Craft Crazy

The girls have been asking to do crafts daily ever since I gave Eleyna a ready-to-do craft box from Oriental Trading for Christmas. Those are my kind of crafts since the girls are still at the please-do-it-for-me stage of life. I really hate "doing a craft" with them and making it all myself. (Then again sometimes I have a hard time letting go and not insisting they look exactly how I think they should.)
Valentine's Day threw me into a craft crazed frenzy. We had a really fun week making these projects:



I threw the girls a Valentines party where we decorated purses for the girls and beanbags for the boys:


In my search for crafts, I found some really great craft websites, including these:

http://belladia.typepad.com/crafty_crow/
http://tipjunkie.blogspot.com/
http://www.notimeforflashcards.com/

Happy Birthday for Real

Eleyna's birthday started off rocky, but as soon as we started the party she cheered right up and has been pretty happy and doing really well ever since.
We started off with a treasure hunt to find her presents with clues like:

We love Eleyna because she is cute. Look inside a snow boot.
Eleyna is so funny. Go look by her bunny.
Eleyna is such a silly head. Go look in her bed.
We love Eleyna because she is sweet. Go look where you'd find a treat.
We love Eleyna even when she's a grouch. Go look in the couch.
We're glad Eleyna's at home. Look by the telephone.
We love Eleyna because she's pretty. Look underneath Hello Kitty.

She got a beautiful dress from her Grandma Susan that even fits with her cast:

a nightgown that we took an arm off for now



and some Littlest Pet Shops. She was going to get a Build-a-Bear on Saturday, but instead she and Jake had a great time going on Monday.


Next we had pizza and cake. Can you tell the girls helped with the cake? It's a Littlest Pet Shop...and Ariel... cake

She's been so happy with each get well card and present. On Saturday she got a big balloon/stuffed animal bouquet from Jared and Karen. You should have seen the smile on her face when that came! Sunday some of our friends brought her cards and a stuffed monkey, and she's gotten coloring books, sticker books, and even a bag of presents where she opens one a day until they're gone, at which point she'll hopefully feel a lot better.



She's really back to normal, playing dollies and hitting her brother with her good arm whenever he touches one of her new toys. Fun times all around.

An early birthday present for Eleyna

Yesterday Eleyna got a terrible birthday present- a broken arm.
We were at the park where Eleyna and I were having a great time playing a tickling game, when Eleyna lost her footing and fell off a waist-high playground platform. She landed right on her elbow and I knew right away from how her arm was laying on the ground that it was broken. My friend took the other kids and I rushed her to the doctor, who had me go straight to the ER. Poor girl had a terrible break clear through the bone a few inches above her elbow. They sent her to Primary Children's by ambulance so a pediatric orthopedic surgeon could operate on her. About 8 hours after the break, she was all put together with a full arm splint and 4 pins in her arm. We spent an uncomfortable night crammed in a teeny room in a packed hospital and came home this morning. Next week she'll get a cast when the swelling goes down.
I feel so sad because I was seconds away from catching her and preventing the whole thing. I can't imagine what awful pain she was in, and I don't know how she'll get over the fear of this when she's already afraid of so many things. She was a trooper through the whole thing, though, and she's doing alright considering.
So, Happy Birthday, Eleyna! I hope you enjoy your new bike... when your cast is off and you get the courage to ride it.

Winter

The Sky is Falling

Sweetest darling Eleyna often sometimes drives us crazy. We ask her to do something and she falls on the ground in despair because her legs don't work or she's too tired or she's scared or her finger is sore, or.... you get the picture. For example, today she hurt her arm because, "I was trying to dance cool." I laid her on my bed to rest and get better, and she said, "It's never going to feel better. Now I'll have to be in your bed even until my birthday." And believe me, she really meant it.
So today I was trying to clean the house.
(Obviously, only because we're having friends over tonight. It's their first time coming over, so I like it to be extra clean so they know that I can clean it. Next time they come over, it won't matter as much. I'm actually feeling more stressed because this is a lady who cleans ALL the time. I asked her once what she and her little 4-year old do during the day, and she said something like, "Mostly he just watches TV or plays by himself because he knows that I have so much cleaning to do." So now I feel like she'll notice every spot of dust or every splotch of dirt. She's a very nice person, so I probably don't need to worry.)
Anyway, most of the mess was Eleyna's, so I tried to get her to help. I bribed and threatened and yelled (yes, I may have yelled), only to meet groans and moans and "I can'ts". So, finally, I took a break from her and wouldn't play with her because, "If you don't want to help me, I don't want to play with you". Awhile later, when I was feeling nice again, we played a game where we acted out something in the room and the other person guessed it, then cleaned that thing up. The room was clean in less than 10 minutes.

How do you get your kids to clean?

(I just have to add this because I was dying laughing the other night. It's probably only funny because I was in a funny mood after we were playing charades and Jake acted out Princess Jasmine. We were trying to convince Eleyna that she could actually sleep in her bed and not die or be eaten by giants. She was trying to sleep as close to the edge as possible because I was sitting on the floor by her and she wanted to be as near to me as possible. But we didn't want her so close to the edge that she'd fall off. She said, in the most pitiful, sad little voice, "The other night I was on the edge and I fell off and it was awesome." Yes, awesome... )