The Final Countdown

I had kept the party a secret for what seemed like FOREVER. I had even chosen NOT to tell my kids. I didn't want to burden them with keeping the secret and also feared that something might slip out. (I was having a hard enough time myself. I wanted to tell Jason about my day, all the things I had been doing, but couldn't.)

I had made it to the very last week of the party. So far so good, on the secret UNTIL....

Monday, Amber asked Rylee if she could babysit for the party on Friday. Rylee said, "What party?" Oops, now Rylee knew, but I still felt ok about it. I thought that out of anyone, she would be the one I could trust the most.

Tuesday, Abree caught me paint-splattering the sheets in the back yard. She asked, "What are you doing that for?" I played dumb and said something vague. Then she said, "Are they for Dad's 80's party?" What? How did she know about that? When I asked her what she was talking about she said, "Oh yeah, Shhhhhh, it's a secret." I was hoping she was a trust-worthy secret keeper. She had actually seen the most and hadn't said much up to this point, so I crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.

Wednesday, Treyson found a leather jacket (for an 80's costume) and brought it into Jason and I. He asked, "Did Grandpa Waite leave his jacket here?" It caught me so off-guard, that I didn't respond very well. I got upset and said, "Go put that away! Why are you getting into stuff?!" --Later I realized I should have just went with the Grandpa Waite story and acted normal. -- I said to Treyson, "If you seen anything out of place or something that seems weird, don't say anything! There is a surprise and I will tell you about it later."

Thursday, I had the kids do their Saturday chores after school (because we had company coming and because I knew we would be busy during the weekend). They questioned it at first, but I continued with the vague answers and promised to tell them why later. That evening, right in front of Jason Taylee said, "I know you're making us do chores... because Krissi is coming!" Jason didn't act like he had heard her, so I pulled her aside and let her in on the surprise and swore her to secrecy.

That night, Treyson came into our bedroom for scripture and prayer. He said, "Mom, so what's this surprise you keep talking about? Tell me what it is, please?" I saw the look on Rylee's face and the glances between the girls, but this time I kept my cool and said, "Oh, you want a treat?" (always a good distraction for Treyson). Yes, of course he wanted a treat. So I gave them all a treat under the pretense of having done their chores. Whew, secret still intact.

Friday, the day of the party, we had people coming in from out-of-town. Krissi and Steve hung out with me during the day and then I dropped them off at the Stoker's home.

Some of Jason's family were staying in a hotel , but my sister-in-law and 2 nieces were to stay with us, that night (after Jason knew what was going on). Somehow we had to figure out how Catie (niece) was going to be at our house, while her mom was at the party. We made a plan for Catie to come over BEFORE Jason got home from work. She was instructed to "hide" upstairs. I told my kids to act "normal". I also told the girls to hide Catie in their bedroom, because Jason wouldn't have a reason to go in there, before going to his X-box party. Somehow the lines of communication were crossed and the "bedroom hideout" was not received, so Catie was sitting in the family room watching a movie, when Jason came in to get his X-box packed up for the night.

Catie said, "I saw him coming and thought, 'If he doesn't turn on the light, I think I'll be ok..and then he turned on the light!'" He commented on the movie she was watching and then turned to get his X-box gathered. As his back was to her, she slipped out of the room.

Abree came down to me panicked, "Mom, dad saw Catie Jo!!!" What?!! I was so bummed that the secret had been kept for so long, but now had been blown an hour before the party. Oh well. What could I do about it now? I waited to hear from Jason. If he had seen Catie, I thought he'd come down and ask me what was going on. I never heard from him.

Finally, I went upstairs and found Catie and Rylee talking in her room. I said, "Did he see you or not?" Catie looked at me and shrugged, "I thought he saw me. He looked right at me and asked about the movie I was watching, but then I snuck out."

Hmmmm. Maybe the cover hadn't been blown after all? Time would tell.

We all went about things as normally as possible. We ate dinner, I curled my hair and got ready, Jason kept gathering his stuff and puttering around.

Finally, it was close to time and Jason was ready to go. I made one last-ditch effort to delay just a few more minutes, by going into the bathroom. (I had received some calls asking about the address or directions. I wanted to make sure everyone had, enough time to gather and that we would arrive at a good time.)

I called Krissi to let her know that we were on our way. I got her voice mail and left a dumb message. She called me back, as Jason and I were driving to the Stoker's. She asked me to give her a code word, like "2 minutes" or "2 miles away". I couldn't think of anything good to say, so I just kept saying "two". Our conversation had to have sounded weird. When I hung up, Jason asked, "Who was that?" "Krissi." "What did she want?" I said, "She was telling me about a sale on chicken nuggets at Costco" (because she had, earlier in the day). He probably thought I was acting weird, but dismissed it.

We pulled up to the Stoker's home. I had Jason park in the driveway because I would be there "just for a minute, while I picked up Marianne for the movie". We walked up to the door and rang the bell. Brek answered and said, "Hi Jason! Are you ready?".......

"SURPRISE!"

The rest of the story......
What we found out later, was that as soon as Catie snuck out, Taylee slid into her place on the couch and continued talking to Jason as if she were there the whole time. SNEAKY!

Jason said that if he would have thought about it, he had just seen Taylee on the computer downstairs, so how could she have also been on the couch upstairs? He WASN'T thinking about it... just the X-box party he was about to go to. He totally thought that it was Taylee on the couch the whole time. :)

The Set Up

The day of the party finally arrived. The Goodmansen's, our good friends from Northern Idaho, flew in to be a part of the surprise. I picked them up from the airport and then we headed over to Marianne's house to set up and decorate.

I needed Krissi and Marianne to help me implement my decorating ideas (I was a bit scatter-brained) and I needed Steve to do some of the technical set up. Steve set up the Atari and got the speakers connected to the CD player. He also helped with some of the decorating, was drug around for last-minute errands and just hung out when there was nothing else to do. He was such a good sport. Thanks Steve! Jason's Letterman's jacket hung on the wall along with old photos from jr. high and high school.
We also created a "Wall of Shame" to put guest's 80's photos on.

Abree and Emylie "helped" by dancing to the 80's music and playing together nicely.

We put up 80's paraphernalia everywhere; Cabbage Patch Kids, old records, My Little Pony, Transformers, Strawberry Shortcakes, Smurfs, Care Bears, etc.

We put signs everywhere that had 80's sayings on them.

"Like, do you totally remember saying some of these?"

This is an original Care Bear from the 80's. Abree calls it the weird Care Bear.

Here's one of my paint-splattered sheets in action. Looks totally 80's, right?

We also used one of these sheets as a backdrop for our 80's Polaroid photos.

Here's Jason's poster. We put a Sharpie next to it and had people sign it.

"Stay cool Dude!"

We played a Jeopardy-style game answering 80's trivia and questions about Jason.

Here's the old Atari system Steve set up in the corner. When suggested we put it on a table Steve said, "What? Atari was never played on a table.....always on the floor." See how much I know about it?

We set out the candy and the dishes for the food.
I made little signs for some of the candy. Jason LOVES trivia tidbits and I thought some of these candy facts were interesting...

Gummi Bear- The original creator of the gummi bear, or Gummibar, meaning "rubber bear" was a German man named Hans Riegel. He was born in 1893 in Friesdorf, a village near Bonn, Germany. In December 1920, at age 27, he decided to enter the candy market himself by starting his own candy company Hans decided to name his company Haribo. The"ha" came from Hans, the "ri" came from Ridgel, and "bo " came from Bonn. Haribo went on to manufacture the first American made gummi candy in 1982.

Big League Chew- In 1980, while sitting in a bullpen one night, pitcher Rob Nelson and former NY Yankee all-star Jim Bouton came up with the idea for something different and fun to chew -shredded bubble gum in a pouch. Bouton approached Amurol Confections only to discover that they had already been developing such a product. Nelson suggested the name "Big League Chew".

Pop Rocks- Thoroughly tested and found innocuous, the exploding candy still started people. The Food and Drug Administration arranged a telephone hotline to assure anxious parents that the popping candy would not cause children to choke or that mixing the candy with carbonated drinks wouldn't cause the stomach to explode. According to playground lore, the cute kid who achieved fame in the LIFE cereal commercials had died of this.

General Foods was battling "exploded kid" rumors as early as 1979; a mere 4 years after the product went to market. They took out full-page ads in 45 major publications, wrote some 50 thousand letters to school principals around the county and sent the confections inventor on the road to explain to all that Pop Rocks generate less gas than half a can of soda and ingesting them could induce nothing worse in the human body than a hearty, not-life-threatening belch. Despite all these measures, the rumors of the urban legend abounds even to this day.

Around 1983, pressure became too much and Pop Rocks were taken off the market. What is less known is that Kraft bought the rights to the product from General Foods in 1985 and then marketed it as "action candy" through a company named Carbonated Candy.

Pop Rocks are now back out in the open and are again marketed under their original name.

Nerds/Runts- Nerds were first created and launched in 1983 by Angelo Fraggos. Nerds became the "candy of the year" in 1985. Angelo Fraggos was also responsible for the creation of Runts in 1985.

Jelly Bellys- Jelly Belly Candy Company is based in Fairfield, California. They're best known for their gourmet jelly beans available in 50 official flavors.

Extra production was needed after Ronald Regan began his run for presidency in 1980. During the campaign Regan was photographed eating Jelly Bellys and he told how he maintained a fondness for jelly beans even after he quit smoking. Some 7,000 pounds of Jelly Bellys were reportedly sold and consumed during his 1981 inaugural ceremonies. The candies were made available at cabinet meetings and offered to visiting foreign dignitaries, ensuing ongoing publicity for the brand.

In 1983, President Regan even sent Jelly Bellys as a surprise gift for the astronauts on the Challenger space shuttle mission.

I worked on signs for prizes. I printed out 80's hair photos, old t.v. character's and old movie posters and put them on labels for our 4 different prize categories. We had prizes for:

-Best Hair

(aerosol hairspray, styling mousse and a big round-handled comb)

-Looks most like 80's Photo

(Rubik's cube)

-Most likely to be voted 80's Prom King/Queen

(Rubik's cube)

-Best Overall 80's Look
(New Cabbage Patch Kids doll)

When all the decorations were in place and all the the last-minute errands had been run, I went home to act normal. After Jason got home from work, ate dinner and got ready, we finally headed toward the Stoker's.

The Set Up- Brek (Marianne's husband) called Jason up a few days a head of time and asked him if he wanted to come over for an X-box party. Jason had been to the Stoker's for X-box parties before, so this was nothing out of the ordinary. I also told him that Marianne and I would like to go to a movie, so I would ride over there with him to "pick Marianne up for the movie". Jason was kind enough to find out movie times and tell me all about the movies that were playing, to help Marianne and I choose. :) ---I was hoping he wouldn't be disappointed that he wasn't really going to be playing X-box that night..... he wasn't.

Heart Break

Taking a little break from all the birthday posts (yes, there are more!), to bring you heart happenings.... Valentine's Day stuff.

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FHE

For FHE we talked about kindness, by word and action. We challenged our family to treat each other with kindness and to notice when others treated us with kindness. --As we did kind things or had kindness given to us, we wrote it down on slips of paper and put it in our "Love Bucket". Our goal was to fill the bucket before the week ended. We reached our goal and the "Love Bucket" overflowed with kindness. The next week, we read all the kind acts and shared a treat too.

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Pre-school Valentine's Day Party

The plan:

Heart worksheet

Lacing hearts

Heart leis

Dancing

"Candyland" game

Cookie decorating

and a Valentine exchange.

Abree concentrates on getting her heart lei just right.

Andi models the finished product.

The girls actually really enjoyed lacing these hearts, but were not that interested in learning how to tie. Too hard and frustrating for right now.

Yum?

Emylie says YES!

The girls decorated these little mailboxes the day before. Toward the end of our party, they delivered their Valentines to each friend's mailbox. They were SO excited! Our mailboxes were so full of LOVE the lids wouldn't fit, so we put them in bags and they took them home to open.

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School Classmate Valentines

Most of my kids are satisfied with store-bought Valentines.......

except for Taylee.

Taylee prefers to make Valentines for her school classmates from scratch. (She's not demanding, just very excited about it each year, so I indulge her and we come up with something original... or more likely, something I've seen in a magazine or blog. )

Here is what we came up with this year.

"Valentine You & I Are A Perfect Match"

And for the teachers, we made bigger ones, with the candy cane hearts I melted a few weeks back.

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Valentine's Day Swap

I participated in another swap. This time with a Valentine's Day theme.

"I'm FORTUNATE to have you Valentine" -Chocolate-dipped and sprinkled fortune cookies

"We make a great PAIR Valentine" -Cute knee-high Valentine socks

"Valentine STICK with me" -Homemade pin cushion with Shrinky Dink pins

"Valentine you're SWEET" -Box of chocolates

"Valentine we're a perfect MATCH" -Homemade match book with candy cane heart

"Valentine you're the BOMB" -Bath bomb

"I hope U-NO how much I like you Valentine" -Mini Uno game cards

I also sent a "Love Pillow". A "Love Pillow" is a simple tradition of family service. When you find the pillow on your bed, a service has been done for you. Next, it's your turn to do a service for a family member. (You have 24 hours or less to do it in.) As the pillow makes it's way from one bed to the next, hopefully love abounds and service is done with a smile. :)

Hope you had a HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!!

Party Favors

I wanted our guests to bring a little of the 80's home with them, in the form of a party favor.

I put together favor bags filled with candy that I remember from my 80's childhood. I also had a variety of candy on the food table that were first introduced in the 80's. Remember; Gummi Bears, Jelly Belly's, Runts, Nerds, Pop Rocks, Reese Pieces, Cry Baby gum, Fun Dips, Big League Chew bubble gum, Blow Pops and Tootsie Pops?

How many licks DID it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop?

The other favor guests could take home with them were these 80's music CD's.

I posted a want ad on Craigslist. I was looking for 80's music mixes. A nice man named Cory, who lived in Nampa, answered my ad. He said he had over 3,100 music CD's and would be willing to make me an 80's mix and burn me as many copies as I wanted. He said he'd only charge 1 CD per CD burned. What??! That seemed like a great deal to me and I told him I'd like to also give him some cash for his trouble.

Cory was QUICK and efficient. He had 2 different CD's (x 26) burned and ready for me within a day!

I put Jason's AWESOME 80's band photo on the label and they were set to go.

Poster

Next on my list of party details, was getting a poster made. I went through many old photos of Jason, trying to decide which one would best show his "eightiness" and may be even a little embarrassing.

Many of these were too cute.


Any one of these would do!
But this one seemed perfect for the poster!


Gotta love the "Q-tip" hair-do, older-style glasses and white pants.
I had Costco blow it up to poster size 20"x 30". At the party, we put a Sharpie next to it for people to sign.


"Stay Cool Dude!"

Third Time

Is the third time really a charm? Not in this case.

I had this great idea....actually it was more than great, it was an AWESOME idea! I wanted to make a Rubik's cube cake for the party. I thought about it and planned it, weeks in advance. --As part of my preparation, I watch a lot of Food Network and TLC, especially the cake challenges. I had to get myself psyched up and ready to take on my own cake challenge. (Ok, I would watch those shows any way, but I really do think it helped.)

Weeks in advance, I baked several square layer cakes, wrapped them in wax paper and tinfoil and secretly put them in the freezer for a later date. --My family was curious about the foil-wrapped squares. When asked about them, I played dumb again.

Next, I had decided that sugar cookies would make perfect "buttons" for the Rubik's cube. I researched and found what I thought would be a good recipe. I needed a cookie that would hold it's shape, as it was baking. Blob buttons wouldn't cut it.

First attempt. The recipe called for vanilla and almond extract. I added the vanilla but didn't have any almond extract on hand, so I added the next best thing.... butter extract. NOT! The cookies tasted like homemade salty play-dough. Yuck! BUT... they did hold they're shape quite nicely.

Second attempt. I had wasted so much time with the first batch, with the second I went the easy route... pre-package, store-bought sugar cookie dough mix. This time they tasted really good, BUT they didn't look so good... blob-like.


Third attempt. I made up a triple batch of the first mentioned recipe. This time I added the almond flavoring as it suggested. It was better, but not that sweet. Oh no, could this be another fail???

I rolled and measured and cut and spatula-ed (nice word, eh?)the little squares onto the cookie sheet. Although the 3 attempts had been spread out throughout two weeks, I was starting to feel exhausted. I thought this cake could be so cool if it all worked out. I crossed my fingers again.

The last cookies came out pretty good. They weren't as sweet as I was used to, but after adding the royal icing, they tasted pretty good.

I also made Pac-man shapes and ghosts. The small Pac-mans went on cupcakes and the others were for snacking on at the party.

**Side note-I think I've figured out how they make those candy buttons. You know those little candies on the paper backing. Using thinned royal icing, you can make your own homemade version. Look what I found when I moved the cooling racks... candy buttons.

The day of the party finally arrived. We had decorated the Stoker's house and I was ready to put together my awesome Rubik's cube cake. I was happy with the shape I was able to get...fairly squared, but I was disappointed with the color. I frosted it with chocolate and then had a black food coloring spray that I thought would make the frosting black. It didn't, only a darker brown.

Next, it was time to put the cookie buttons on. We started puting them on.... they weren't fitting.... they were TOO big! Grrrrr. My awesome Rubik's cube cake was not meant to be.
We pulled off the buttons and set them aside to be eaten as cookies. Big bummer.

Costco... here we come!