Up to my elbows in crafts

Well, I didn’t post yesterday.  Although I did think about it.  But I decided based on the state of my house and the state of my frustration that posting would be unwise.  Here are a few things that went through my mind yesterday and today:

•  1. When you see “Glitter” tulle, and think “oooh, that will be so pretty!“–DON’T BUY IT!

That was my first mistake.  It’s like a glitter tornado went off here.  Glitter.  Everywhere.  As I was getting ready for bed I actually found glitter in my hair.  I don’t even know how it got there, but there was a lot of it.  I eventually got smart and moved my activity outside but so much damage had already been done.  I went to bed without cleaning anything up, since I was so fed up with it.  Which seemed like such a good idea… until this morning when I still had to clean it up.

• 2. No project takes the amount of time they say it will.

I found this adorable troll village origami set thingy that you cut out and glue together.  How perfect!  And best yet–how affordable!  I’ve been making a conscious effort this year to spend as little money as possible on these parties.  You can get out of control with party spending so fast.  I’m flabbergasted when I see the amount people spend on parties.  So, a project I could do with just printing a couple pages sounded perfect.  Well, I can say that it was cheap, but incredibly frustrating and time consuming.  The pieces were tiny and had to be glued in weird spots where my fingers couldn’t actually reach… argh!  There was a point in the middle where I told the kids that I was done.  I didn’t want to make any more.  But we powered through.

• 3.  Chloe is a good cheerleader.

In the midst of the troll village fiasco, I threw up my arms in frustration and said “I’m done!”  And Chloe jumped right in without skipping a beat and started to cheer me on and showed me that I was actually over half way done.  It was adorable.  She even said she would keep cheering me on until I finished.  And she did.  I’ve noticed her doing it for Josiah too, when things get hard for him.

• 4. My eyes are definitely bigger than my stomach.

Isn’t that the saying?  Or maybe I should more accurately say: my perception of how much I can accomplish is not equal to the amount of time and energy I actually have.  Either way, I have more projects still sitting in a basket waiting to be completed before tomorrow.  When I’m planning everything out I feel like I just don’t have enough things to make it a really cool party, so I just keep adding things to the list.  Then when it comes to the party day I feel like I have soooo much!  I suppose the things that don’t get finished aren’t crucial, right?

• 5. I love that the kids can help now that they are older.

It’s wonderful that we have passed that line of the kids actually being helpful.  For a long time there was a lot of interest in helping, but not too much that they could do (without me having to redo it later when they weren’t looking) for the parties.  But not anymore!  And I get to use the line, “Well, it’s your party, so you have to help!”  Today they helped me prep all the fruit for tomorrow and even cut tulle and helped make the cake.  It was lovely.