Turning Eight Is Great

For her birthday party this year Emma wanted to have a Charlie and the Chocolate Factory party, and wanted to actually watch the movie during her party.  Well, since that is just about as easy as it gets as far as planning is concerned, I had no problems with this.

Invitations

After some online inspiration, these golden tickets were inside the invitations.

The girls arrived (because Emma wanted a girls only party this year), and first had to guess how many pieces of candy were in a couple different dishes (the winners were announced at the end).  When everyone had arrived, they watched the movie.  Eric ran to pick up some pizzas, and when he got back we had an intermission for everyone to get their food and drinks.  Everyone loved the popcorn maker we borrowed from a friend, and almost everyone had at least 2 bags of popcorn.  Eric had no problem having this around for a few days.  He now says he must own one.

The table ready for drinks and food, the goody bags above, and the popcorn maker.

After the movie we did presents followed by cake.

The movie was all about chocolate and candy, so I went with this cake.  Chocolate cake with chocolate frosting, covered in mini m&ms and surrounded with Kit Kat bars.  The fact that Kit Kats are Emma's favorite candy was just a bonus!

For the rest of the time while waiting to be picked up the kids played chocolate twister (just like regular twister, but with some chocolate perks added), and other games.  At the end of the day, if the birthday girl is happy I know we did our job right, and Emma had a blast.  That's all I wanted.

In the attempt to make it feel more like a candy factory, we made some giant suckers and other large sized candies and had them all around the room.  Emma is posing with a few of her favorite giant suckers.

Renaissance Fair

We went to the Renaissance Fair again this year.  Not much changed from last year of course, but we still had fun.  Here are a few fair moments:

Trying her hand at archery again.

She sped up the 18 foot wall fast and with hardly any effort.  I was impressed.  

So we let her try the 24 foot wall.  As you can see, she mad it up there too!

Just taking a moment to relax.

Some Beach Fun

We went to the beach with some friends and had a ton of fun.  The beach was almost exclusively ours.  This may have had something to do with the very strong wind that day, but we decided to make the best of it and stick it out.  It was too windy for beach umbrellas, which makes this very fair-skinned-and-burns-way-too-easy mom a little worried, but I just kept putting the sunscreen on and everything was alright.  Other than my attempts to thwart sunburns, the day was very relaxing.

Packers Family Night

Okay, so if you know Emma, at all, you must know what an obsessive Green Bay Packers fan she is.  Ever since we moved here she's been this way.  Right after we moved here the Packers played the Bears to see who would move on and play in the Superbowl, which of course the Packers did, so then we saw them win the Superbowl that year too.  And I think all the hype and excitement coupled with the cheesehead hats which she loved turned her into this super fan.  And she's in love with Aaron Rodgers.  She wants to marry someone with the last name of Rodgers just so she can name her son Aaron.  Yup.  Die hard.

She will actually sit and watch an entire football game.  She'll cheer, boo, ask questions, and stay interested the entire time!  I know adults who can't or won't do that.  Myself sometimes included.  And every birthday and Christmas since we moved has included at least one item of Packers paraphernalia.  From stuffed dolls of Aaron Rodgers to shirts to dresses to hats and scarves, to cheeseheads, to nutcrackers, blankets, pajamas, and sleeping bags, she has it all.  I even made a cheesehead ornament for our Christmas tree since I didn't like any of the packer ornaments that were sold anywhere.  Yes, she bleeds green and gold.

So you can imagine her excitement when we told her we were heading to Green Bay for the Packer Family Night.  She was beyond excited.  We had never even been there to see the stadium, let alone go inside.  She looked like this the entire ride there:

We caravanned up with some friends who were also going so we could park by each other and tailgate.  We found out later that we knew several people who went.  Next year maybe we'll all coordinate more so we can hangout.



We got tattoos of course.  Then on to the pro shop for some souvenirs.  I got some earrings and a necklace (and a clear bag to take stuff into the stadium later), Eric got a shirt and a hat, and Emma got some socks and a foam finger.  She's wanted a foam finger for awhile.  We also got something else to hang on our Christmas tree, although as I sit here typing this I can't remember what it is.  I guess I'll be surprised this winter!

There were some students from some college there in the atrium building the stadium out of legos.

Aren't the players cute?

In a replica of Aaron Rodgers' locker.

Ate Brats and grilled corn, some pasta salad and had some chips and cookies (the corn makes this an acceptable and healthy meal don't you know) and enjoyed the company of our friends.  Then it was time to line up to go inside.  We made our way to the gate closest to where our seats were, and were herded inside along with everyone else.  We had some great seats!  And that was just lucky, because you couldn't choose where your seats were.

Enjoying some down time while we got dinner ready.

Our view.  Pretty good huh?  This picture is a little out of order, obviously, as the night lights are on.

Emma was thrilled every moment we were there.  And then when the team finally came out and she saw Aaron Rodgers - well, we could have gone home right then and she would have been satisfied.  We decided to stay though and watch the team warm up and play some scrimmage and have some kicking contests etc.  The fireworks at the end were a nice touch too.

She wanted to wear as much Packer stuff as she could in this picture, which is why she's wearing both her hat and her cheesehead, along with her hoodie around her waste.  Goodness!

I think the most shocking/amazing part of the day was when we were leaving (along with the other 63,000 people) and were trying to make our way out of the parking lot and to the freeway.  EVERYONE was taking their turn, and I didn't hear a single car horn.  Packer fans are the best!  At least my experience is that they are extremely polite.  Maybe things at an actual game would be different...against Bears fans or something...