I Can Already Hear the Screams

Alexis' 9th birthday is just around the corner. That means it's party time.

HOORAY!

In case you've forgotten, I love me some party planning. Give me a theme and I am off and running. Monster High? YES! Glow in the dark? SURE! Hello Kitty? ABSOLUTELY! I love beating a theme into the ground!

So, of course, Alexis decided she didn't want a theme this year. WOMP WOMP WOMP.

There will be no fun-colored dips. No crazy decorations. No fun names for common foods.

I mean, there might be some of those things. You can take the theme away from the girl, but you can't take the theme OUT of the girl. I'm working on figuring something out.

In the meantime, I'm scared out of my mind. Not only did the child NOT want a theme, she decided she wanted a sleepover. That sounds fine and dandy until you remember that the kid is an evil genius. There are nine girls coming to the sleepover. NINE.

That's a lot of screeching and screaming and HOOBOY. I should probably put Mila into some sort of witness protection program as soon as possible.

There weren't suppose to be nine girls. There were suppose to be five. Maybe six.

The story about how that happened begins with Alexis picking out invitations on Etsy and me deciding I can make similar ones myself. That happened and all went well and blah, blah, blah. I sent them to be printed on photo paper and all was well. Oh, and by "them," I mean seven of them. I wanted a few extras. One to keep, and one extra invitation just in case we screwed up when getting them ready to mail. No big deal.

But.

But then I forgot to mail them. Too much time went by, so I decided I better email a few of the people who live farther away that they were invited. Advance warning and such. Those two quickly replied that they would be there. Great!

Somehow, those two email invitations turned into Alexis thinking she had two more people she could invite. NOT GREAT.

Alexis addressed all seven invitations. When I tried to talk her off the ledge, she couldn't figure out how to cut out 2-3 people without hurting someone's feelings. The kid knows I'm a sucker for kindness, so I couldn't say no.

So. Nine girls. For the whole night.

Enjoy the silence for me this weekend. And maybe send some earplugs for Mila.

Just Because

There Is a Floor! Who Knew?

Everybody in this house knows that if a room needs to be cleaned, it's best to do it without me around. That's why I knew things were dire when Alexis invited me into the playroom to help her find the floor.

It has been a long time since I have posted about the awesome that is our playroom, so allow me to direct you over here for photos from when it was first done. Then, allow me to mention that the other three IKEA flower lights still live on a shelf in the closet. WHOOPS. Oh, and that room hasn't looked like that since that day. I'm not kidding when I say it's often impossible to find the carpet in there.

Alexis requesting my help to clean meant she was okay with me throwing things away.

I am surrounded by hoarders, so every toy we've ever had is in this house. Nearly all of those toys live in the playroom. Just the Happy Meal toys alone are enough to send me over the edge. Add in the collection of broken toys and I'm a total nut. Alexis knows it. She knows I don't think we need to keep everything. She knows I have no problem thinning the herd. She knows.

She didn't argue with me even once when I hauled eight bags of trash out of that room.

THAT is how bad it was.

Once eight bags of trash were out and three bags of things were bagged for donations, the room was clean. Beautifully, delightfully clean. It was clean enough for Mila to enter the space.

She had never been in there. Frankly, it wasn't safe. She might have gotten lost in a pile of crap and never been seen again. Also, choking hazard. The entire room was a giant choking hazard. But with everything in its place and significantly less stuff in there, it was finally Mila ready.

Mila is now super mad that nobody ever alerted her to the wall of mirrors in her very own home. Also, DISCO BALL OMG. She loves the disco ball.

And the piano.

In another year or so, Alexis is going to have outgrown a lot of the things in the playroom. She might even be done with it by then. At one point, we had planned to turn it into her bedroom, but that's no longer the plan. Now Alexis will be exiting at about the same time that Mila is ready to enter.

Sorry, Alexis, but it's going to be Mila's room to destroy soon. Try to make sure more trash is moved out before she takes over.