This blog was initially created with the intention of writing once a week. On Wednesdays. That has not happened. So, the posts are and will be completely random and this title is now meaningless. I may change it someday, but until that time, remember that Wednesday is for writing.
Of all the parties we've had, the Mary Poppins party was possibly my favorite.
I've always loved Mary Poppins and I was very excited when we drew this movie. However, I was a little concerned because I was fairly certain Jill had never seen Mary Poppins, and if she had, I was fairly certain she never sat through the entirety of Mary Poppins. I've noticed that kids' movies are getting shorter and shorter as kids' attention spans are getting shorter and shorter, but Mary Poppins is a proper, full-length feature film.
Perhaps one of the reasons I loved this particular movie night so much was the decorations. Because Mary Poppins is older and not a princess movie, I couldn't find any awesome paper crafts, so I had to get creative. The first thing I found was directions for making a chimney sweep here. Here's dad modeling our finished product:
Another thing I found, and loved, was this design:
Unfortunately, I couldn't find anything particularly awesome to do with it, so I just printed it out and put it on the table or something equally boring. However, it did give me the idea that I wanted to do something with the silhouettes of Mary and Bert over a skyline. So, I used the following images to cut the silhouettes out of black butcher paper.
Small Fry then used more of the black butcher paper to make a skyline, and we decorated the entrance!
We were very happy with the finished product! So much so that my family left it up for quite some time after the party, and when they finally took it down, Big Lil made an art project out of saving it, so now I have a permanent piece of the Mary Poppins party in my home! Didn't she do a great job of recreating the wall paper at my parents' house?
For dinner we decided to go with a classic English meal of roast beef and roasted vegetables with gravy, and Yorkshire pudding (gluten free of course). I don't know if you're familiar with Yorkshire pudding, but it was the key to making this feel like an English dinner instead of just a plain old roast. They're actually very similar to a roll, but calling them Yorkshire puddings just makes you feel British!
For dessert, we took the lead from two wonderful songs from Mary Poppins. The first was from "Jolly Holiday" (around 3:23).
"Now. then, what would be nice? We'll start with raspberry ice."
And then, of course, we had to have spoonfuls of sugar!
Although we made these in advance, it could have been fun to make them at the party when "A Spoonful of Sugar" comes on. Instead we just ate them when the song came on. In fact, we did a lot of activities during the movie! In order to combat any potential boredom in the six year olds, we had activities peppered throughout the movie.
The first came at the scene when Mary measures Jane and Michael. I secretly gathered the heights of all in attendance (even the dogs) and wrote special messages on a measuring tape for everyone. Frankly, I thought it was a little silly, but it was the biggest hit of all of the activities.
When Mary Poppins measures Jane and Michael, Michael's says "Extremely stubborn and suspicious, and Jane's says "Prone to giggling and not tidying up." Those were a little negative for my tastes, so I did one positive and one potentially negative for each person. Well, sort of. In order of height, our messages were as follows:
The husband: Sleeps a lot; surprisingly funny.
Dad: Extremely handy; grumpy after 9 p.m. (he still hasn't let us live this one down)
Big Lil: Stubborn to a fault; very clean.
Me and Mom: Mary Poppins, practically perfect in every way (we decided we were probably the same height as Mary Poppins)
Small Fry: Full of joy; rarely puts things away.
The Bean: Slightly stubborn; prone to giggle.
The BFF: Somewhat suspicious; puppy magnet.
Penelope: Very sweet; doesn't listen. (This is the Jack Russell.)
Emma: Chews on everything; too cute for her own good. (This is the Dachshund puppy.)
Big Lil seems skeptical about her measurement.
The next game we played was during "Pavement Artist" when Bert is doing chalk drawings on the sidewalk. For this, we used the leftover black butcher paper and sidewalk chalk to let the girls do their own chalk drawings.
Next up was penguin bowling! While Bert was dancing with the penguins, we did a little bowling for penguins! These penguins were made out of empty 2 liter bottles, black spray paint, multi-hued cardstock, and hot glue.
Our final activity was dancing to "Step in Time" with our chimney sweeper. Some black face markings could have been fun here.
Apparently, the Bean has enjoyed dancing to this song for a LONG time!
I currently have a list of all of the Disney posts I have yet to post. I have a list of all of the movies I still want to do parties for (even though we already went to Disney). I have a list of all of the things I need to grade. I have a list of all of the books I want to read. I have a list of the groceries I need from the store. I have a list of all of the things I want to buy that aren't immediate needs (I really want a shadow box for an art project).
I love lists of things I love: movies, music, food, a combination of all things I love, whatever. I love "to do" lists. I love shopping lists. I love handwritten lists. I love lists in the form of a paragraph or in a standard list form. I love poetry or creative writing in the form a list. I love lists.
I'm also somewhat picky about my lists. Unless the list is a creative list, it must be parallel. There must be a logical order to the list. If the list is handwritten (which it should be), it must also be perfect. That doesn't mean the handwriting must be perfect, just that it must be perfect for the list. A hurried list can have hurried handwriting.
I think it may actually be a little bit of a problem.
Surprisingly, I don't like crossing things off of lists. That makes them too messy. Instead, I have a tendency to rewrite the list. There are usually new things to add at that point anyway.
Many of my lists have a rough draft. I quickly jot down all of the things to go on the list and then neatly put them in the correct order making everything perfectly parallel. If one item is a complete sentence, they all must be complete sentences! I probably spend as much time making lists for Thanksgiving dinner as I do cooking Thanksgiving dinner. I start with a list of possible foods that must be narrowed down to something that's still way too much food. Then I make a list of all of the ingredients in all of the recipes. Then I go through my kitchen and pantry and cross off all of the things I already have. Then I rewrite the ingredient list with only the things I still need. If I have time, I put that list in order based on where the items are in the store. Then I make a timeline list. Sometimes, if I have a lot of time or a lot of grading I'm trying to avoid, I will put every single step of every single recipe into one giant timeline for the day. Most of the time I do a more generalized list: Start the turkey at this time. Peel the potatoes at this time. You have to have the ham in the oven by this time at the latest. And so forth.
I also have a tendency not to look at lists after I make them. Well, until I'm making a newer, revised version of the list or if the list contains recipes I need. They just help me organize my mind. I think. Sometimes I make a list just so I can go, "Yeah, that amount of stuff is doable. I got this." Sometimes (rarely) I actually use the list to make sure I don't forget anything. It used to be that once I wrote it down, I wouldn't forget it (hence my fondness for handwritten lists), but as I am getting older, I do actually have to glance at lists every once in a while.
Well, I'm off to make a list of all of the things I need to do instead of actually doing them!
