• artsy fartsy,  crazy stuff,  Niece-com-poops,  painting,  party party,  Poems

    Twas the night before…

    decorated cups

    Twas the night before the Great Big Green Birthday Party, oh what a sight. The house is all set up for squeezing guests tight. The hostess is sleepy and she nods to the right. Will everything be ready? Can she turn off the light? Not yet she mumbles deep into the night. A post must be written, how fast can she type?

    Soup cups have been covered with fancy green paper. The craft table is ready with supplies galore. Will it be too much for thirteen young toddlers? Will they eat the pom poms and pour glue on the floor? Tis likely, says the hostess with no sign of distress. Who cares about carpet, it’s already a mess!

    The puppet show is ready. The scenes have been painted. What fun did they have, Rapunzel and she. “Should we make the castle orange? Would that be a fright? We ran out of white paint. Oh what a night! We wanted pink but orange is nice too. No matter how much light yellow you add to dark red it does not turn rosy if you mix till you’re dead.” So the hostess and the young artist talked on through the night not rehearsing the show but creating such a sight.

    Rapunzel, the artist

    “So elaborate!” said Toby, his face lined with stress. “Do you realize even wealthy people don’t throw parties like this? How much have you spent? Have you drained our accounts?” The hostess shakes her head. “I promise! No checks will bounce.” Budgets have been minded. She skimped and she saved. She may not wear J.Crew but her parties rage.

    exploding frog soap packaging

    Favors and prizes have been wrapped up with care. There’s something for everyone and lots left to share. Exploding-frog soap is sure to be a hit. Imagine their eyes when they see this bit. Green glycerine frogs, simple as can be, but when put in water they turn all bubbly! Green melts to pink and pink turns to fizz. This is serious shizz in the soap-making biz. Don’t ask the hostess for the recipe though, she bought them on etsy a whole month ago!

    explosing frog soap

    Tap tappity tap tap she wraps up the night. The hostess must sleep now, it’s after midnight.

  • artsy fartsy,  painting,  party party,  raving lunatic rant

    Puppet Show Box Completed!

    this green

    This is about the point in party-planning where I start to get on everybody’s nerves. Even though I have been told by reliable truth-telling friends that I am not as annoying as I think I am, I imagine myself as one of those crazy lunatic reality stars who runs around yelling at everyone because they don’t “get my vision.”

    Of course part of the problem with people “not getting my vision” is that I am in a hyper state of brain-activity where I do most of my communicating in my head and I forget that you all can’t hear that. It’s loud and clear to me, what’s your problem?!!

    Anyway, I cannot complain about party stress because it is 100% self-inflicted and I love it. Naturally, it drives Toby bananas. He is counting down the minutes until it is all over and he can have his quiet life back without giant green boxes in the living room and a sewing machine whirring away at 2 o’clock in the morning. Of course, you know the minute it is all over I will be planning the next one IN MY HEAD! Bwahahahhhahaahha!

    I have a knife and I will use it

    Things are rapidly progressing. Bethany brought me a bunch of her old moving boxes and they have been sliced and diced into a puppet show theater. Annalie and Bug helped with the painting.

    girls paintingfairy mural to match the bunk bed I was completely sick of it. My nieces thought their bunk bed was great but every time I walked into their room or saw a photo of it, it made me wince. So bright! My eyes, my eyes!

    rolling down the green

    I think I picked this color again because on the little card it was next to two other greens and it looked subtle and just right in comparison. It wasn’t too dark, it wasn’t too light, it was smack dab in the middle. Now I’m thinking without those other two greens it looks like some kind of Shrek Drano. But whatever. Three-year-olds will love it.

    painting the awning

    Speaking of not being a perfectionist and letting things go, the awning was a complete mess. It looks great from far away but I really screwed it up. The weather has been quite warm and dry (perfect for painting outdoors on our patio) and because of this my paint dried almost as quickly as I painted it. This resulted in way too much texture. Sort of like when you’re painting your toenails and you accidentally smudge the paint and then you paint another coat on top thinking you’ll just cover that smudge up but instead you end up with a giant mess. Yeah.

    It’s okay though. Nobody will notice. I only mention it because I want you to know that painting for me is just as frustrating as it is for everybody else. I always do everything wrong. I just don’t give up. I keep plowing through.

    puppet bug

    The puppet-show box is done. All I need to do is sew the black curtain that goes behind the green curtain, paint the little hanging scenes for our script and…all the rest of the stuff that I need to do like grocery shopping and housecleaning. No stress at all! Hahhahhahahah. There is way too much still to do.