Category Archives: Birthdays

Cupcakes, shopping, and Junior Mints

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I am pleased to report the happy news that there have been zero barfing incidents since the first day of school.  Although, writing that, I just broke out into a cold sweat thinking that I just jinxed everything and now my children will be up all night barfing.  Cue the Stevie Wonder riffs.

I really, really hope this doesn’t come to pass, and not just for the obvious reasons: tomorrow is Jake’s birthday party!  After the insanity of Mark’s last birthday party, I privately vowed to never host another birthday party as long as I live, but Jake very sweetly only wanted to invite five of his neighbourhood friends – whose mothers I am all friends with – to go play at the playground and then eat cupcakes.  I felt I could really get behind that idea!  And so that is exactly what we are going to do, and the weather is going to cooperate as well, it seems.  At this very moment I have cupcakes in the oven – these cupcakes, if you’re interested – with the promise of making extra peppermint frosting just for the birthday boy.  I’m also wearing my brand new apron:

Isn’t it adorable?  It has cupcakes on it and I’m MAKING CUPCAKES!  I’m going to feature it in an upcoming “Nicole’s Favourite Things” post, but strangely, like kale chips and 70s soft rock, I am the only one in my house who does not revile this sweet apron.  What is wrong with everyone I live with?  I put it on last night to show the kids, who stared at me, making “Uhhhhhhh” noises until Mark said “Mom?  It’s kind of lame.”  I showed my husband, who wasn’t shy about sharing his unfavourable opinion.  But what does he know?  He also said “I thought when you said you had a new apron, it was, you know, the kind that is black and lacy…”  It’s not a French maid outfit, husband.  I’m using it for actual baking, not “baking”.

That was the strangest euphemism for sex ever, no?

Anyway, so cupcakes are on the to-do list today, as well as putting together loot bags.  I went out yesterday specifically to buy loot bag treats, a replacement shirt for the one that was barfed on, and shoes for Mark.  I’m kicking myself a little because – I don’t mean to brag, here, people – I am the most organized person I know.  Yet I fell down on this one.  I bought indoor school shoes for the boys weeks ago, but since they were in sandals all summer, I failed to notice that Mark’s regular outdoor runners were a size too small until the first day of school.  ORGANIZATIONAL FAILURE.  He could barely walk in them, poor giant-flippered child.  So I thought I would just pick up a pair while running all my other errands.

And let me tell you, by the end of the day I was so frustrated and crabby that I was ready to burn the whole mall down.  I went to every single store that sold shoes and I purchased the only pair of boys’ runners in Mark’s size.  THE ONLY PAIR.  I have written many times about my frustration over the lack of selection for boys’ wear, but that really took the cake.  I ended up paying an exhorbitant price for a simple pair of running shoes which will likely be outgrown in six months, although thankfully they can be passed down to Jake as well.  BUT STILL.  Then I attempted to find party favours that were not embossed with Tinkerbell or Barbie, but again, this was futile.  I ended up going to the dollar store where I found not only Star Wars-themed Pez dispensers, but also Angry Birds-themed napkins and bags, and gigantic packages of candy, including Junior Mints!  I hope I don’t eat all the Junior Mints before I get them into the loot bags.  Who doesn’t like a Junior Mint?  They are so refreshing!

So the first week back at school has been full of excitement, hasn’t it?  There are a few other things going on around here that are amping things up a little, such as an in-law visit and preparing for the first school council meeting.  Suffice it to say I’m looking forward to my Friday night cocktails/wine/any alcohol at all.  How early is too early for a drink, really? 

Birthday and Earth Day and Painting the Basement

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Today is voting day in Alberta and, as luck would have it, my polling station was located at my kids’ school, making it easy to slip in after drop off and vote.  You know you are at the polling station early when you beat the sea of seniors flooding in. 

How was your weekend?  Mine was absolutely fabulous, and I just have to mention the weather – warm, hot even, and sunny.  It was perfect birthday weather!  I am now older than Mrs. Robinson and yet I feel just as saucy.

I look just like this, minus the smoking and the (I think) fur coat.  Honestly, I kind of love her hair.  I would cut mine like this but I am committed to growing it out, because I regret it every single time I cut my hair.  Hoo boy, here’s a hot picture:

I would totally not trust Dustin Hoffman to fasten my bra.  He looks way too befuddled.  Come on, Mrs. Robinson, you’re better than that. 

I do wear a similar amount of makeup though.
So it was my birthday and it was a very happy one, complete with a date night on Friday, new Pandora beads from the boys – including a dog one, from the dog – on Saturday, ice cream cake, and a visit with my grandma, who is in town!  I also treated myself to homemade cosmopolitans which, while delicious, left my Sunday morning yoga practice a bit to be desired.  Well, as Bridget Jones says, if you can’t splash out on your birthday, then when can you?
Our Earth Day celebration took the form of a seeding and raking party with the neighbourhood parents over at the school’s naturalization area (read: area that has been planted with native grasses and plants; an “outdoor learning area”, if you will).  Did I mention it was hot and sunny?  It was a fabulous day; the kids were riding their bikes, playing in the playground, and blowing bubbles while we raked and seeded and chatted.  The day was only slightly marred by my apparent development of allergies to all the grass and dust.  I took some Benadryl for my sore, itchy throat and then slept like the dead.  LIKE THE DEAD.  I woke up, startled, when my alarm went off and it took me a while to shake that groggy feeling.  Who knew that Benadryl was so deadly? 
Speaking of saving the earth and whatnot, we had our basement painted last week.  Well, that really had nothing to do with saving the earth with the exception that we used special non-smelly paint.  But our basement!  It’s now blue!  I’m so happy with it, and will get around to posting pictures soon.  Years back in the dead of winter I wanted to paint our whole house blue – so cheerful!  Who could be sad in a blue house?  But I met with some resistance, and now we have compromised on a blue basement and wow, it’s lovely. 
We had hired a guy to do the painting, and it turned out that he was the type of guy who preferred to work without even the company of the radio, which meant that I completely forgot he was there.  Normally when we have had people working on our house, things have been very noisy and disruptive – i.e., the hardwood – but painting in the basement?  Silence.  Which meant that I would come in from my errands, and walk around the house singing.  Because, you know, I seem to think my life is like a musical theatre, the way I burst into song at any given time of the day.  Remember my impromptu Christmas duet with the old man at the liquor store?  It’s like that.  The problem was that the songs going through my head were twofold: Linger by the Cranberries, and Over My Head by Fleetwood Mac.  So throughout the day I found myself bursting out with “You’ve got me wrapped around your FINGER, do you have to, do you have to, do you have to let it LINGER?” or “You can take me to paradise, then again you can be cold as ice, I’m over my head – OVER MY HEAD – but it sure feels NICE.”  Then I would remember, I’m not alone.  I would stop abruptly, and all I would hear is the near-silence of the paint roller.  It was kind of ominous. 
It turned out that the painter’s girlfriend is a mail carrier, and coicindentally she was substitutng for our mail carrier last week!  She brought him a Jugo Juice and the two of them sat on our step for lunch.  Cute!  Young love!  I’m sure he had better things to talk about than the crazy singing lady-client.  Right?

Eight! Eight! Eight is Great!

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Yesterday I was doing some things around the school (putting up posters asking for volunteers to help in the naturalization area.  Do you want to help?  No?  Yeah, neither does anyone else.) when I heard the kindergarten class singing their morning song.  It is a song familiar to me, since I heard Jake singing it all last year.  Hi there neighbour!  What do you say?  It’s going to be a HAPPY DAY.  It proceeded to wedge itself into my brain, supplanting Pinball Wizard (That deaf dumb blind kid sure plays a mean pinball!).
When my alarm went off this morning, I thought “It’s going to be a HAPPY DAY”, because not only is it my tenth anniversary – I did not receive any tin foil, sadly, but my husband did present me with a bouquet of my favourite Gerber daisies – but it is also Mark’s eighth birthday!  Nothing says romance like going into labour and delivery on your second wedding anniversary after being on bedrest for three weeks with pre-eclampsia and checking your own urine for protein twice a day! 
But it is a special and happy day in our house.  I have made a big gooey chocolate layer cake, there is the promise of TAKE OUT PIZZA tonight, and a nice bottle of red with my name on it.  Figuratively speaking.  The wine is not actually named Nicole.
Happy Birthday Mark!

Happy, Happy Birthday Baby

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It’s my husband’s birthday today!  Ssssh.  He doesn’t like a big fuss made about his birthday, something I totally do not understand since I enjoy wearing a birthday tiara and a sandwich board with “BIRTHDAY GIRL” written on it.  However, he and I are going to Banff for the night tonight – squee – with no kids – double squee!  We haven’t even gone out for dinner, just the two of us, for months and months, and so I’m pretty excited.  Bring on the wine!  Bring on the appetizers!  Bring on the cosmopolitans!  I used to work with a guy who had a date night with his wife every single Saturday night.  That actually sounds kind of exhausting to me, but a night out without kids should probably occur more often than once every six months.

Speaking of Saturday night, remember The Simpsons?  (Yes, I know it’s still on TV, but I haven’t watched it in probably ten years, so this is a dated reference.)

Homer: Saturday night?  But that’s our special night!
Marge: What’s so special about Saturday night?
Homer: What’s so spe…oh, I don’t know.  A little so-called Dr. Quinn?  MEDICINE WOMAN?

For the record, I LOVED Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman.

But since we are going out tonight, I baked this yesterday:

Nom nom nom.
The boys made cards for their dad using their brand-new Smencils.  Are your kids into Smencils?  They are very strongly scented pencils made out of 100% recycled newspaper.  The boys worked very hard on these cards yesterday after school, and I inspected them when they were done.  Jake’s had drawings of Ben 10 aliens on it, along with coloured circles for him to smell.  Mark’s had elaborate animal drawings, the animals floating in a sea of bubble gum.  In very small print on the front were the words “Have a happy fart.”
Oh, farting.  It is just so funny.  I really was unprepared, prior to having little boys, for the number of hours I would have to spend a) listening to discussions about farting, b) being in rooms that have been farted in, and c) making up rules that no one, save myself, follows with regards to farting, such as no farting at the dinner table.  I am the only one who complies.  The other day while we were eating dinner, Jake put his chin in his palm and looked at me sweetly.  He smiled softly, and I half expected little hearts to be in the place where his irises are.  “What’s up, sweetie?” I said.  “I just farted.” he replied.  Jake is also famous, in our house, for suddenly yelling “Mom!  Mom!  Moooooooommmm!  I farted, and it did NOT smell good.”  This happens frequently.
His brother is no better.  Mark likes to stand beside me, fart noxiously, and then move away, giggling at my protests.  He also informed me that he farted, very loudly, in his yoga class.  I suppose that happens to the best of us.  After this confession, Jake said, with great pride in his brother’s achievements, “I know!  I heard you! You were so loud!”
Life with boys.  It stinks, literally but not figuratively.

Charity Birthday Parties, or the post where I have strong opinions about birthdays

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I frequently look at my house and feel like I’m drowning in stuff.  I’m not even talking about Mark’s extensive “rock collection” (“Maybe we should get him a rock polisher for Christmas!” my husband suggested cheerfully, to my horror – how many MORE rocks would we then have in the house?).  I’m not talking about the fact that my fridge is threatening to implode from the sheer volume of artwork that is either festooning it via magnets or piled in a scary high stack on top of it.  Those are things I can handle (although not the idea of a rock polisher, heaven forfend). 

We’re in an awkward stage, toy wise.  The problem I’m facing right now is that my children still build complicated tracks with their wooden Thomas toys, they use both the junior Duplo Lego AND the teeny tiny big kid Lego, they play with dinosaurs AND stuffed animals, they stage car races with dozens and dozens of little Hot Wheels, they play with board games and superhero action figures.  In other words, there is nothing in the house that I can in good conscience donate or otherwise get rid of.  We are literally drowning in the volume of toys that we have and I have not been able to donate anything that was unused since I boxed up all the Little People sets and Mega Blocks. 

So when we were planning Jake’s birthday party, there was no question: no gifts.  We did this last year as well; on the invitations I specified that in lieu of gifts, each guest was asked to bring a food bank donation.  One of the things I most dislike about other children’s parties are buying gifts for them – I never know what to get, I never know if they have something or not, and I generally feel overwhelmed and confused while trolling the aisles of the toy store.  Food donations – easy.  And let me tell you, people stepped up!

Having a charity birthday party is a very good way to introduce children to the concept of giving and what I consider to be the responsibility of people who are more fortunate than others.  My children are, I think, extremely fortunate and lucky children; they receive many gifts from aunts and uncles, grandparents, and us.  There were fifteen children at Jake’s party; he would not need, and should not have, fifteen little gifts. 

In order to have a successful charity party, there are a couple of things to keep in mind.  First, make sure your child is in agreement – have a discussion about charities and giving and be sure to reiterate that they ARE going to get gifts from family members, just not from their little friends.  We can only expect so much.  Second, make sure the party is going to be a lot of fun – the focus of a birthday party, or any party, should really be the good time we are all having, rather than gifts.  We held the party at the Calgary Gymnastics Centre, and it was fabulous.  The kids all had a blast, there was no downtime, and there was only thirty minutes of “party room” time which is where I find parties to really drag. 

Third, make sure you have good food.  Since our party was from 3-5 pm, I did not want to have a huge snack for the kids right before the dinner hour, so I just served cupcakes.  We had a guest with Celiac disease, and so I branched out and made both regular and gluten free cupcakes, and they were equally – but differently – delicious.
Can you tell which are gluten free?  (Hint: the short ones).

The last thing to remember about having a successful charity party is do not forget the loot bags.  I know.  I know.  Loot bags are a scourge on society, but really, you CAN have loot bags and not lose your essence of yourself if you choose carefully.  I gave each child a little egg of Silly Putty – my kids once received those from a dinner guest of mine and they played with it for months after, so hooray for longevity and non-breakable-ness – an eraser shaped like a crayon, and a ton of candy.  Fortunately Halloween candy has been in the stores for over a month now, so I bought several large bags of rockets, bubble gum, and candy necklaces.  I gauged the party’s success from the sheer joy that volume of candy brought to the guests.  Our little gluten-free guest was particularly overjoyed as she opened her bag.  “ROCKETS?  Nicole, I’m ALLOWED to have Rockets!” she shrieked.

Success!  At the end of the day, we had a giant box of food donations AND a group of happy, exhausted, and sugar-high children.  What could be better?

Save the drama for your mama.

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I try to write quality posts and occasionally I try to write beautiful posts and yesterday I checked my statistics to see why, specifically, people visit this blog.  Is it my views on parenting, on mindful living, on good karma and kindness?

Here are some of the popular search terms that have been used to find my blog:

1) Cougar moms and velour tracksuits.
2) 16 year old girls with whale tails.
3) Boys stripping girls in their house. *although this has also been spelled “boyz striping girls in there house”, but that kind of spelling gives me squidgies.*
4) Boy and fack girl in the house.
5) Asam Sandler singing into ex-girlfriends intercom  *That is how it is spelled.  I altered neither the spelling nor the punctuation, despite my squidgies.*

All of which is to say, I must have a lot of disappointed blog visitors.  Perhaps I should talk more about my velour tracksuits.

The past few days has seen a lot of sadness and difficulties for various friends and family, the details of which I am not going to go into, but I seem to be coping by baking things.  There are worse coping mechanisms, I suppose (like drinking, which I am doing right this second).  Tomorrow we are having a birthday party for Jake and 13 little friends, and so I have been a cupcake baking machine.  We have two guests coming who are unable to eat wheat and/or gluten, and so I made a batch of gluten free cupcakes.  I was a bit concerned as to how they would turn out; I read some recipes in Chatelaine magazine (don’t judge, I AM a suburban Canadian mother) but I became completely overwhelmed by the sheer number of different flours and ingredients required.  My dearest friend, who has a daughter with Celiac disease, suggested Pamela’s Products, and I have to say, the result was not bad at all.  The cupcakes were only one inch high but they were tasty.  The package suggested adding an extra egg for extra light cupcakes, and I will say this: if you need to make gluten free cupcakes and there is an option to make them “extra light”, ADD THE EGG.  I can’t imagine how dense the result would be if you, as the package suggested, added less water for a more dense cake. 

So it’s the birthday party tomorrow and I am sure I will have much to say about that, but for now, I think I might go sample another cupcake and refill my wineglass.  I hope your weekend is going well, my lovelies.

And now we are six

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“This is the greatest day of my life!” Jake said this morning.  “I got Finn McMissile toys and I learned how to button up my pants!”  He stood on one foot for a minute and added thoughtfully,  “I don’t really feel older though.  I could still stand like this when I was just five.”