"House Hunting"

My sweet dad is kind of known for bringing home things he finds off the curb.  Bless his heart, most of it is junk and mom sneaks half of it off to Goodwill.  I really, really, really hate to admit this and cannot even believe I am blogging about it but I think his problem may be hereditary.  The difference is that what I find is NOT JUNK...  kid's water table, tri-cycles, outside play slide, pottery barn chairs on the deck, brand new wagon, t-ball tee, kids rocking chair, croquet set, along with a few other odds & ends... SO NOT JUNK!  Can you tell I am trying to convince myself that my problem is really not a problem?  What's sad is that I am pretty sure Charlie has acquired this trait as well.  She LOVES to go on treasure hunts with me and gets just as excited about it.  She calls it "house hunting." Of course Chuck is not so thrilled about this genetic trait so I thought he was going to kill me when I brought this home.  I was surprised at myself for even picking this up...

Lol. Looks AWFUL but it was screaming at me, "Take me home!" I don't even know why I put this nasty thing in my car but I felt bad for it.  Bless it's heart, it just needed a little bit of love!  When I got it home I noticed there was a tag on the the bottom of it (ya know, one of those tags that says this can only be removed by the consumer or you are pretty much going to jail...)  that has dates in the 1920's.  The padding was pretty much rotted but the rest of the chair was in amazing shape.  I cleaned it up, repainted it, re padded the cushion and recovered it.  I already had the paint so I just had to buy the padding and fabric, which was a remnant piece I picked up at my fave store, Hobby Lobby.  For less than $10 I have a new favorite chair.  Here is the finished project!

Love!!!  I'd like to find three other chairs I can redo and have them coordinate with this one and put them around my kitchen table.  Oh, and Chuck loves the chair too!

Meeska Mooska, Avery Turned TWOska!!!

And I bet you already know the theme of the birthday party...  Minnie Mouse!!!  I did, however, do the red & white Minnie as opposed to the new modern pink Minnie simply because I have a ton of red dishes (Hotty Toddy! ) on hand.  It made things much easier when getting my food table ready.  :)

But really, could it be true?  My sweet Avery is already TWO!?!?  I can already tell you that Avery is going to be my wild child.  Whether she is running around the house chasing us growling or I'm finding things in the toilet (bottles of baby shampoo, hair bows, oranges...), or she's climbed her way up on the shelves in the pantry and can't get down... the girl is just wild!  She is totally and completely obsessed with shoes (every body's except hers, of course), boats and eating.  The girl loves to eat! 

So back to the party.  I've never done a character themed birthday party before.  Charlie has never really "loved" a character so we've had parties like a ladybug party, princess party and a Halloween party in the past. My friend was doing a Mickey party for her little boy and as I was looking on Pinterest (obsessed) for ideas for her I saw the cutest things so it didn't take much for me to be sold on a Minnie party. 

So here is Avery's Minnie's party!!!

My sweet Avery!!!  A friend of mine made her cute shirt and I made her tutu and hair bow.  I tried all day to get her to smile for a picture but she just wouldn't give me one. This is the best picture I was able to get.  Also, it was raining the day of her party so that's why her hair looks like I've styled it with mousse.  She and the other kiddos decided to go play in the rain. 

Walking up to the party I had signs along the walkway saying: Messka Mooska, Hot Diggity Dog, Say Cheers, Oh Toodles and Avery's Clubhouse.  I already had the wood, canvas and frames and I found the balloons at Hobby Lobby, which I had blown up at Kroger. 

This was probably my favorite thing of the party.  Charlie wrote on her chalk board easel "Welcome to Avery's Birthday Party" and we put it by the front door.  So sweet!

My ribbon wreath!!!  I went back and forth thinking of what I was going to put on the front door.  I forgot I had this wire wreath in my craft closet and I just used a ton of scrap ribbon that I also already had and tied it all around it.  I loved the way it turned out!  So EASY!

On my table by the front door I had ears for everybody.  Thanks to my friend Amy, I was able to use the leftover ones from her little boy's party and glued a red ribbon on some of them for the girls to wear Minnie ears.  I also framed an invitation and got pinwheels for favors.  The pinwheels were 99cents at Hobby Lobby (but of course I caught them on sale for 40% off!!!). 

Avery's Sweet Treats table included goldfish, and chocolate covered strawberries, marshmallows and pretzels.  There goes my diet!  Yummy!!!

My sweet friend, Abby, made the cupcakes for us.  Half were chocolate and half were strawberry. She did an amazing job and they were super yummy too!  Found those cute black & white polka dot plates from Hobby Lobby.  I needed something to hold spoons for ice cream so I used a can of corn (cleaned of course!) the girls had eaten the week before and glued a red ribbon on it.  Voila! 

I had the most fun decorating the food table!  I prepared everything the night before except the corn dogs and I picked up the sandwiches the day of.  Here was my  menu.

Mickey's Clubhouse Sandwiches:  Lenny's club sandwiches (thanks Mom!)
Goofy's Garden Veggies:  Celery, Tomatoes, Bell Pepper & Ranch dressing
Donald's Dip:  My corn dip recipe:  1 can rotel drained, 1 thing of cream cheese, 1 can of white corn drained, stir it up, warm it up & serve!  I tripled it for the party.
Hot Diggity Dogs:  mini corn dogs (Kroger brand)
Clarabelle's Cheese Puffs: so yummy! Someone told that these were the best thing on the table!  Now that I think about it, I'm questioning if that meant they didn't like anything else.  Lol. 
Minnie's Bow Tie Pasta:  I couldn't find any bow tie pasta that I didn't have to prepare from scratch so I made my good ol reliable Suddenly Pasta Ranch & Bacon found at my Kroger. No one questioned me that it was shells and not bow ties!  Made 3 boxes for the party.
Pluto's Popcorn:  found little popcorn holder things at Hobby Lobby and filled them up for the kids.  I think I'm still cleaning up popcorn!
Daisy's Fruit:  Cantaloupe, Grapes & Strawberries with Fruit Dip:  1 big thing of Marshmallow cream & 1 thing of cream cheese.  Mix it up with a blender.  I also had chocolate graham crackers to dip in it.

I made little Minnie's out of styrofoam balls I found at Hobby Lobby, stuck them together with wooden skewer things (also found at H.L.), spray painted them black and glued a bow on them.  I had these on a few of the tables around the house.  I wasn't too happy with they way they turned out.  A couple of them had a very smooth finish and the others were very rough looking as if the spray paint was eating the styrofoam!!! Yikes!  Oh well, I wasn't about to start over and make more since these were probably the most expensive things I made for the party.  These were also the only Minnie's I had around.  All of the other decorations were just red, white & black.  I made a bigger Minnie for the food table centerpiece along with a glittery 'A' and '2.'  

Charlie and I had been practicing singing Happy Birthday to Avery for a few weeks.  She normally would smile, laugh & clap but of course things went completely the opposite at her birthday party.  Poor thing got a little scared with a room full of 35 people staring at her singing.  She jumped into Chuck's arms and Charlie blew out her candle for her.  

Avery absolutely loved opening her presents.  She was so cute getting so excited opening each gift. 

It was absolutely an amazing day. We had so many great friends that came to celebrate Avery's second birthday.  Even though we have our terrible two "moments" I really do love this age when she is discovering something new everyday and can be the sweetest most loving little girl then being a monster five minutes later. Her actual birthday was the next day, May 5th (cinco de mayo baby) and bless her heart, she had come down with some sort of stomach bug and was SO sick.  Maybe she just partied too hard with Minnie and her friends.  Now that it's all over and done with, is anyone having a Mickey or Minnie party?  I have decorations for you!!!