Tait's 3rd Birthday:: Dino Style

Our Birthday Boy!

This year we decided to do a small family/god family celebration for Tait's 3rd birthday. With his aussie god-muma here we had his celebration a few weeks early. It was small, and sweet but I still allowed my creative energies to flow to create a fun "Dinosaur Discovery" for my boy and his 'family friends'. Here are some pics of the party and all the little details. Enjoy!

The birthday boy got a kick out of helping to make his invitations ...

... which ended up looking like this.

Our party started at 'snack time' so when everyone arrived the children dove into their 'snack sacks' which were guarded by Tait's dinosaur costume. I think most of the kids ended up wearing the costume at some point during the morning!
For our DINO DISCOVERY
we had 4 "exhibits"


In the Fossil Dig, the kids got to dig around to find a little dinosaur skeleton and then brush the dirt off and put their find in their bucket.

Paint-o-saurus was a painting activity, we plan to turn ours into magnets for our fridge!

Exhibit C was a dinosaur habitat play land. Renatah and Tait helped me set this up in the week before the party and had a great time 'testing it out'. They are still enjoying it a week later. On the day the dinosaurs ended up in a time warp and into modern day with horses, trains, airplanes, and people joining in their habitat!!

Our final Exhibit was a story read by Papa, "Harry and the Bucketful of Dinosaurs" and a Dinosaur Classification activity. Each child was given their own 'bucket full of dinosaurs' and were asked to find which one in their bucket matched the description that was given.
After all our discovering was done it was time to feed our own little dinos. Having a small group meant I was able to make a place for each of them at the table with a table runner made to look like some dinos had run across it!!

Our feast was complete with some "swamp water'' to drink (a mixture of ice tea and lemonaide!)
It didn't go over too well with most kids, they ended up asking for 'normal water' instead!! No complaints from the mumas!


Of course there was a 'cake'. Which was enjoyed by all and my favorite part ... there was NO LEFT OVERS!!

The kids all left with their dino discoveries in little bags that had some more dino fun inside.

We are in the midst of converting our garage into a rec room. Progress had come to a stop for a few weeks, which ended up being great. We were able to set it up as a party room exclusively. Probably not something that will happen again - so I thoroughly enjoyed it!! We decorated with dinosaur books from the library too to add to the activities available for the day. Here are some room overviews.

There is it. Tait's third birthday party - Dino Style. Thanks for looking - please leave a comment, I'd love to hear what you think!!

Jump ahead to Spring: An afternoon at Hug Point

The benefits of Tim's job is that we can sometimes travel with him. Today he had a job out at the coast which he knew wouldn't take too long so we all piled in the car and went on a little road trip to play in the sand.

Our favorite 'beach' is Hug Point and we pretty much had it to ourselves for an hour and a half today. During that time the sun, which had been in a battle with the clouds and the rain all morning, won out and shone bright to add to our delight in savoring the sand and the ocean and the rocks.

Renatah enjoyed the rhythm of scooping watery sand into her bucket from the stream.

Then she went for a swim in the sand since it was too cold to swim in the water!

We all had fun with our el cheapo sand toys. It was a treat to see each of the kids delighting in the sand and the water and the rocks in their own way. Tait's favorite activity was to fill a bucket with sand, tip it over and then stomp on the castle. Repeat and repeat again.

The highlight of our afternoon was a "real live starfish''!!!

After a photo shoot with our 'star' we took her back to the ocean to find her friends.

A great start to a week.
(The clouds and the rain returned on our trip home - no complaints here!)

Crafting Craze: Made-By-Muma Gifts

While on my crafting, hand making kick last Christmas season, and our desire to make Christmas simple on the gift giving/receiving side of things for our family, I embarked on a mission to hand-make gifts for our kids this year. It is my goal to do this ever year. I realize it will be quite the undertaking especially as the kids get older -- but it's a challenge to myself to be a model to my children of giving love at Christmas and focusing on the gift of Christ's birth for us all.

For Tait, I made a giraffe to go with his blanket. I used the design (same size) of the one on his blanket to make this simple animal shape and stuffed it with the inside of a pillow that had been washed a few too many times. To my delight, he is quite attached to his giraffe, it's almost as big as he is!

For Shalom, a young lady who is taking delight in accessorizing, I made a collection of hair clips and a little 'wallet' to hold them in. I had a great deal of fun making this, coming up with different designs for hair clips. They are being well used, by Renatah, Shalom and I, thankfully Shalom is happy to share!

Renatah got a 'kitchen' and a dish set for her birthday ... so it felt like a 'no-brainer' to make her some place mats to go with her dish set (not photographed). It was great to finally have a use for some fabric I had bought ages ago, 'because I liked it'! To go along with the theme, I also made her two chefs hats (one for her and one for a friend/brother to help buffer the potential fights had there just been one). A good friend of mine had made one for her son, so I pinched the idea and pattern from her!!


I really enjoyed making these things for my children and look forward to what ideas will come for next Christmas's Made-By-Muma gifts.

Crafting Craze: Fun with Felt

The pre-Christmas season in our house was a constant state of craftiness as I was on a mission to make little gifts for relatives and a few others. It was such a soul nourishing time as I prayed for people as I made things and had fun tweaking things that I was 'mass producing' to make each on intentional and a little different for the person for whom the gift was intended.

I know that Christmas feels so far behind us know ... but ... I thought that I could share my crafting endeavors from that season with you nonetheless.

~broaches for ladies~

~flower hair clips for the little ladies~

~bookmarks for men~

~monogrammed notebook covers for the little guys~
and I made some for some men too with buttons instead of the monogram

So there they are ... I had a ball!!

Thanks for looking, please leave a comment if you stopped by to let me know you've been here!!

My Curl-less Boy

The day finally came.

We've been putting it off.

Till he was 2.

Then ... till Auntie Joy came to visit. She gave Renatah her first hair cut ... so ... we thought we'd ask her to do the honours with Tait too.

Once again - frozen blueberries did the trick to keep him happy. He was so 'un-phased' by the whole process. Glanced over his shoulder once to have a look at the thing that was buzzing around his head ... but other than that ... just sat there. "Happy as Larry".
Here he is the next day. My little man.

It has been 4 days since his 'big chop'. I'm still getting used to it. I feel like it has 'changed him'. Not just his looks, but he seems to be 'acting' older?!?!?! Just my imagination maybe?! His eyes pop all the more without the shag. His cheeks are even more kissable, not hidden by the curls.

I love my boy ... I miss his longer curlier baby hair ... but I love his new look!

Renatah's Fairy Tea Party (part 1 - Our Fairy Land)

The fairies at Renatah's house (my dear neighbour and some good friends) learned that it was her birthday and put a lot of time and effort into making a beautiful setting for a celebration of Renatah's 4th birthday. It was a delightful afternoon for the little girls in her life, their muma's and some other special ladies in Renatah's life. It is a delight to share the pictures of her afternoon of 'girls only fairy fun'.

You are about to enter our Fairy Land

Fairy lights, tissue paper pompoms decorated our space.
The wings and wreaths prepared for each little girl hung waiting for their arrival.

After getting 'dressed up' the first activity the girls got to do

was decorate their very own little fairy house.

Pompoms decorated this space too.

Once the fairy houses were complete we headed outside for "Musical Logs". We 'played games' with the weather that afternoon. I had the logs outside, ready, then it rained so I scurried to get them all inside. Then the rain cleared up and the sun came out ... so out went the logs again ... the rain held off long enough to play the game! I couldn't have asked for better cooperation!

After our musical logs the girls 'flitted' in to play "Pin the Wings on the Fairy" using wings they decorated themselves ... the whole activity was prepared by our gorgeous 'artist' and dear friend Auntie Kerri!

The Muma Fairy food table. (before the food arrived!)

The little fairies buffet (the whole effect, before food)

The buffet table filled and awaiting the hungry fairies.

Fairy 'tea' ... lemon'laid, as per the birthday fairy's request.

The eating table for the girls.

The cake!

Take home bags, waiting in Renatah's fairy cradle
(had to use it some how, since it went so well with the theme!)

Colouring books I made to go in the take home bags.
They also got little fairy 'snow globes' that they had to find around 'fairy land' before the left. (didn't get a picture of that though!)

Renatah's Fairy Tea Party (part 2 - Party Time)

Our birthday Fairy

sister fairiesmaking fairy houses

our little fairies ready for musical logs

it's my party and I'll pout if I want to!
Renatah got 'out' ... no log for her to sit on ... "I'm very dissapointed Muma" she said!decorating her fairy wings for the next activity
one fairy being assisted by the 'party fairies'
for her turn to pin her wings on the fairy!

enjoying the snack feast

cake time

to enable the Muma's a little more party time of their own,
we put on a Tinkerbell movie!

The Muma Fairies!
we had just as much fun as the little girls!