Birthday. Jett drew me a cute picture of he and I with some hearts around it. I love their gifts. Before leaving in the morning, I found a card in my car from Dave wishing me a Happy Birthday which was so much fun to find. 

I had a therapy appointment after dropping Cruise off at school. On my way to my appointment, I realized I hadn't eaten breakfast so I stopped by Sonic for a breakfast burrito and a hot chocolate. After ordering, I pulled up to the window to pay only to find out their credit card machine wasn't working. I was about to just drive away without my breakfast when the employee said, "Oh, I'll just give it to you free." I almost cried and said, "Thank you! It's my birthday!" It was pretty awesome. Then I went to my therapy session to discuss why I hate my birthday...ha ha ha! But as always, it was a very successful session. 

I came home to a clean kitchen and the smell of chocolate cake. Dave was busy cooking and cleaning, and pretty much being his awesome self. The rest of the day was pretty normal, and then we had cake after Dave got home from work. 

I got a few cards in the mail from my parents and my grandma with some moolah that we used for my birthday date. My sisters, Char & Ruth, called me to wish me a Happy Birthday, and my sister Abby made me a delicious pumpkin cheesecake as well. 

So as birthdays go, this one was pretty good. Thanks everyone for making my birthday special!

P.S. Earlier in the month, Dave gave me my birthday present early. It's kind of hard to hide an 80lb. heavy bag.

Miles: 13 Months

Just thought I'd do a little update on Mr. Miles.

Miles has found his cute voice and says a few things. Along with the usual "Mama", "Dada", and "baba", he will say "ah dah" along with the sign for "all done". He also will say "uh huh" for yes, and shakes his cute little noggin profusely, while it shakes his whole body along with it, to say "no". He babbles a lot and points at everything. Especially when he sees other babies.

He still isn't walking, but can crawl faster than you'd believe! He enjoys walking while holding our hands, but gets frustrated that he can't walk on his own. He is really good at getting up and down the stairs without any problems, as well as getting off the couch safely. He has also become more and more of a sensory seeker. He enjoys playing in water, especially cups of water that he originally was using to drink out of. He loves to swing on the trapeze bar, jump on the trampoline with us or his brothers, and swing in the baby swing outside.

Miles loves Daddy the most, and NEEDS his attention. I guess he likes me too, especially when I've been away for a bit. But no one can compare to Daddy.

Miles loves playing with his brothers, and even will sit and play by himself for a bit. He loves Sesame Street and Curious George, he loves eating meat and fruit, he loves music and likes to dance when I put on his Pandora station. Miles loves taking things out and putting things in to various containers and drawers, as well as taking things like phones, remotes, etc. and stashing them in random places we would never know to look.

He is getting into such a fun stage where he finds so many things funny and loves to be silly, and he loves to play "Where's Miles?" Which is essentially Peek-a-Boo. 

We love this kid.