Call me crazy but I decided to open a children consignment store with a dear friend of mine. Pixie Dust opened the beginning of June.
Here we are with the Mayor celebrating our ribbon cutting on July 20th.
I would have thought of this myself if it weren't for the fact that I can't think straight with a full bladder!
2 medium sweet potatoes (about 1 pound), peeled and cut into ¾ inch cubes
4 T vegetable oil
¼ tsp. red-pepper flakes
coarse salt and ground pepper (to taste)
2 T fresh lime juice (from 1 lime)
1 can (15 oz.) black beans (rinsed and drained)
½ medium red onion, finely chopped
½ cup chopped fresh cilantro
- place sweet potatoes in roasting pan
- toss with 2 T of the vegetable oil, red pepper flake, season with salt and pepper
- roast on lover oven rack at 450 for 25 to 35 minutes, tossing once during cooking.
- wisk lime juice with remaining 2T vegetable oil
- season with salt and pepper
- add sweet potatoes, beans, onion and cilantro
- enjoy!
Several of the moms said I should package up the party and sell it. I’m of course happy to share it free of charge (donations gladly accepted).
INVITATIONS: I made the invites (as I usually do) from plain white paper glued to scrapbooking paper, decorated with stickers to match the theme; for this party I used party balloons. The invitation reads: “You’ve got an appointment at M’s Birthday SPArty! Services to include: pedicure, facial & hair beading. Please call to confirm your appointment.
This party requires assistance! I never could have painted all those toes alone. Cherry’s Day Spa and Salon doesn’t operate without her crew; Taffi, Bubbles and Lola.
Cherry set up the living room as a relaxation area, complete with Yoga Kids, Silly to Calm playing on the TV and magazines (American Girl, Discover Girls and Yoga Journal) for the girls to read while they were chilling in-between services.
When each child arrived at Cherry’s Day Spa and Salon, they are asked to write their name on a mailing address sticker and place it on a drawstring backpack (purchased from Oriental Trading Company). The backpack served as the goody bag; as the child received her services and completed her crafts, she placed her items in her backpack to take home.
SERVICES: Each child received a facial (by Taffi), a pedicure (by Bubbles) and hair beading (by Lola).
FACIAL: Cherry purchased a variety of colored hairbands for the girls to choose from and keep. Each girl choose either a cooling cucumber peel off mask or a firming mineral clay mask. Of course the experience would not be complete without a cool cucumber on each eye while their mask and pedicure were drying.
PEDICURE: Everything that was used on the girls they got to put in their backpacks to take home. Cherry found some funky colored emery boards and some fruit scented ones too. She also purchased the really small (and cute) bonbon nail polishes; each girl picked her color to be applied at the party (she gets to take it home too!). Cherry also found super cute flip flops with flowers and sequins at the dollar store for the girls to wear after their toes were done. Nail art stickers were also applied to the girl’s finger nails.
HAIR BEADING: Cherry’s Salon uses the Girl Crush Magic Hair Beader by Spinmaster that M received a while ago as a gift. She has been totally unable to purchase replacement beads for it, but we really wanted hair beading for the SPArty so she picked a bunch up of pony bead from the craft store and used clear plastic hair ties instead of the special clip beads that came with the Magic Hair Beader. Lola did a great job of making all the girls look fab!
CRAFTS: Cherry created and assisted the girls with two crafts at the party; glitter hair gel (super simple) and custom bath salts (a little more assistance required for seven year olds). Instruction sheets for the crafts were put together just like the invitation, plain white paper glued to scapbooking paper, so the girls would know how to complete the craft. (At this age, verbal instruction and hand-holding is very much required.)
GAME: Dad was a real sport and I owe him big-time. We played a game that’s a variation of pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey. I like to call it, put-the-lipstick-on-the-dad. (When I explained the game to M, I told her that Dad would do it for her because he loved her so much. She said if he didn’t want to do it, she would pay him 5 bucks!) Each girl was blindfolded and armed with a tube of lipstick. The goal, of course, is to get it somewhere near dad’s lips. (This is a photo-op not to be missed.) Since there is no real “winner” in this type of game, each girl received a flavored lip gloss and a bath puff just for playing.
FOOD: Cherry choose to serve simple and nutritious “spa food”; fruit salad, tuna fish tea sandwiches, bread sticks, water with lemon slices or cucumber slices, fresh brewed iced tea and the Barefoot Contessa’s herbal iced tea (which we always make for parties and re-name for the occasion; i.e. spa tea, fairy tea).
Cherry likes to serve cupcakes at her spa. She chose yellow cake with raspberry icing. (A box of Jell-O mixed into vanilla icing will both color and favor white icing.)
The party was a huge success. Before and after photos were also taken of each child so I have photographic evidence that each of the girls had a great time and are sure to return to Cherry’s Day Spa and Salon very soon.
Cost of the party: under $200.00
One happy birthday girl: priceless
HERBAL ICED TEA
4 Celestial Seasonings Lemon Zinger Tea
4 Celestial Seasonings Red Zinger Tea
4 cups apple juice
Steep the 8 tea bags in 4 cups of hot water for 10 minutes.
Discard tea bags.
Combine the tea with the apple juice and refrigerate until cold.
Serve over ice.
CUSTOM BATH SALTS RECIPE
(Each Ziploc bag was labeled with a large mailing address sticker that had a place for her name and a list of all the essential oil that I had available for them. I also provided a guide to the essential oils that explained to properties of the oil so they could make informed selections.)
Measure all three ingredients for the bath salt base into the Ziploc bag.
1/2 cup Epsom Salts
1/3 cup Baking Soda
1/4 cup Sea Salt
Add 5 drops (no more than 5 in total) of the essential oils you’ve selected into the Ziploc bag.
Be sure to write your name on your bag and mark which oils you’ve added.
Close Ziploc bag and massage to distribute the oils evenly.
GLITTER HAIR GEL INSTRUCTIONS
Fill bottle half full with hair gel.
Add approximately 1 teaspoon of glitter.
Replace cap and shake like a mad woman.
Remove cap and add more hair gel until nearly full.
Replace cap and shake again.
What is Angel Food? Angel Food is a way to get quality food at big discount. For $25.00 you get enough food to feed a family of four for one week or a senior citizen for one month. You can purchase as many $ 25.00 basic units as you want. If you purchase the $25.00 basic unit, you can also purchase specialty boxes (which are usually meat units such as a chicken or a beef). Specialty boxes cost about $18.00 or so.
There is one order day and one pick-up day per month. Just order by mail or online and pick up at the designated site. (They take major credit cards and you can pay via PayPal.)
I’ve just placed my first order so I don’t have any feedback on the food, but my friends have and they’ve been pleased. They report that the meats are of good quality and the frozen vegetables are name brand (like Bird’s Eye).
For a “city” of only 5,000 citizens, we have quite an interesting cast of characters. By “characters” I’m not just referring to Avery, the homeless guy with 23 dogs that plants plastic flowers in front of the Sheetz. I’ve made friends with an air marshal (his wife is a psychologist), a husband & wife archeology team and a soon-to-be-famous architect, and that’s just the A’s.
Anyway, I was reading our local paper this week and discovered another A, an artist. Tom Engeman also calls Brunswick home. “Who is Tom Engeman,” you ask? He has designed 18 postage stamps, including the new forever stamp.
I love this town. I wonder who I’ll meet tomorrow!
Anyway, I just received my photos in the mail (yes I’m using actual film for this project; it helps keep me honest) and have started my album. Check it out; I’ve posted the first three rolls on Yahoo! Photos.
One of the most frustrating parts of this project is taking my daily photo and then turning my head and seeing the shot that I should have taken.
Thanks to everyone that I interviewed for my Parenting Study; I got an A on my paper. I appreciate your help so much!
