Let's Get This Party Started

[This post is part of the January Cure project. Read more here: Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6 | Day 7 | Day 8 | Day 9 | Day 10 | Day 11 | Day 12 | Day 13 | Day 14]

DAY 7: Get Your Get-Together Together - Date, Guests, Invites

Thursday, February 7th

Plan Your Get-Together for the Weekend of February 1-3

I'm taking a bit of liberty with this one. Instead of planning for a random get-together to celebrate my somewhat more organized apartment, I'll be using this task to get ready for Harrison's first birthday party! Only two months to go - when did that happen? Didn't I just pop this kid out?

I have lots of ideas for his first party, and I'm going to try not to go overboard but I promise absolutely nothing. I like to plan, this is my first child's first birthday party, and I like to plan. Did I mention I like to plan? As in I've already been planning this party for a month. You should see the monstrosity that is the Pinterest board I've set aside for the occasion. Except you can't, because I made it invisible muahahaha. Anyway.

I already have the (tentative) date, the guest list, and a rough idea for the invitations. In fact I just got side tracked for about an hour looking at inspiration invitations to nail down what I really want to go with. I briefly thought about doing an online invite - there are sites like Paperless Post that have a lot of insanely adorable designs. But in the end I just like the idea of sending out a hard copy. Plus, it's always fun to get real mail.

I'm keeping the details a secret because it's way more fun that way, but I will say that I'm tying it in to his nursery theme (Little World Traveler). And I totally plan on having a smash cake because nothing makes me more giddy than the thought of Harrison in a diaper, completely covered in icing. Think of the glorious photos! I mean look:

source | via

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source | via

swoon

DAY 8: Weekend Chores - Flowers, Kitchen Cleaning, & Make Yourself a Meal

Friday, Saturday & Sunday, February 8th - 10th

Kitchen Organizing & Cleaning, Find a Recipe and Try it Out

So apparently when there's a day labeled "weekend" it actually means the entire weekend, not just one day in the weekend. I got confused the other day when I took a look at the entire list for January and there were only 23 days listed and I was almost positive there are 31 days in January. At least I'm pretty sure that's what we learned in elementary school. But it actually works out perfectly through the end of this month, so we're on track.

I'm not going to lie, I totally dropped the ball on the kitchen overhaul this weekend. Partially because we were gone the entire day of Sunday and partially because I kind of forgot about it completely on Saturday. I still plan on making it up down the line, but for now I don't have anything to report. Oops.

I'm not buying flowers again because the ones we bought last week are still looking perky-licious. In fact I decided to spread the cheer by clipping off a few stems and putting them in a small bud vase in the hall bathroom. Want some tips for keeping your blooms all pretty like? The following is a winning combination of my previous knowledge, common sense, and the internet.

• Trim the stems just a tad every day (at a 45 degree angle) and change out the water every other day
• After all this trimming if your bouquet starts to become too short for your large vase, split it up into several smaller (shorter) vases and spread them around the house for some bonus decor.
• I used the flower "food'' that came with the flowers, plus an extra packet I snagged from the bowl at the store. When that ran out, I started adding a dash of vinegar and a small spoonful of sugar to the water instead. 
• I put a copper penny in the vase? Apparently that's a thing, according to the internet. Not sure if it actually does anything.
• Keep them out of direct sunlight
• Smell them often (this is more for you than the flowers, though who knows, maybe flowers like to have their ego stroked a bit)

As for the "make yourself a meal" portion of these tasks, I basically do this every night now, thanks to a meal planning Groupon I bought from a company called The Fresh 20. $24 for the entire year (usually $48) and every Friday they send you the next week's list of meals, a shopping list, nutrition information, and even tips and suggestions for preparing stuff ahead of time so that cooking times on the night of are reduced. You have no idea how much stress this has alleviated. I essentially used to rotate between 8-10 recipes over and over again so we never went more than two weeks without repeating a meal. Plus, they weren't always healthy. And I always had a lot of leftover ingredients (or not enough). Most of the meals have been pretty dang good and I'm even eating (and enjoying!) things that I never would have picked out myself (cod! salmon! shrimp! basically all seafood!). And we're eating lots of veggies. The health factor of our meals has increased tenfold since we've started giving Harrison whatever we're eating for dinner. I love that we're making balanced meals that I feel good about serving him (and us).

I didn't have to make dinner Saturday or Sunday but Friday we had Teriyaki Chicken Burrito Wraps. YUM.