Fall Kick-Off Shindig!

Okay, peeps. 

I know I’m just a broken record in these days and months (years?!) but life is just so full and busy! I’m about a dozen posts behind, and there are so many odds and ends to share, but only 24 hours in the day.

I hope (I hope, I hope) to play catch up over the next few days and work myself in sequential order through allllll the things, but for now, there’s one I definitely don’t want to forget:

A really amazing, happy, raucous Fall Kick-off get-together we hosted last Friday night. Woohoo!

The hubby was out of town for the weekend, which is so rare, and since I knew it would feel odd without him, I decided to double down on the uniqueness of the weekend and let Chica have her gaggle of friends over for some pre-Halloween fun!

I try to do my best giving each of the kiddos a chance to have special time with their friends in whatever rotation that works.

And since Little Man had the best (and wildest, ha) bday party last weekend with his buddies, I shifted the focus to the girls for this one (though, don’t kid yourself—Little Man was also in the thick of it, despite recovering from his illness).

Chica has such a stable and solid group of friends that have remained consistent year over year—with the joy of a new addition or so over time—so it’s always the easiest thing to just let her gather the troops and bring the joy.

So far, we’ve been fortunate with really great turnout for these events, and that’s such a blessing because it’s a lot of work to put together occasions, so hitting a slew of friends all at once is golden!

I knew it would be a prime opportunity for Chicklet to have a friend over, as well (but didn’t want to do double the group fun at this time), and it was the best decision. Across the board, the gathering of a dozen kiddos under our roof was a fantastic combination.

It’s no surprise that I love a good themed get-together, and since I’m feeling the spooky spirit right now, and our giant outdoor decorations are sparking the joy, I thought it would be perfect to make it a Fall-themed thing.

I bought pumpkins and prepped them for string art decorating—a project we’ve done in the past, to great success.



I was curious as to whether the girls would actually manage to tackle the craft, as there’s always so much unstructured hang time to be had, but they totally did it!

Of course, they were upstairs, downstairs, eating, singing karaoke, having table tennis tournaments, playing laser tag and hide-and-seek and just living their best lives as well, ha, but they did always come back to the pumpkins! 



And they turned out so well!





Maybe my favorite, favorite part of the night was the pizza time.

Since the dining room and kitchen tables were both taken up with the project, everybody just hovered naturally around the island in the most natural way, and the conversation amongst the girls was priceless. Nothing brings me more joy than seeing these girls feeling at home and happy in our casa.



I ordered this stinking adorable cake for funsies (who can resist??) and it was devoured in record time. :)



The kids were nearly three hours in before they even managed to settle for the movie they’d planned to watch, and it tickled me endlessly to see that this group of teen girls happily chose Inside Out 2 and cheered and hollered and snuggled…for the whole twenty minutes they managed before parents started showing up, ha.

I really, really wish I could bottle up the sounds and the vibes and the happiness of these sorts of hang-outs. 

It’s absolutely worth all the prep and planning to enable the togetherness time and memories-in-the-making.

And, honestly, there wasn’t too much to clean up afterwards. Victory!

So…all in all, a most excellent way to keep ourselves distracted on one of the evenings the hubby was away. But, man, was I glad when he made it home!

Okay…many, many posts to come in the next few days (fingers crossed). Until then…

Happy Tuesday, peeps!

Over and out.