They grow up fast

So, this is a more recent photo of the boys (they grow up fast). In a couple of weeks, they'll turn eight. In the photo above, they are showing off their stripes for Run for the Arts. This program raises money to pay for those little "frills" that our school system can no longer afford to pay for with our very slashed budgets, like arts and music.

The stripes indicate the number of laps that they ran (Colin nine laps, Ethan eight).

After a chilly run under skies that threatened rain and wind that ended up blowing over the tent that was covering the volunteers who were doing the logging, the kids were treated to frozen popsicles.... brrrr!

As I mentioned, in a few weeks, they will turn eight. The theme for their party will be Circus/Carnival. I picked up a cotton candy maker a few months ago at Goodwill (works wonderfully) and they're completely jazzed about putting it to use with their friends, so we worked out the entire party around it.

The invitations have been sent out. I'll take a photo of them and post them soon. I didn't have as much time to devote to them as I could have used, but they still came out pretty fun...

A Fishy Party

As I mentioned in my previous post, the boys' third birthday party revolved around a fish theme. Above, you can see Colin on the left and Ethan on the right behind the first of their two birthday cakes (I have it on very good authority from an identical twin (who happens to be their godmother, Sarah) that it is de rigeur to have a cake for each child, even if they are so lucky to have a twin sibling).

The cakes were frosted with tinted buttercream and seaweed was piped onto the sides of the cake with a leaf tip. Crushed graham crackers stood in for the sandy sea bottom. The decorations were made of melted meltaways -- they're like white chocolate discs that you can melt in the microwave and then tint with candy food-coloring (you can't use regular food coloring). Then you can pipe shapes onto wax paper, which quickly cool into candy confections. I got this technique from a wonderful book called "The Whimsical Bakehouse: Fun-to-Make Cakes that Taste as Good as They Look!"

The decorations were great as I could make them far in advance and only have to worry about doing minor things to the cake the day of the party.

One of the games we had was fishing, of course. I got a ton of little foam fish from a party supply place and hot-glued washers on the backs. I got some bamboo from a friend for fishing poles, had my husband cut them down to size and drilled holes in one end for string and a magnet. The children were given little buckets and fishing poles and sent out to the backyard to go fishing, where fish galore lurked all over the yard. The smaller children got poles with shorter strings which made it easier to catch the fish.

Crepe paper streamers hung down from the ceiling to simulate the ocean and seaweed.

Since the boys' party, I've reused this basic invitation twice for friends' parties. One had a Finding Nemo theme and the other was a pool party. In all of these instances, the invitations were a huge hit and really helped set the stage for the entire party.

Have other ideas? Please comment! I'd love to hear from you!