5.19.2010

party time

i am in stressville, USA over here trying to plan judah's birthday party this weekend. it's not even a big thing, just a laid back cookout for some of our friends who live in the area and our families. i don't even have a theme (but if you wanna see a first bday theme done pimptastically, check this out. i would have head 3 strokes while trying to pull this amazingness off. my friend merran is a stud). our party really isn't that big of a challenge, or shouldn't be, i am just a total over reactor.
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we aren't doing presents since judah has plenty and we don't want to start a tradition of binge-receiving. instead, we asked the invitees to bring some of their old toys that don't get a lot of use so that our family can take them and donate them to a kids' group near our house that really does need them. the idea here is to give judah the gift of learning to find joy in meeting the needs of others. because we are super fortunate to be able to financially and materially meet all of our own needs at this stage in our lives.
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i know this way easy when he's one and has no idea what is going on and has never been to a "normal" american birthday party where the birthday kid gets a million light-up, noise-making, battery-operated, awesome toys that he will drool over and covet like a third arm. it won't be so easy then, and once he has been blasted by about 54,298 commercials, to convince him that his imagination/learning toys are really cooler because they are hand-crafted and earth-friendly and that they will probably make him a better person with a more active imagination and without a sense of materialism and entitlement and "entertain me, oh world." maybe? we can say this stuff not because all the kids who have traditional birthday parties are little spoiled wankers, but because we totally see this grabby-grabby, must have the newest/flashiest/fanciest things attitude in OURSELVES. like, every single day. and it kind of makes us miserable.
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so we are desperate to find ways around this at a young age that don't involve moving to amishland.(any tips on how to do this would be GREAT). yeah. good luck with that, jesse and keight. he's already in love with and learning from the flashy plastic stuff we have bought him. not that there's anything wrong with that, we just don't want to go overboard. arrrrg, see how hard this is, already!?!?!?! (note: we are not anti-plastic or anti-light up, we ARE anti-waste, anti-cheaply made crap that will break in 3 months and requires no thinking or interaction or activity on the part of the user..again, these are all things that jesse and i tend to want to accumulate, to our detriment).
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controversial tirade aside, a big part of the stress is that i can't do a lot of the party stuff ahead of time (it is at the grandukes' house since we didn't know if ours would have sold by now...HA!), so i sit around envisioning saturday and me running around like a maniac trying to do everything at once and trying to make everyone happy and really just making everyone miserable. this is my hostess m.o. typically. ah, the golden moments. i have had 2 stress dreams about the party so far, but i actually did some real problem solving during the dreams so that was slightly productive, if not restful.

cue random segway: so to keep from just letting these thoughts fester and not being able to do anything about them yet, i decided to take out the frustrations on my sewing machine last night by making a stupidly girly apron.


this pattern was in my sewing book, 101 one yard wonders, but i changed it up by lining it (a one-ply, unlined apron seems like a bad idea to me), rounding the edges and adding pockets cause i'm advanced and off the cuff like that. don't try to cage me, sewing book! i have no idea what i am going to do with this ruffle-bomb now. it's not my style and i have a ton of my grandma's old aprons that i never wear. i think it's cute...but that could just be the model.

i couldn't model because i defend to the death my right to not wear a bra or pants while in my own house

bashful in the kitchen


this was a favortie angle/pose.


hard to pick just one.
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holy moly, while i was writing this post, lena stepped up and took the 4 dozen cupcakes off my plate (not literally, that could get her eaten). she's kind of amazing. the stress is lifting. i feel like maybe i should give the next baby to her as a thank you. also my mom bought a ton of the food for the party as well and is prepping it herself. i really have nothing to worry about. situtation normal. where the hell are the tongs?!!?!?

9 comments:

  1. His party has a theme... the gift of giving. I love it! I have a friend who makes her kids choose one of their gifts at Christmas to give away to a needy family. This is beautiful and everyone will have fun just hanging out. Just let it happen and be natural... organic. And Jesse looks like a transvestite!

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  2. A. I look like a man in an apron, thank you very much. If you're referring to my man-boobs, then I don't appreciate that at all.

    B. I specifically asked for the 4th picture to be taken in lieu of the 3rd being posted. No respect at all here.

    C. In response to yesterday's comment about politics...
    i. I am a moderate
    ii. I am not too lazy to know what I'm talking about
    iii. I hate politics and am a firm believer that it is not the answer to many of our problems.

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  3. we're anti-crap, too (but have learned I can't say "anti plastic" because my dad will launch into a tyraid about how plastics sent me to college...). Anyway, we plan on using amazon's universal wish list for gift ideas from family for gift-giving occasions. That way, we can literally add whatever we want from any website to the list (earth friendly, non-light-up junk) and family can pick what seems right to them. Another trick I've learned from parents is that the toy won't make noise or light up if you never put the batteries in... baby won't know the difference!

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  4. the target circo brand actually has a lot of cute learning toys, some of which are plastic but most of which are light- and sound-less, which i appreciate. my little one especially likes the shape sorting hippo... too cute. http://tinyurl.com/26tcupx
    leapfrog also has some good stuff, although it does tend to get a bit flashy for older kids.

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  5. Someone recently gave me an idea for the whole keeping down the crazy gift-givingness that happens these days. They said limit yourself to three gifts based on the reasoning that that's what Jesus recieved from the wise men. One you need, one you want, and one just for fun....or all three just for fun.

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  6. Jesse, I was referring to your 5 o'clock shadow... nobody said man-boobs but you. I bet you could give away the apron as a Christmas present to someone!

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  7. We are anti-gift gluttony too. I like your idea of bringing gifts to give to charity. For our kids we always let people know that gifts truly are not necessary but should they feel obligated just to bring their favorite book when they were our child's age. We feel a child can never have too many books. Like Amy posted above, we don't put batteries in toys that make noise. This has worked well, until our kids find a friend with the same toy and it DOES have batteries.
    ;-) I think Jesse should model all your crafts! Who won your burp cloth giveaway?

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  8. I have NO suggestions for how to keep your sweet judah from being greedy... other than keeping him away from me because I literally spent the whole last half of the post going "I MUST HAVE THIS APRON!!" and then I get here to comment land and NOT ONE person has mentioned how stinking adorable it is! So, if you can't find a good use for it, I'm in! I'm in the market for one because the one I have nate's granny made... (You know the one who's sewing maching you learned to sew on...) And now I feel like I shouldn't use it or get it dirty! I'll pay you for it? Or trade you a Chicago souvenir?

    I think you're awesome keight. I love this post & jesse's comments to it! Hope the party is wonderful :)

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  9. Love the apron. Your choice of fabrics is inspired!

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