WHEW....

So I've had to spend the last few days recuperating from Jackson's big birthday bash. I cleaned the house like a mad lady on Friday, then forbid anyone to touch anything or get anything out. I did let them use the bathrooms and sleep in their beds, but that was were I drew the line. On Saturday morning we got up early, I had to run a couple of errands. It was pouring down rain so I made a last minute stop at The Hollow Log to ditch, I mean drop off, the kids so that I could wrestle the birthday cake in the rain by myself. After picking the kids up we went to the Tedder's to pick up Patrick, and to love on that beautiful new baby sister of his!

It worked out really well, when we returned to the house Patrick kept Jackson entertained enough that he wasn't asking me every ten minutes how much longer until his friends would be here. He only asked every 20 minutes or so.


Jackson wanted a Star Wars party. Ingles didn't have a Star Wars cake. I could have taken them a picture to have them put on the cake, but I wasn't real happy with Hailey's Elmo cake that I had done that way last year. So we decided to do it ourselves, sort of. I ordered a plain blue cake from Ingles. FYI: they look at you kinda weird when you tell them that you don't want anything on the cake. I purchased fondant, because #1 Martha Stewart I am not and #2 I am a firm believer that if you can buy something why on earth would you make it from scratch. I cut letters and stars from the fondant for the cake and added a Stormtrooper. I think that it turned out pretty good and Jackson was pleased which is the only thing that mattered.

I made pool-noodle-light-sabers for their entertainment/party favor. It was inexpensive and easy, both of which are qualities that are right up my alley. I cut the pool noodles in half and made handles by tightly wrapping one end with packing tape and finished it off with sliver duct tape and black electrical tape. They were at big hit with the kids, literally and figuratively......Watch out Monica!

Since parties with six and seven year old boys are nothing but organized chaos, light on the organized part, I hadn't planned any games. What I had planned on was letting them loose in the yard with their pool-noodle-light-sabers. However, we were in the middle of a monsoon and there was no going outside. But the boys (and one girl) did well entertaining themselves in Jackson's room. And Hailey's room. And the living room. And the kitchen. And the dinning room. And the stairway. I didn't pass out the pool-noodle-light-sabers until just before the kids left. I might be crazy, but I'm not dumb!

I would call it a successful event. Jackson had fun. His friends had fun. Nothing was broken. No one was injured (I was in fear of this a couple times). Yep, successful.