Favorite Finger Foods

Madison will be exactly 15 months in 4 days. She is a full blown toddler...ohhhhmigoodness!  She runs around the house like a total lunatic running into everything, literally CLIMBING the oven to get to the stove.  It's absolutely redonkulous.  I cannot take my eyes off of her for one second or else she'll be ears deep in dish soap or bubble bath or worse, ketchup that my husband has left out from dinner.  Oye!  And what do you ask gives this little tyke all her energy?  Well here you go...

1.  Sticky Rice Balls
Sticky rice can be absolutely tedious and annoying, but you can make a heck of a lot of it and keep it in the fridge for a week, so if you have multiple kids...this is a good one.  The only meat my daughter eats is beef, ground beef, steak anything red meat she'll eat it, but chicken?? oh heck no!  So what I do, like the sneaky mommy I am, is sneak it inside the sticky rice ball, and she is none the wiser! Maybe you can sneak something inside yours! 

2.   Meatballs (what's with the ball theme, yikes!)
Like I said before my daughter will only eat red meat, its crazy!  So what I do is I make something similar to a meatloaf mix.  Ground beef (or turkey sometimes) breadcrumbs, egg, seasoning etc.  Roll them into tiny 1 inch balls and either cook them in a pan or bake them in the oven.  I think baking it easier.  Then I freeze the whole bag and pull out 5 at a time and pop them in the microwave or back on the stove for a little warm up.  They are simple, protein rich bite size nuggets perfect for my little nugget!

3.  Bite size fruits
Watermelon for instance: It is in season and absolutely delicious.  Simply prepared just cubed and served.  She will eat a whole melon if I let her!  Berries: Strawberries cut into pieces, blackberries, raspberries, blueberries - cleaned mixed and ready to eat!  Apples:  She likes to gnaw on a piece of apple because it feels good on her teeth!  She also enjoys the freeze dried pieces of apple that almost melt in her mouth. 

These are probably her top favorite snacks aside from COOKIES, which daddy gives her when mommy isn't looking.  **shakin my head**  that's why daddy will always be her favorite!

"Favorite Photo" Challenge

Perusing through my blog list this morning and I came across a photo challenge.  Yay, what a great opportunity to show a cute pic of my little Maddie! :)

Maddie turned one on the 26th of March and her birthday party was on the 25th.  After the party was over she hadn't napped at all, she had puked up her birthday cake (I think there was a little too much butter for her in that butter cream icing!) on top of that she spilled juice all of her outfit and face for that matter - therefore no longer had her cute outfit on and her rainbow face paint smeared onto her cheek giving it a bruise type appearance.  fun stuff.   I purchased a balloon bouquet for the party and I did not want them to go to waste.  i wanted to capture some shots with her and the balloons before they deflated, but that morning was just too hectic and of course I was not going to be able to take a lot of pics during the party - hell I was running like a chicken with my head cut off for 6 straight hours.  Needless to say after the party I forced Maddie to take some pics even though she wasn't in the mood and she wasn't in her original birthday attire!   But man, when she got an opportunity to play with those balloons her face just lit up and I literally melt when she smiles and laughs like that.  What a sweet heart....so here it is for your viewing pleasure! :) 

The Paper Mama Photo Challenge

Rainbow Crazy

Madison will be 1 in less than a week.  In a matter of days my darling little bugaboo baby will no longer be just that...a baby. She will take that leap into toddler hood and mommy is just now in serious panic mode.  I've jumped head first into the planning of her birthday party and haven't had time to really think about her turning the big O-N-E.  Now that I'm sitting here for a second and taking some much needed time to write a little bloggy blog entry I've come to the realization that time will never in our entire lives stand still.  Occasionally I will soak up the moment and stare into her smiling eyes and realize when she is 18 and I give her a final hug and kiss before she departs for college I will picture that very moment of her when she was 11 months old giggling in my arms - I'm tearing up just thinking about it.  God help me!!

To avoid all emotional breakdowns I will again delve into the planning on this epic event!!  I have chosen a rainbow theme for her birthday party - so exciting!! I have completed a variety of fun pinterest inspired crafts and treats. 


Madison's Birthday Tutu which looks somewhat complicated, but is incredibly easy if you have ever made a tutu in the past you would know! :) I also made a matching "wand" and birthday hat how stinking cute is that?  I also purchased some adorable rainbow leg warmers , ahh i literally cannot wait to take her 1 year pictures in this effing adorable outfit!

Now These looks odd don't they.  The eventually end up being round lollipop looking marshmallow pops.  I got the recipe for the marshmallow fluff from Martha Stewarts website.  It's not regular marshmallow fluff, but the recipe she uses to make her version of peeps! I piped the fluff onto skewers which were set on top of rainbow colored sugar strips sprinkled on parchment paper.  You can obviously see that these suckers looked a little phallic which I was not pleased with in the slighest.  Rainbow covered penises was not really what I was going for when making these for my 1 year olds birthday party!  So I took them off the skewers rolled them and put them on sucker sticks, which they ended up being super cute.  I'll have to post another picture of the final product in the future.

The last picture that I have of the treats I made are these cake pops.  I was really happy with how they turned out considering it was my first attempt.  I use funfetti cake and frosting for a fun little visual treat when you bite into them.  I went through 2 boxes of cake and made about 50 pops, which the hubs immediately consumed a handful of them so let's say less than 50! :)

In addition to all of these fun things I also made chocolate covered & rainbow sprinkled pretzels rods and oreos.  Rainbow layered sugar cookies, which was a super involved process but they really turned out quite amazingly.  The "logs" of dough are in the freezer now in preparation for baking the day of the event to maintain super freshness!  I also purchased a home use cotton candy machine for everyone to use and some rainbow popcorn too!  I'm going a little overboard on this rainbow theme, but c'mon too stinkin' cute right? I'm also going to make Trix Treats (like rice crispie treats, but using Trix cereal instead).  

I have a lot of fun activities for the older kids and the babies too.  I ordered a bounce house for toddlers age1-4 so it's pretty small but something fun for the babies to enjoy too.  I have a face painter and balloonist coming.  I purchased some rolls of art paper to tape to the floor and have tons of crayons for the kids to draw and go crazy.  I purchased a ton of bubbles and bubble wands for outdoor bubble play! And I think that's it.  

Now that I've written this all down, I'm not sure if that's enough...ahh am I going crazy?!?!  WTH- I'm seriously a psycho mommy!!  Oh well, I accept that title and wear is proudly! I might have a button made for her bday party lol

Until next time....