8/26 - And then they were 4th graders!

This growing up business -- it goes even faster than They say it does.  Would you look at these enormous children of mine?  #proud

6/26 - Love Wins

Happy is a lot happier today.  Thank you, SCOTUS.  #lovewins

6/15 - Minion and the 5-inch spike of doom

Peggy has some of the most amazing shoes. By that I mean I am mostly amazed that she can walk in them.  And, while it's weird to ask a coworker if you can take a picture of her feet, I just had to do it.

Run, Minion, run!!

2/17 - Love You Puppy says, "Rats!"

The twins and I have been renting pets from Sulphur Creek Nature Center.  This week, we have Beyonce the rat.  She is very inquisitive and makes really cute little sounds when she's exploring and really cute little snores when she's sleeping.  Here she is helping me take (eat) a note.

1/11 - A Woodland Birthday

Happy New Year!  Hope you all had great holidays and 2015 is bringing you love and other good things.  Would you believe that my little twins are almost nine?  It's true.

We celebrated with their friends this past weekend at the Sulphur Creek Nature Center, which is a great place.  The party deal offered the kids a chance to meet and feed the animal(s) of their choice, from a list of friendly residents, and do a project or go on a nature hike.  Our naturalist was super friendly and gave great customer service (but did not allow rides in the birthday cart).

You know me.  I had to bust out some decorations and goodies for the party, even if it was just in a rented space.  I leveraged heavily the woodland theme ideas from The Ellie Blog.  First of all, how cute are these printables?

Next up, some cupcakes.  I really like gel food coloring for tinting the frosting.  (Yes, I still had my Christmas tree up.)

  

I ordered some rainbow-colored goodie bags and the kids decorated them with the printable stickers.  We tossed in a camo-colored bracelet and owl stickers from the party store, some candy, and one of these little animal figures (except the ones the twins wanted to keep at home):

The kids and I trimmed down brown paper lunch sacks and used more stickers to pretty them up.  We offered popcorn, "twigs," (stick pretzels), crunchy carrots, and bear graham crackers.

We decorated the room with the super cute birthday banner and offered animal ears (fox, bear (or mouse), and bunny).  I wasn't sure if the kids were too old or cool for that sort of thing, and was delighted when they all put them on!

The kids enjoyed roaming around the center, checking out the animals in the displays and putting on puppet shows.  Then it was time to meet some animals!  Lil' Gal had selected a guinea pig, and Strawberry was a sweetie.

Lil' Guy wanted to meet a rabbit, and Scarlett was very nice, although not really into crowds.

Then it was time for the nature hike.  We howled at the coyotes that live at the center (our naturalist encouraged us to do it, and, while the coyotes didn't howl back, we were thrilled to see them scamper around and wag their tails just like dogs.  We also saw a family of wild turkey vultures and a deer family, including a mom deer with triplets.

After that, we needed some cupcakes and ice cream.  Poor Lil' Gal has never been a fan of the singing...

It was a really special day, and I was so happy the kids had a good time.

Happy birthday, my sweeties.  I hope this is a wonderful year for you -- the best yet, with many more to come.

Love, Mommy

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Note:  Other neat woodland-themed ideas I found are on my Pinterest Board.