Getting ready for a puppy party

I'm kind of a slacker in the birthday party department. We normally just do a cake and ice cream and invite family over. One year we let Brendan invite a few friends but even still didn't really do a theme. I was feeling a little on top of things awhile ago and decided Tori could have a birthday party this year. We were talking about themes and she decided she wanted a dog birthday party.

Luckily, my close friend Julie had thrown her dog birthday party for her daughter about 6 years ago so she was full of ideas and helpful hints. She also loves to plan birthday parties. She helped me make the invitations and gave me an article from a magazine with some different ideas and showed me pictures from her daughter's party. I had all kinds of grand ideas.

But now the party is just two days away. I'm slowly dwindling the list of ideas down. Some just seem too impractical and some would take way too much effort then I want to expend on this. I am learning that I am the type of person who would rather just buy something or pay someone else to do it for me than to actually do the work, at least with birthday parties. I wanted to find some puppy ear headbands. I know many would think, "Oh, easy - just buy some plastic headbands and some faux fur material, cut and hot glue them on." I saw them on a website and thought, "Fantastic! For just this much money, I just enter all my info in and it will be shipped here in a week." I don't know if I will always be like this or if I'll get more daring as the twins get older.

So, Friday night our living room will become a kennel. Each child will have their face painted and play some "doggy" games. There will hopefully be a cake that resembles a dog (wish my sister-in-law Maryann could be here to help with that!) and some fun doggy treats. I don't want to give it all away before the party! I think it will be a lot of fun and will be a birthday she'll remember. And if I don't drive myself crazy trying to do too much, maybe we'll do another one someday.