Earth Day Princess Turns 4!

On Clarissa's actual birthday, we celebrated with some cupcakes (we took the rest to school for a classroom party).

And she opened gifts from us and grandparents/aunts and uncles. She was so methodical when unwrapping gifts. She had to completely remove all wrapping paper before she would allow herself to react with a happy face.

When Mason tried to get excited and react.......he got yelled at.

All wrapping paper off, YEAH!

Since Clarissa's birthday fell right after Easter Break, we waited to the following weekend to have her party.

Clarissa approving her birthday cake after I decorated it Saturday evening.

Can you guess what the theme was?

Richard picked up a couple beers for the parents to enjoy....

20 minutes before the party starts.....Sleeping Beauty?

So we started out with crafts.....decorating a Rapunzel hat with stickers (I made shields for the 2 boys from her class) and making a bead bracelet.

All the kids fed Snow White apples.....

Who doesn't like to knock out evil witches and queens with bean bags....

The popcorn was a huge hit!

The Royal Feast

The arrival of the cake.....she seems surprised at the sight of the cake even though she had peeked in on it in the fridge multiple times during the day.

She did freak out a bit when everyone started singing happy birthday.....she went and hid under the table....."its my party and I'll hide if I want too" ??????

After all the snacks and sweets, the princesses (and pirates) were informed that Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather had lost their wands at the playground.....so they all ran down to find one (ONE was a tough number, lol....but everyone ended with one wand).

(Yes, that is my hippy child running around barefoot).

All the kids went home with a cloth fairy dust (aka goody) bag......

All and all, I think it was a great Princess Party.

PS - I don't recommend letting 9 year old boys "help" decorate for a Princess Party.

* Sorry for the interesting cropping....some people can be quirky about photos of the their kids online......don't want to be that person and upset anyone. :)

My heart just went pitter patter

I am a tree hugger....not the crunchiest of them all, but I have my fair share of granola in me.

I really doubt he knows this, but one thing that I noticed when we first started dating was Richard had (and used) his recycling bin.....totally scored him some points in my book.

Fast forward a bit and Charleston county had gone to single stream recycling....recycling came every other week....and our giant rolling bin was regularly overflowing (in fact, on more than one occasion (and with their permission) we would put some of our recycling into our next door neighbors bin). Our trashcan, most weeks had 2 small bags....barely worth pulling to the curb.....

As a teacher, much to many a students' disdain, if I saw them drop their soda can in the trash can that was touching the recycle bin, I would make them pull it out of the trash and put it in the recycle bin....I can still hear them now....'Midds, that is so disgusting, you want me to reach in the trash'....to which I reply its been in there 5 seconds get it out....

When we live in DC, I think we took recycling down to the recycling bins way more often than we made a leisurely walk to trash chute......

So, when we arrived in Tbilisi.....I had heard a rumor there was a place to take your recycling way out on the other side of town. Most people didn't bother since it was such a trek. But I figured if I only go every month or two it won't be that big of a trek (and I'd be driving the Prius so it wouldn't be that much fuel either). So I couldn't un-train myself and had kept the recyclables out in the garage (ok, I admit, I did toss the empty peanut butter jar b/c those are such a pain to rinse out and only felt a tad guilty). You can imagine what elation I had at an embassy coffee last month when I found a gentleman had started up a recycling program in Tbilisi!

With this program still in the start up phase, they have not gotten city permission to place bins on public property yet. They can however place them on private property and will pick up on a regular basis unless they get a call the bins are full and will come pick up earlier. Another person at the coffee is on the PSG board at the school the kids go to.....she made it happen! There is a recycling drop off point at their school.....so today when dumping our recycling in the bins, my heart went pitter patter.....because that's what this tree hugger gets excited about!

Now currently they only take paper/cardboard, plastic and glass bottles (no metal yet).....so I am still stock piling my metal and consciously make the decision to only buy beer in bottles, not cans!

P.S. Yesterday our housekeeper threw a couple glass bottles next to the sink away and I pulled them out of the trash and told her about the recycling program.....I'm pretty sure she thinks I'm nuts now.....

Name that Dip

So remember as kids on long road trips you played the 50 state license plate game....with Alaska and Hawaii definitely scoring the most points.

Here in Georgia we play a different version of the game....we play 'name that diplomat'....

In Georgia, all diplomats are issued special red licenses plates. They all have a red 'D' in the middle to announce we aren't from around these parts.....

Before the big red D, there is a number, ranging from 1-61. I was told the numbers were issued in order of that country's recognition of Georgia being an independent republic (the US got number 2...we were beat out by the Germans).

Given the kids go to an international school, every morning at drop off I have my handy dandy issued cheat sheet and have checked off a good bit there.

To date we have seen diplomats from (in no particular order):
US
Germany
Armenia
Ukraine
Azerbaijan
European Union
International Organizations
Netherlands
Czech Republic
Denmark
Great Britain

And yesterday, I totally scored the most points with my spotting of an Iranian diplomat downtown!