One thing I’ve never really understood about kid’s birthday parties is why some parents feel like they need to spend a large amount of time, energy and money to make it fun. 

I feel like I LIVE in a circus…and certainly when you invite extra children to the party (which of course is what makes a party a party)…it becomes even more of a circus…therefore I’ve never felt the need to spend a lot of money to bring more circus to the circus. 

This weekend we’ll be celebrating Asa’s 11th birthday <gulp>…and he’s invited several boys for a sleep-over.  All the boys are SO excited (in fact…I’ve heard nothing but birthday talk now for the last few hundred hours)!!  The excitement comes simply because we’re having a bunch of friends over.  Nothing else.  We aren’t doing anything big or extravagant. 

We’ll have a nice “Junk Food Buffet” for dinner…birthday cheesecake…and shaved ice.  And the kids will run around like crazy in and out of the house doing all of the things boys like to do.  And that’s it. 

I love it that it doesn’t take lots of money to make my kids happy on their birthdays!

But aaaagh…..it just occured to me what I’m writing about!  My house is going to be filled with not only my boys…but six extra 11-13 year old boys!!!  I think I’d better start airing the house out now and lighting some scented candles…

(Oh you know I love it!)

Need some frugal ideas?  Check in with Biblical Womanhood for Frugal Fridays.

Our local Farmer’s Market opens tonight!!!

Every Thursday night now for the rest of the summer…that’s where we’ll be!  I’m SO excited!

I NEED a fresh strawberry.  Really badly.

And…along with purchasing lots of fresh, local, very good for us fruits and veggies…we’ll be setting up shop downtown right along with the other venders!

When we purchased our Shaved Ice Machine, one of our intentions was to take it to the Farmer’s Market each week. 

(Side note:  Our original plan to open up our “Shaved Ice Shack” on June 1 has been post-poned to June 13…due to all kinds of fun licensing and technicality issues.  I’ll share more about that adventure soon!)

Soooooo…we’ve got our ice ready and our juices ready and our cups and spoons ready…and we’re very excited to sell shaved ice tonight! 

AND…we decided that since we’re going to be set up with a booth at the Farmer’s Market anyway…we might as well bake some things to sell there too.   (I had sold baked goods there a few years ago…and it went very well.)

So, today…I’m baking like crazy (which is one of my very favorite things in the world to do)!

I’m making my pretzels (although I’m using white flour and sugar, because it’s not always easy to get my wheat or honey these days…and I’m hoarding it to feed to my own family), applesauce bread, giant chocolate chip cookies, flourless peanut butter cookies and chocolate chip brownies (again with the white stuff). 

Baking is very theraputic for me…therefore I will undergo much therapy today and be calm and cool as a cucumber by tonight’s market when I get to eat my fresh strawberry.  Ahhh……

What kinds of crazy things do YOU do for therapy?

*UPDATE*   Just about the time my therapy session ended (except for the wash all the dishes when you’re done with therapy part)…we got an email letting us know that because of the threat of very horrible weather…the Farmer’s Market will be cancelled for the evening.  Grrr.  Better safe than sorry though, of course.

Well…looks like for dinner tonight we’ll have Pretzels and Brownies with a side of Cookies.  Anyone want to join us?