Too much in one day

So today was Sydney's birthday party. That ordinarily would be plenty for any one day, but she was also attending a birthday party on the same day as her own. Normally the girls go to parties together, but occasionally they are not both invited. This was such a party. It was small, and only for 4 year olds. Emily was crushed when we actually got to the door. All morning she had been fairly supportive and helpful, but I think she thought I'd change my mind at the last minute. Luckily Karl was able to stop his yard work and distract her so she cheered up fairly quickly after I left. I dropped Sydney off at the other party, and came back 30 minutes or so later to finish the prep for her party in the afternoon. It took a lot of work, but I got the food ready, and the house fairly tidy. I also had 2 extra helpers, friends of mine came over to help get it all done before the guests arrived.

We were having a princess theme-ed party, at Sydney's request, but since some of her guests were boys, we did not lay on the girly stuff too much! we invited everyone to bring their suit and set up the backyard slide as a water slide. All day long it had been hot and sunny. Sadly, 30 minutes before the party, the wind changed, the clouds drifted in a bit and the smoke of a local fire filled the air! It was not quite as pleasant an afternoon to be sure, but at least it did not rain! The kids had a wonderful time shooting down the slide, and running down the slip & slide. We did have to do some creative work with the mulch & the hose so we could keep the inflatable pool in place when the kids landed! And the yard got very well watered in several spots!

After the water games, we feed the little munchkins dinner, had cake, unfortunately I scorched Cinderella's arm when I carried in the lit cake, and opened presents! Then we pulled the string on the pinata, a safer but less exciting version. I was amazed that the string that opened the hatch was literally the second to last string pulled! The kids swooped in as they rushed to pick up the candy from the floor, but they didn't actually wait for it all to fall out of the pinata, so several of them kept yelping as they got hit on the back & head by falling candy!

All in all, it was a success. Everyone ate, had fun, and went home fairly happy. Although there were a few tears after a balloon drifted away on the way out the door. (Did anyone know that helium is a natural resource and currently somewhat restricted? Apparently the local grocery store, with attached floral & balloon shop is restricted in their helium intact, 2 tanks a month instead of per week, and really hate having to face unhappy moms who want their balloons! I just heard this today and no I was not a ranting mom at the store!)

Emily had really struggled today to understand why she could not...go to the other party, have the balloon she wanted (one of the fancy mylar ones), share the presents with Sydney, fill in the blank! You would not know she was the older child today!!! I don't think she fell asleep last night until about 9pm, which is terribly late for her, but still it was a long day for her.

She ended the night in hysterical tears in her bed in time out. Dinner was served at the birthday party, but she decided she was still hungry at 6:45pm even though she ate 1pb&pb sandwich, 1 chicken drumstick, 1 hot dog, watermelon, grapes, carrots, and cake . I offered her several choices for additional dinner which she refused. She then continued to sob to her sister about how sharing was a nice thing to do, as Sydney continued to color with one of her new presents, and refused requests to share. When the warnings did not have much impact, and the sobbing didn't lessen, I was extremely grateful to notice it was time to go get ready for bed. Then she began crying even harder because she was still hungry. 3 strikes later, she was in her bed in tears. I actually thought she fell asleep, so Sydney and I quietly finished bedtime routine without her, but that backfired too, since then she was sad that we didn't do bedtime with her. So now, I have finished, but both girls are out of bed-potty run this time, and I really hope they fall asleep soon. I am beat!

About the cake, just a little side note, I decided to make it this time, since Sydney liked a really simple cake, and I figured it would be fun to buy the princess toy set, so she could have cake decorations and actual toys to play with later. Normally I would have picked the set myself since they are not always painted the same, but I had to order this set. I was extremely disappointed to discover that whoever painted this set decided to make the princess look like drag queens. I was even more annoyed since I did not have time to send them back & get a new set! But she does not seem to care, so I will just be quiet about it from here on out! I wish the picture wasn't blurry too! Oh well. Enough griping! It was my own fault for not bracketing the shoot.