Brittany's Horse-themed Birthday Party

1/30/2011

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     My baby has turned eleven years old this week. Does that make me feel OLD?

     No, not yet.

     But when she turns 18, then I think I will definitely feel OLD.

     For the last couple of years, I've told the girls that I don't mind hosting a birthday party with their friends, but I won't be able to spend many hours planning their parties like I used to do when they were very young and we weren't yet educating them at home.

     Brittany wanted a horse-themed birthday party this year, so she and I planned out a few things and had fun working around the theme of horses! Here's how her birthday party went:

The Guests Arrive

Brittany invited ten of her girlfriends to come over for the birthday sleepover party, but five of them (from two separate families) were unavailable this weekend. So, five girls came over around 4 p.m. on Friday for some frolicking horse birthday fun!

The girls unloaded their sleeping bags and gear into the Paddock (girls' bedroom), and after everyone had arrived, they went out into the backyard for some outdoor horse-themed games. We were so thankful that the weather was nice this week! Brittany has always bemoaned having a January birthday with weather that doesn't cooperate for outdoor activities, so she was especially blessed to be able to do outdoor games this year.

"Horses Eating Carrots" contest!

My girls had tied carrots onto strings and had hung them from tree branches in the backyard. You should have seen the girls working as hard and fast as they could to eat the carrots! I wish I had thought to get a video of it. We laughed and laughed! They chose to do this in two groups of girls so each group could watch the other. It was a great choice!

Bobbing for Apples...

Horses love apples as well as carrots, so we decided to have fun bobbing for apples! We did it slightly different than most groups...we placed one apple at a time into the bowl, so everyone wouldn't be biting everyone else's apples. But of course, if we wanted to be even more health-conscious, we would have used a clean bowl for every child. Well, we didn't, but they still had fun!

Showjumping Obstacle Course...

I didn't get a photo of the girls taking turns doing the obstacle course, but my girls had laid out various ladders and objects to make a "jumping course" for the girls to use. They got the country music going (we only own one country music CD) and the stopwatch to time each girl as they jumped and galloped through the course. I wonder if the neighbors were wondering what in the world was going on!

Settling down and grazing...

     Okay, so I enjoy punishing myself by feeding a herd of girls a bunch of sugar. Oh, well.

     We got out the trough of Jelly Bellys and let the girls have some. I didn't have to encourage them to eat. They willingly went to the trough.

      But I did limit them some, since our pizza would be ready soon. While they waited for their pizza, I allowed them to play the Wii...something I usually don't let my girls do when we have company over. But it's a birthday, right?

Cake and Presents...

Brittany has two love languages. We jokingly call them "back rubs" and gifts. That's her. She enjoyed opening her gifts which included two Webkinz, a couple of games for the Wii, a Scrabble game for the computer, some books that she has been wanting to read, a miniature "Kit" American girl doll and her accompanying Kit books, and more. As her mama, I was thankful that she graciously and enthusiastically thanked each girl for her new gifts.

After not having any success with Kelsi's birthday cake that I had ordered in December, we decided to try the made-to-order cakes from Costco. We were pleasantly surprised! They were half the price of other cakes in town, the decorative icing was very professionally done, the filling was a nice cream filling that wasn't too sweet. I did need to make room in my refrigerator to fit the cake, but that was fine. It was even better tasting the next day, which was surprising. We did add our own horses to the sheet cake, to give it more of a personal touch.

More fun and games...

...carrying Brittany around the living room until their arms started to hurt...

...a horseshoe craft project for the girls! I found this idea online, and it was very simple to do! I found brand new horseshoes at one of our local ranch/feed stores for just a little over $1 each. I spray painted them gold with a can of paint I already had, and then the girls decorated the horseshoes with their name (using t-shirt puff paints), jewels, and plastic emblems. I think they turned out really nice!

Settling down for bed and watching a movie...

...which was even more fun to watch in our ClearPlay DVD player. The filtering on the DVD player removed several swear words, a couple of misuses of God's name, and a very small section in one scene of the movie that was slightly inappropriate. I just love using the ClearPlay, turning all movies, regardless of their rating, into rated...

Bedtime and Saturday morning...

Like most sleepovers at my house, no matter how late the girls stay up, they usually are all awake by 7:00 a.m. Fortunately, on Friday evening, they were all asleep by 11:00, if not sooner. Whew!

Breakfast seemed to be a hit with everyone. We enjoyed giant muffins...

...Mom's Oven Omelet...

This isn't a photo of our omelet. Ours contained eggs and cooked sausage, not spinach...

Recipe for Mom's Oven Omelet

Serves 4-6:
8 eggs
1 cup milk
favorite toppings, if desired: chopped onion, green onion, bell peppers, mushrooms
1 lb. cooked sausage, ham, or bacon
2 cups shredded cheese

Heat oven to 425° F. Beat eggs and milk together. Pour into greased 9x13" metal baking pan. Sprinkle cooked meats and other toppings (if desired) over egg mixture. Bake 25-30 minutes. Sprinkle with two cups shredded cheese. Place back into oven for 1-2 minutes until cheese has melted. Serve immediately.

...and fresh pineapple (the plums we bought were not quite ripe enough, but the pineapple was very sweet and juicy)! I had never cut up a pineapple before, so I turned to my America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook and read how to cut up a pineapple in there. It wasn't hard at all! The pineapple was guaranteed to be fresh and juicy, and it was.

Last but not least...

Before everyone left to go home around 10:00 a.m., the girls used graham crackers, frosting, and inexpensive wooden horses and picket fences to build their own "horse barns." Well, they weren't exactly works of art, but they had fun building!

We really enjoyed Brittany's party a lot. There was a nice number of girls with us, and my girls organized all of the games and activities except for the horseshoe craft that they did. Kelsi and Brittany also helped to organize the house and clean up things for our guests. I'm very pleased with their willingness to help things go smoothly throughout the weekend. Thank you, girls! You are a blessing to me.

Happy Birthday, Brittany!

Love,
Mom

15 Comments

Marie link

1/30/2011 12:28:56 pm

It looks like everyone had a great time. My oldest is turning 11 this year, :-( You have a lovely site. I'm doing the blogwalk and I'm now following you...hope you'll follow me :-)

Julieanne link

1/31/2011 01:41:41 am

Hi, Marie, Thank you for stopping by and saying hello! I'm trying to follow as many people in the blog walk as I can. EnJOY your day!

Lisa

1/31/2011 08:40:58 am

I loved your creative games!! Really fun! Sounds like she was blessed with some very thoughtful gifts that she'll enjoy throughout the year!

The horseshoe decorating craft was AWESOME! Very memorable!

I also thought the build yr own stable w/ graham crackers was very creative! Work of art or NOT... translates into a GOOD TIME!

Can I just say YUMMY for breakfast! I ADORE the oven backed omelette, THANKS for sharing that!

I enjoy omelettes but there are times that standing over a frying pan while multi-tasking or orchestrating children doesn't make it conducive for many breakfasts / brunches... that may just change around here :o)

Also, thanks again for ClearPlay info as we've been keeping an eye out for years not knowing where to get it!

We love your blog!

Lisa

1/31/2011 08:42:38 am

P.S. Sorry about the January birthday Brittany but so happy you were able to have outdoor games this year. The party looks like it was super duper FUN! Hope you have a blessed and fabulous 11th year! CONGRATULATIONS!

Lisa

2/1/2011 03:56:05 pm

My daughter's also wanting a horse themed party in June ... we'll see if stays the same. She's usually consistent up until the final decision and then has to review all the options again to make sure it's still #1! Hope Brittany had a lovely B'day! 11 is a fun age!

Julieanne link

2/1/2011 03:56:47 pm

She DID have a wonderful b'day party! It was probably the best organized and most fun of any of them that she's had so far! Julieanne

Lisa

2/1/2011 03:57:37 pm

That's ironic...we've been looking for the company that puts this out but couldn't remember... Am I right in thinking you pay for the DVD player and the monthly free? Does it work with any videos or only those that are in their own library?

Julieanne link

2/1/2011 03:58:23 pm

Generally, you buy the DVD player, and while they'd like you to sign up for one year at a time of filtering downloads for new release movies, you could technically sign up for one month, and then again every 3-4 months for one more month, e...tc., unless you really like to see new releases as soon as they come out on DVD. We've chosen, so far, to pay annually, but at some point in the future, we might choose to pay for a month at a time, here or there. I don't know. The ClearPlay DVD filtering works with thousands of movies that have been released in the last 10-12 years, plus a lot of other popular movies from the past. Most anything that has been released into the theaters and performed at least a little bit well usually has filtering on ClearPlay's website. ClearPlay is currently developing a newer system of filtering that will work with things like video streaming via NetFlix or some other system. The gentleman on the phone wouldn't give me the exact specifics, but I was asking him if they were going to be switching to a streaming format so we can filter movies from Netflix or something like that, and he said that their company is working on that kind of option but that it won't be fully developed right away. I was glad to hear this, because we do watch quite a bit that we stream from Netflix, and it would be really nice to filter it...although a lot of instant play movies on Netfllix aren't titles that are so popular. We'll see what happens.

Joanne

2/1/2011 03:59:00 pm

Does it chop out footage of the movie, or just block the audio of the offensive language? I still don't really understand how it works. From what you have explained, it sounds like you download the filters for whatever movies you want to wa...tch. Then can you store the downloads for future viewing?

Julieannee link

2/1/2011 03:59:49 pm

What they have done is (for the most part) very carefully clip out individual frames from a scene so that they remove the least amount possible so that the offensive material is cut out, and you are still left able to watch the movie. The fi...lters are downloaded over the internet onto a USB stick (either theirs that comes with the ClearPlay DVD player, or your own). Then, you just place the USB stick (with filters already loaded) into the DVD player and insert the DVD, and it automatically loads up the filtering for the movie and cuts out the junk that you don't want to see. For audio, like swearing, it just silences that word or phrase so you don't hear it being said. Another thing I really like about the ClearPlay is that you can adjust the DVD player to either be extremely filtered or moderately or mildly filtered. I think this is brilliant! So, we've learned to set the nudity filter to moderate. If it's at its highest setting, then it will cut out any scenes that show a woman wearing a revealing top or any cleavage. While I don't like viewing that, it would cut out too much of the movie. The moderate setting has worked well for us for nudity. We have the language/swearing setting to its highest level, so it will filter out the misuse of God's name as well as swearing. We've set the violence level at its lowest or else if someone threw a punch at someone else, it would cut out those frames. If Elmer is watching a war movie by himself, he will set the violence level down to zero, because war movies are just violent in and of themselves, and that's how they go. I've heard a lot of families say that they can't afford ClearPlay. For $8-$12 a month and being able to provide my family with clean entertainment, even with rated R movies, I think this is one of the best deals on the planet! This way, no one in my family has to fill our minds with senseless trash. I really believe that what goes in comes out, and we are so much happier not viewing any of the trash anymore. They are a bit flexible about the price per month if you are wanting to do an annual pay instead of monthly. You just hemm and haw a bit, not ready to commit to paying the price they are quoting, and they have always come down quite a bit for me. I think last month when we renewed annually, it only cost me about $65 for the entire year. Compared to watching movies at the theater, this is a steal!

Joanne link

2/1/2011 04:00:35 pm

Thank you for the explanation. I understand much better now. I just finished watching a movie tonight called Mrs. Palfrey at the Clairmont, and it was uncanny, because I was just thinking about the content of this movie over the past few ...days. It was about an elderly woman and a young man becoming friends, and preserving the dignity of the elderly and appreciating the contributions they have made to the world as they are finishing their lives. Joan Plowright was the star, and I think she is a very good actress, and I have always enjoyed anything she has starred in. As to the subject of the war movies, if you had the violence filter set on high, you could watch a war movie in about 5 minutes!

Lisa

2/1/2011 04:01:09 pm

Thanks Julieanne! We do a lot of Netflix streaming as well.... I hope they will advance in this area too BUT D and I have been interested in this technology for over 8 years... heard about it on FOTF but neither of us could remember the company or the name of the product... Both of the kids REALLY have been wanting us to get this. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! We'll have to save up but it'll be worth it! Blessings!

LeAnn

2/1/2011 04:01:46 pm

And where do you find this DVD player? I have actually looked for one and inquired at different places and no one could answer me.

Julieanne

2/1/2011 04:02:46 pm

It's available at www.ClearPlay.com Joanne, you are so correct - a war movie with the violence settings at its highest level would be VERY short! :) Ha, ha...

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