Not Going So Well

My best laid plans to make my own food staples is not going so well. Now I blame school entirely for two reasons:
1. I am tired from all my classes, labs, homework, and studying.
2. I am taking Microbiology and just learned way too much about fungi, mold, and bacteria.

I just can't possibly eat yogurt that I just made myself. Somehow it was fine before. But now it's not fine. Maybe I can go back to it once I'm not studying the sexual reproduction of bacteria and their different names and faces and diseases and growth patterns. For now, I just can't do it because bacteria is gross.

And I can't make my own bread. Not because I have the same problem eating yeasts- I'm learning all about them and they are not nearly as gross. But because we scarf up store-bought bread like there's no tomorrow but none of us are quite as keen on homemade bread when it comes to sandwiches. It's just not the right consistency and it's not pre-sliced. So the delicious warm homemade bread eventually turns cold and wrapped up on the counter where it immediately (and I mean immediately, even if you can't see it without a microscope) starts growing mold. Mold is also very gross when you know how much is there beyond what you can see and pull off.

On the plus side, what is going great is the garden planning for the spring! I have all my dates on my calendar for all my different seeds and seedlings. Most of my seeds this year come from seeds that I saved from the garden last year. That's very cool. And the rest I just bought as heirloom or organic varieties from the local farm store.  So my garden will be Green again!  We've started the seeds for basil and parsley indoors already because basil is an annual and I want a second variety of parsley for the herb garden.  Everything else is just lined up, waiting it's turn.

Another thing that is not going so well is the birthday party slim down.  My girls have always had fun yet reasonably priced birthday parties that I believe focus more on the experience with friends than on presents (though the birthday cake is probably a close second on the importance scale). I still get regular emails from BabyCenter, an online parenting website, about the developmental milestones for each of my kids based on their birthdays.  I got one a few weeks ago that explained why the 5 year old birthday party tends to be the one that kids get most excited to plan themselves. Sure enough, J. has been looking forward to turning five since she turned four and has been planning her birthday party since New Years. She finally picked a theme that stuck around for a few weeks- Science.  And then we worked together to narrow that down, since she wanted "something she didn't know about already" but didn't know the right questions and lingo to say what that would be.  We finally narrowed to two options: Chickens (the biology, ecology, and life cycle) or Geology (with fossils, geodes, and crystals).  After much research, we couldn't find new baby chickens for a reasonable price early enough for her party (our order comes in at the end of March and her party's in early March).  So we went with geology for a Party that Really Rocks!

Ok, I did all that part right.  What I didn't do right was managing the guest list. We have many beloved friends who live out of town and they will be invited to the weekend family birthday party.  But J.'s birthday is on a Friday and we want to celebrate on that day with her, so we're having a party for local friends that afternoon.  J. mentioned it at school before the guest list was determined so we lost the option to pick and choose- we're inviting her entire preschool class and a few other local best friends. Her party has 20 kids invited to it! Craziness!  Our idea of scaling down her birthday this year is not going so well. But I guess if your 5th birthday is the one that you care about the most because it's the first one you ever care about, we might as well do this one super cool and then just let her down every year after that.