Sharks and Mermaids

It was such a fun day. I am already sad it's over.
To celebrate the kids' birthdays, we had our much anticipated (at least at our house) Sharks and Mermaids party. I picked the theme months ago and Clara has been talking about it since I mentioned it to her.
I picked up some extra hours at work yesterday, and didn't get as much time part prepping as a result, so we ended up spending most of the morning getting ready. We kept it pretty simple with snack foods and inexpensive decor.

The centerpiece was this wonderful cake made by an extremely talented friend of mine, LaChelle. I actually haven't seen her in quite a few years (since my wedding), but thanks to the beauty of social media, I was well aware of her talent for creating beautiful cakes. The cake turned out even better than I imagined, and was really a hit. 

Our kids got spoiled half to death with presents, and then we let our almost 1 year old (10 more days) dig into his smash cake.

When Clara turned 1, she dipped her hands into the frosting on the cake then got super sad because she was messy. I don't think she ate any of it. Lincoln did not follow suit. He dug right in. In fact, he just trashed the cake. After a while, he figure out her could actually eat it also, instead of just obliterating it. He loved it.

 Thanks to our families for coming and making our party special. Love you all!

Small moments

It has been a rough few days. We have all been sick around here. All I want to do is lie around and sleep or watch TV and not move. But I have kids. And they are sick too, so that means they need even more TLC than normal. When I woke up this morning and remembered I was flying solo and my husband was already at work, I thought the world might end. Okay, maybe not that dramatic... not quite.
When the baby's morning nap time came around, we headed up to rock him. Lately, Clara wants to be with us while we're rocking, and our deal is that she sits on the arm of the recliner and does not make a peep while we rock, or she has to leave. Some times she cooperates more than others. I was all geared up for a battle with her this morning, but instead she nuzzled up to me, laid her head on my shoulder for a few seconds, then planted a big kiss on my cheek. I was sitting there snuggling my dozing off baby and enjoying some snuggles with my big girl too.
I thought about all that cliche stuff about parenthood, about how childhood goes too fast, about how sometimes the moments seem like a struggle while they're happening but we wish them back as soon as they're gone. I though about how terrible I've been about writing anything about our lives, big moments and small. I knew I had to put this one down on paper (or computer screen). I want to remember it.

Bride to Bee

In honor of Alisha, my sister, mom, and I threw her a little bridal shower. We did a breakfast time shower with family. We kept it simple with various honey foods, and one game where we asked Matthew to guess what Alisha would say to certain questions (we recorded him on video beforehand), and then had her answer the same questions. She did really well at matching his answers. It was a fun time.

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A wedding

I remember the day Matthew came home from the hospital. I remember when he potty trained. I remember when he was a cute little grade school kid. I moved across the country when he was about 15 or 16, so the years after that are less detailed in my memories of him. Maybe that's why it seems hardly believable that my little baby brother is old enough to be married.
But he is.

I know I am terribly behind as this happened months ago, but my baby brother married the lovely Alisha, and just like that, I have to admit that my baby brother is an adult.
Their day was lovely. Alisha looked fantastic, they both looked so happy. The temple ceremony was nice, a luncheon with various people gushing about the couple followed. In the evening, an outdoor reception with lots of dancing polished off the day. It couldn't have been better if you ask me. I am so happy for them and so happy that we have another fantastic member in our family.

On cleaning

If I had to choose one word to describe my cleaning style, I would pick...
Perfectionist.
This is not a good thing.
This leads to the following kinds of thoughts: "I can't clean the kitchen today because I do not have time to wipe down every cupboard, clean out the inside of the fridge and microwave, clean the oven door in between the glass, clean underneath the sink, etc so I guess I won't even get started on it right now." or "Yes, I did pick up and vacuum the living room, but it's not clean because the couch covers need to be laundered, the drawers in the entertainment center are filled with disorganized cords, the video games are not alphabetized, and there are syrupy child fingerprints on the arm of the chair."
I am also prone to get caught up on one area for so long that nothing else gets done. For example, I decide I am going to pick the clothes up off the bathroom floor. Then I figure since I am there anyway, I should switch out the shower curtain and towels and launder them with the clothes. And since I am doing that, I should probably clean the shower so the clean curtain is in a clean shower. Eventually, I am sorting through all the hair ties to throw away any that may be worn out, and on and on until I have spent all time that I may have to clean that day on one part of the house that is probably low on my priorities list.
I am pretty sure there is no way that I will ever in my life feel like my house is clean. There is always something else that needs to be done.
Does anyone else out there struggle with finding "good enough" in your efforts to keep your house clean and still have a life outside of cleaning?