Pet Themed Birthday Party

Is it me, or is Pinterest getting a little more 'real'? I mean, you still have those ridiculously expensive, meticulously decorated parties for one-year-olds who just want to chew on the streamers. I'm also seeing more my-budget-is-$50 posts, though, and that's where this Mom is headed! In that vein, here is what we did for Sheridan's tenth birthday - much of it stolen liberally from the latter Pinterest posts.

FOOD

Logan asked me what my favorite part of birthday parties was, and as this one was over and I was stuffing a third piece of pizza into my face, I answered "leftovers". Rule #1: don't make anything you don't mind eating for the next three days, but then make lots of it! Sheridan wanted pizza, and since there is no delivery here that meant cooking from frozen. I bought 8 or 10 and baked them this morning, cut them into slices, put the slices back on cookie sheets, and just warmed those up when people arrived.

For pet-themed treats we had:

Snakes!

The dog food bowls will go to our favorite local rescue after the party.

One of my friends won't come unless I make meatballs, so:

For her cake, Sheridan decided on a dog bowl. Daddy always does the decorating! The icing to write her name ended up too runny, so he did it in candy bits instead.

Lemon cupcakes for those who didn't want chocolate cake:

She liked it!

DO

When kids first came in we invited them to make dog toys for that same rescue. Plastic bottles (lids removed) in a sock, tie it shut and decorate it with markers. Jeans cut into strips and braided, some with a tennis ball added partway down.

With Valentine's Day coming up, it was easy to find a bajillion stuffed animals at the dollar store. But how do we decide who picks first? Let's have them draw numbers.

From the bottom of the litter box.

Many people thought this was one of those cakes made to look like kitty litter.

Nope, just kitty litter.

Once they drew their number and picked their pet (which kind of turned into a madhouse just because of the sheer number of kids we had here), they filled out an adoption certificate and made a collar for their pet.

Personally I think pinatas are weird, but Sheridan insisted, so we took turns beating the tar out of a cute dog and then scrambled for its guts.

Of course, baby cuddling is also a popular pastime! 

Make sure your bathroom is labeled - there's nothing like trying to find the toilet in a hurry in a strange house: 

And ours is certainly a strange house. Some of the gifts were strange, too!

Here, big sister apologized to Mom before she opened it.

MORE DUCKS! This may bring the total to 400. I've kind of lost track.

But, the best gift was for me. In three years I will have a 13-year-old daughter. Enough said.

Happy Tenth Birthday Sheridan!!!

This Week

Does anyone know what happened to my sweet peas?

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Shane: "I'm glad I always have my evil laugh with me."

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Dirt for Saturday arrived Tuesday! Ever try to keep large groups of children away from a big pile of dirt for 5 days?

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This weeks craft was either hanging gardens,

or potato dolls

modelled after this guy:

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Ugh.

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$15 well spent!

Wednesday was a sad day. 13yo Bella, who had seemed fine the day before, appeared to have a stroke. We sat with her in the morning until the vet's office opened, but she passed away on the trip down the hill. We will miss her 'talking' to us (no dog talks like a husky does!), and sleeping on TOP of the dog houses in snowstorms.

She was a really great dog!

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People frequently leave things behind at the library, and if I think something belongs to one of my Facebook friends, I will sometimes post a picture to see who claims it.

This one resulted in a cross-country tussle, with people in several states declaring they left it right where I found it. Wherever that was.

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I can totally do plumbing and construction, but electricity is not my thing. So, of course, I planned a Teen program centered around making light-up cards. I was able to explain the basics of closed circuits, and made one of my own with one light, but I wasn't able to make two lights work off of one battery.

The kids experimented, and a few were able to make it work! That's scientific exploration that will stick in their brains!

Super simple program, you just need cover stock, batteries, LED lights, and copper tape. I got all that off Amazon, and have a ton left.

Why yes, that is the Death Star.

The program went way over because they were still experimenting. We will definitely have to do it again!

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The kids like to explore the fields and forest, and bring home old rusty treasures. An old railroad spike. A broken tool.

A car.

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In other news, Psycho Cat still hates my guts.

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Logan's head is filled with so many awesome ideas, even when he is sleeping he needs to write them down.

97 Shopping Days Until Christmas - but Only 89 Until Hanukkah! Review: Latke, the Lucky Dog

*Please check out my post from 9/12/14.

What do you name a toasty brown pup rescued on the first day of Hanukkah?

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Latke, of course! Latke is lucky to have a new home, but he is having a little trouble learning the rules. And, how can you resist the smell of fresh, powdery jelly donuts (sufganiyot), anyway? Fortunately, his new family is very understanding ("Poor, hungry latke. They didn't feed you enough at that shelter, did they?") Readers who are new to the traditions of Hanukkah will absorb them painlessly (as in, this is not one of those 'now I am going to teach you something' books), as they follow Latke's escapades. Those who already celebrate the holiday will appreciate a story they can just plain enjoy. And just look at that face!

Now, the obvious companion gift for this book would be your very own rescue dog. There are many reasons why the puppy-in-a-box gift on Christmas morning may not be the best bet, despite the great video you can post on Facebook. Alternatives could be a stuffed pet,

this one available here - no shots required!

or a book about choosing the right pet,

and a promise to take your time as a family and find just the right companion.

Not ready for a new family member? How about a promise to volunteer at a local shelter? If yours has a volunteer form, you can slip it inside the last page of the book!

Going another route, this Hanukkah set

has been very popular as a check-out item at our library, for those who aren't familiar with the holiday but who want to learn more about it. That angle opens the door to all sorts of tasty cooking possibilities and history lessons!

Okay, now I want a latke. And a new dog.

A Four-Legged Baby

Many, many years ago, before I was married, before I even had kids, when it was just me and there was no one around to say "no", I saw someone giving puppies away in the grocery store parking lot. So I took one. On a whim. Terrible way to get a new pet, but just look at this face:

He was so LITTLE! And so CUTE!

I named him "Malenchki", roughly "Little One" in Russian. He stayed short, but not so little in other ways, earning the nickname "sausage dog". I told people he was half Rottweiler, half dachshund.

He was already getting on in years when Christopher came along,

Did someone say, "treat"?

and most of my kids have grown up with him. Sure, he'll eat anything remotely resembling food, and the comparisons to Walter the Farting Dog were definitely made when that book came out, but all in all he has been a good dog.

He is now 14 years old, which is something like 342 in dog years. His eyes are cloudy, but just try tossing a treat in the air near him - it will never hit the floor!

He is also starting to move a little slowly, but then, so am I. I figured it was a little rheumatism, and slipped him half a Rimadyl on days he seemed to be a bit stiff. It doesn't slow him down - even with food and water available on the deck, he insists on running up and down the steps, wrestling with the bigger dogs. The sofa is a bit of a tricky jump on slick floors, so we got him a nice, soft bed.

Which he shares with his best buddy, Baby Alice (also no longer a baby). Sometimes she takes more than her fair share. He doesn't seem to begrudge it.

His face is a bit whiter now, but he's perky as ever.

Trust me, when he's conscious, he's perky.

Then Daddy noticed one hip was swollen - like, really swollen. Oh, great, I thought, he dislocated it wrestling with the husky. In to the vet the next morning for x-rays.

The good news is, his hip wasn't dislocated. They don't think so, anyway - it was hard to see the bones on the x-rays, what with the way the cancer has spread.

He took the news pretty well: "So, we're at the vet, and vets have treats. Where's my treat?" He got extra-special treats to have each morning, and as long as those work, we'll just continue on as is. We try to make him stay inside on chilly days, but he wants to be outside, enjoying life with his buddies.

There's a lesson in there somewhere, don't you think?