FRIENDS lives on.....

So I have these friends. These friends that have been my friends for a long time. They are awesome. We have a blast together and recently my little sister joined our crew, which is super duper. When they are on break (teachers in a year round district) we always get together and do something fun...usually with kids. On one of our mega play dates, we discussed getting together and watching FRIENDS episodes (we miss the show mucho). I had an idea of a FRIENDS themed dinner party, they all said go for it, so we nailed down a date and I got started with the planning.

For dinner, we had Monica's lasagna (although looking back, pizza would have been way faster....ya know, pizza for Joey), garlic bread and salad. For dessert, we had cookies (The One With Phoebes Cookies), mini trifles (The One Where Ross Got High) and cheesecake (The One With All The Cheesecakes).

 

 

 

For drinks, we had margaritas (the One Where Ross is Fine), wine and beer.

 

 

For decorations, I made a coffee filter garland, I used the DVDs from my super cool collectible series box, and used little pieces from my Scene It, Friends Edition game (don't judge).

 

In addition, I made each Friend a mug with their name on it. So easy to do! Just get a dollar store mug, write on it with Sharpie and then bake it at 350* for 25 minutes and it becomes permanent!

 

I made cards for a game, but we never got to that...you'll see why in a minute.

About three days before, I found this picture on Pinterest, tagged my friends and said, "lets do this". Theyall agreed and then my little message thing came up and it was Ami, asking if we were going to wear our wedding dresses at our FRIENDS party.

At first, I thought she was joking, but then quickly realized how fun this would be..... Just like The One With All The Wedding Dresses. So we agreed. My sis and I went to our parents house to pick up the dresses and cautiously tried them on in the privacy of our own homes. I mean come on, I've had two kids....who knew if the dress was going to zip up? But, it did.....mostly. Eric came home and helped me finish zipping it the last inch or so....and it zipped. It zipped! And then, I exhaled and it unzipped about two inches, but I don't care...I was on, you couldn't see the majority of my butt, so I was good.

So there we were, in Anabelle's living room, all looking at our wedding dresses and laughing about what was about to go down. And go down it did....

Before I go any further, I want to point out that this is NOT Anabelle's wedding dress....she had hers all beautifully preserved and did not want to open it (imagine that). So she found one at Savers. She wanted to make sure you all knew that her wedding dress did not make her look like an electric eel (the polyester was quite bright). Okay, moving on......

 

 

Walking out of the bathroom, into the living room and seeing all of us say standing there in our dresses was hysterical. We decided to try out the jumping picture which was by far the funniest thing I have been a part of in forever! Turns out, I am not such a great jumper and every time I would jump, my zipper would come down a bit more. Plus the laughing made the zipper come down because it would be right when we were all quiet and then we'd hear zziiippp and yes, we all giggled like school girls because it sounded like I was farting.

I can't handle this picture. It is too funny. My sister (on the far right) is so funny!

See how Anabelle glows??

After our jumping pictures, we decided that maybe it was time to watch some FRIENDS. So yes, in our dresses, we sat on the couch with our beverages and watched TV.

I'm sorry, but I have some cool friends..... It was so fun!

 

Thanks Ami, for taking all the pictures! Love ya long time!

 

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Eddie came to dinner.....

Each year, we always have a Christmas party with Eric's side of the family. This year it ended up being at our house and we decided to make it a bit different. I realize that ugly sweater parties are not that unusual anymore, but come on, how fun! So it was decided. Ugly sweaters it would be! Our search for the ugliest sweater led us to Savers and Goodwill where we quickly discovered that in order to score the ugliest of ugly, you needed to do a whole heck of a lot sooner than we had. The first day we went hunting, I was alone with the kids. I made the mistake of telling the kids that we were looking for an ugly sweater and to keep an eye out. Apparently, I should have been a bit more specific on where to keep an eye out. This woman walking by was wearing a less than beautiful sweater and Delaney was quick to notice. "Mommy, that lady has on a very ugly sweater", she says to me in the only volume Delaney speaks in: LOUD. I was mortified. I quickly changed the adjective to 'silly' instead of ugly and we left without a sweater. The following day Eric ventured out with us. We had something very specific in mind for Eric. Our FAVORITE movie is Chevy Chase's Christmas Vacation. We can never get enough of that movie. When I think of less than favorable Christmas attire, I think of Eddie. So that was our mission: Eric=Eddie.

Now that I have written a ridiculously long paragraph about the our purchasing of the sweaters I will now just show the pictures. Disclaimer: If anyone owns any of the sweaters that we are wearing, I am sure the look lovely on you. Just now our style:) Don't hate.

Brody, CJ, Delaney, Josh

(Cousins)

Chris and Kaylie

Chris, Holly and the boys all made their sweaters- too cute and creative!

Melinda and Bill- also added some festive embellishments to their sweaters

Cousins:)

The grandparents with the kiddos

Now....wait for it....

wait for it....

wait for it....

BAM

That is my man y'all- Eddie in the flesh- you can't really see the Dickie that is under the sweater,

but oh he rocked it!

The Lopez Family

Holly, Chris, Josh and CJ

The Mikkelsons

Kyle, Kevin, Kristin and Jacob

Oh yeah- we are H-O-T hot!

We decided to do some holiday crafts for the kids and we also had a reindeer food bar which was way fun.

Each child had their own unique formula for the reindeer food... it was so cute!

Very serious

Each year we do a gift exchange between the kids, this year we decided that it would be nice to have an ornament exchange so that they would have a great new memory each year.

These are backwards, but you can tell how excited he was!

The party ended with some good old fashioned dancing..... good times were had people.

Holly spinning Josh and Delaney and Brody rockin out on the side.

Jumping fun!

Delaney turned 4 last week and we had a little shin dig for her at the park near our house a week or so ago. I didn't want to have a huge party.... just family and a few friends. We decided to have it at the park again because, well, because I didn't have to clean my house. That thiery is always good, until you realize that you can't set up ANYTHING ahead of time and you have to remember every, single, little thing. We did a pretty good job of remembering everything this time. THis year, Delaney requested a Strawberry Shortcake themed cake. I envisioned the cute, delicious smelling little doll from my childhood and she envisioned the one from the current TV show- totally different. SO I compromised and had a little vintage and a little new. In my head, I had the cutest party planned. There were going to be coordinating centerpieces on each perfectly table clothed table. There was going be streamers and balloons falling from the roof of the ramada, with a gorgeous gift and cake table along with amazing coordinated food. Turns out, I am a great party planner.... in my head. The tables were haphazardly gorilla taped onto each, ghetto picnic table, the cake had to be covered with tissue paper that we pilfered so the yucky flies would stay off of it and there were no balloons or streamers.... just gum and graffiti. But none of that mattered to my little munchie.
She has been so excited for her birthday this year and she could not wait for the party. We decided that we would get a jumping castle and I am so happy that we did! It was the coolest jumping castle I have ever seen! It had an obstacle course in side, along with a basketball hoop and a slide! If you live in Tucson you definitely need to contact A Jump Above for your next party!

Brody going up the slide

The birthday girl. Her hair looked so cute for about a minute. I should have known better

Gavin checking out the beast of a jumping castle

Brody taking a jumping break to enjoy a strawberry

Jacob, Daylen and Kyle- SO excited to be at a 4 yr. old bday party!

Bridget and Ami keeping a motherly eye on their kids.

Brody took the soccer ball from Hunter (on the left there) and then decided that if he sat on it, it would be safe. Brains? Yes. Social skills? Not so much

Granddaddy and Brody playing soccer. I love that Brody's feet are not touching the ground.

Delaney decided to join in

I made a small cake (cuz she really wanted a cake) and then a crap load of cupcakes. I really didn't want to stand there and cut cake and have to get more plates and forks and blah, blah, blah.

She specifically wanted a number 4 on it!

She was so hot!

Me and my baby.... wait, I guess she isn't a baby- she is freaking 4!

Blowing out the candle

Brody had been waiting all morning for his cupcake

Hunter digging in

Ethan

Colton chowin

Aunt Danielle keeping Brody from his 4th cupcake

Mimi and P-Paw (or MY Granddaddy)

Delaney opening present is a sight. She is SO excited for each and everyone and is equally grateful. I hope her heart remains that way forever- an amazing trait.

We are so blessed!!

SO excited to jump!!

All done!

It was a lot of fun and we are thankful for our blessings. Our little is 4- that is crazy!

oh and btw....I am doing National Blog Posting Month again!!

So, day 1....done!