Beanie's 3rd birthday

Wow--I haven't posted in awhile, but not because I didn't want to! Much busy-ness just got in the way. I took on a new part-time job (which, for various reasons I won't go into here, is driving me nearly mad with frustration), threw Beanie a 3rd birthday party, Beanie started, then finished, a special-needs preschool program at the local public school (it ended up being only 2 sessions, as the teacher went out on disability leave, and it was too late in the school year to replace her--what a waste of time!), Beanie started daycare, and all the rest of life went on, as it does.

Beanie's birthday was a blast. It turned out to be a brutally hot day, so we moved most of the party indoors, and filled the wading pools and set up sprinklers outside. We served crackers and cheese, veggies with ranch dip, green salad (mostly for the parents), and fruit salad, along with cake (the party was 3-5 pm, so I didn't serve a full meal). I made a monkey cake (baked a chocolate half-sphere in a stainless-steel bowl, put banana frosting between two layers, chocolate frosted the whole thing, added Ding-Dongs for ears, and drew a monkey mouth, eyes and nose with other frosting). Since that would be too small to feed everyone, I also made monkey face cupcakes (with yellow cake inside, for those who don't care for chocolate). We had an assortment of beverages. The kids all had a great time running in the sprinklers and playing in the pool.

I was stressed out before the party--it was SO hot, my husband was grumpy about a work issue (he works on weekends, so it was fresh), and I was running out of time, but it all came together somehow. Once the party actually starts, I always have a good time.

I'm kind of a nut about my kid's parties, and they are always themed to within an inch or their lives--LOL. Bless the Oriental Trading Company, my chief soursce for cheap party goods! We did a full-on monkey theme ('cause Beanie's my little monkey), with neon monkey tableware, monkey bean-bag toss, pin-the-banana-on-the-monkey, the monkey cake(s), and monkey-printed goodie bags filled with a small stuffed monkey, a monkey-design platic cup, monkey-design bubbles, and monkey stickers. It was monkey madness!