Thing One: I had to go buy a new tooth brush yesterday. The last time I brushed my teeth with the old one was right after I barfed and I couldn’t bear to use it again. I know, I’m totally admitting to not brushing my teeth for a whole day, but I BARFED people, I barfed. I also know that I’m dwelling on the barfing a bit, but it was that awful.
Thing Two: We are planning a big dinner for all our friends joining us in Vegas to renew our wedding vows on our 10th anniversary. We are also renting a big house (think “The Real World” only with kids*). I started contacting caterers and chefs to see what we could do for dinner at the big house. I am really looking for someone’s nice ol' Aunt Nellie to bring groceries over and cook 12 people (and 4 kids) a wonderful dinner and then do the dishes and leave. Simple right?
Andréa got back to me with a quote for: staff, flowers, table linens, silver place settings, center pieces, sushi rolls, vegetable crudités, cheese trays, two salads, family style service of filet mignon, free range chicken, salmon cooked on a cedar plank and “Dessert could be done buffet style with all sorts of mini cakes and cookies, etc to get everyone moving and mingling” at a price tag starting at… drum roll… $5,000.00. I should’ve known by the acute accent mark in Andréa's name. Maybe when the ‘e’ in your name needs an eyebrow people we should just expect a highbrow attitude to follow. (Ok, that's a bigoted remark and a pun - sorry to anyone whose name has an eyebrow and anyone whose sense of humor I just tormented).
For $5,000.00, I’m pretty sure I could buy each family a cow and have it butchered and I'm sure Margaritas will get them mingling easier than a "mini cake". I was tempted to tell her “No thanks. We’re sorry, but even though your price is right we are looking for something a little more casual”. My conscience (Dan) got the better of me. I just told her "Thanks for your time blah blah blah." Perhaps I wasn't clear enough when I described this dinner as "very small, informal, quiet, low key, simple, convenient, relaxed and uncomplicated". I thought those were all polite code for "we'd just like to do something a little nicer than throwing frozen pizzas in".
*more on this in future posts
Thing Three: Dan discovered a new kid’s website MooseAir it has some really cute songs. These sites are really few and far between if you have a toddler so I thought I’d share a list of ones we frequent. Some aren’t specifically for kids but Ella loves them and asks for them anyway. They are in order of importance to Ella. Enjoy.
1. Noggin – The cable station with all our favorite shows including Move to the Music which is Laurie Berkner videos and Lisa Loeb videos and Dan Zanes videos (I have to tell you if you are sick of “The Farmer in the Dell” give it a listen). There’s Play With Me Sesame Ella calls this one “Ernie game game” and I think watching Grover dance is fun. And of course the all important Oobie’s Letter Game, it’s nice and short, “three stars you win!”
2. Monster Jam – aka Elmo Dance (Ella freaked when she heard the same song on the Grammys the other night)
3. Singing Horsies – Ella can sing each part, this is one of my favorites
4. Boobah at PBS Kids – Has lots of things to click on, but the Boobah dance is what she loves.
5. BBC Pre-School – Includes all kinds of stuff Ella can hit the “space” key to play like Teletubbies “More than one”, I enjoy the “Little Animals Activity Center” it has a funny tune.
6. Playhouse Disney – Yeah, yeah, “Jojo’s Circus” and “Rollie Pollie Ollie Band ” and all that other hoopla
The following sites don’t really get asked for by Ella, but sometimes one can only handle so many Ernie game games.
7. Afro Twister – a freaky frog with a fro dances to a funky beat
8. Create a band – where we always name Ella’s band “The Puny Petes”
9. Lil’ Fingers – Storybooks for toddlers read by someone else, you just click. “Time for Potty” is worth a click just for the weirdness factor
10. Charlie & Lola – I just love them
11. Super Fun – When Ella wants to just scribble the mouse around this is fun
12. Lovin’ Your Momma – Totally catchy disco tune with video
13. Happy Happy Joy Joy – from Ren and Stimpy but actually sung by anime characters
14. Sesame Street Workshop - Has Sesame Street Radio (takes me back, I actually heard “Disco Disco Duck” sung by Ernie the other day)
15. Pancake Mountain – I think I’ll be ordering these DVDs soon.
8 comments:
I think it's really sweet that you're renewing your vows. Surely there's a caterer somewhere in Vegas that can feed you and your friends for less than $5000.00.
Charlie & Lola are too cute! Boobah just freaks me out.
I'm with my sis on the boobah thing, that thing's just way creepy. I felt/feel the same way about telletubbies and firbies, too, though lol.
I've recently started really reviewing the children's shows on TV, mostly Noggin. While some of the shows, like Oobi and Maisy, move slowly and calmly, I've noticed shows like Play with Me Sesame and Lazy Town are a kaleidoscope of color and activity. Right now I'm choosing to keep Parker away from the faster paced shows because they seem to almost hypnotise him which scares me a little. He should want to explore and play and learn through playing, not sit and stare and have his imagination entertained FOR him while his brain is being bombarded with flashing lights and colors. Most of the time we just keep it on the classical music channel though. Our particular cable company even puts up interesting trivia tidbits about the composer, the conductor, the musician(s), etc. while playing the pieces which I think is kind of cool
JJ
Oobie is huge at our house right now. I made a couple of little Oobie-eye rings out of pipe cleaners and pom-poms and Ella plays Oobie all the time.
Lazy Town is a little freaky to me.
I don't think I'm educated in this subject enough to acutally comment here. I do know when we go to Jenny's house, the singing horses are my favorite.
Yeah any time people with plastic hair talk to plastic muppits reminds you of a bad trip when you've never even DONE a psychedelic drug it can't be a good thing.
JJ
For those of you who don't watch day time kids shows, mighty mouse mom is refering to the show Lazy Town.
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