Eleanor's Birthday Party - "Stesame Street"

Pardon the blurred out invitation...what is missing is the address first and then my phone number...

I couldn't have done it without them!
I had so much fun with Pinterest and the many episodes of Sesame Street that we watch as my inspiration planning Eleanor's 2nd Birthday Party.  With the help of my amazingly crafty sisters, we pulled it off.  I am working on finding better pics so I apologize if some are blurry to start.  We were fortunate to have our apt. clubhouse to use at no charge because the party was during the day.

Backing up a bit - I tend to get carried away in buying smocked dresses, especially cupcake birthday dresses.  Right after Eleanor turned 1, I found the perfect dress for her second birthday party which I thought, instead of doing pastels like her 1st bday, we would do bright colors.  Little did I know, she would be old enough to decide she wanted a special theme for her bday.  SO my challenge was to create a Sesame Street Bday which would usually be primary colors and transform it into a bright color scheme.  Thanks to Michaels, JoAnns, Party City, and Market Street's perfect die match to Eleanor's dress, we pulled it off.

The inspiration - the dress

The party was at lunch time so we of course had to serve lunch.  For the kids, we had chic fil a nuggets, Eleanor's favorite, fruit kbobs (pineapple, strawberry, and grapes), apple sauce pouches, Juice Boxes, and Elmo's Goldfish (Dorothy) - or just goldfish.  For the adults, I bought a teryiaki sauce at Costco and added orange zest, garlic, orange bell peppers, and some orange juice to a marinade for chicken kbobs. The grill wasn't working well so they got a little charred.  I served them in mom's chaffing dish and with them we served asian slaw, and chips and guac with homemade salsa.  FYI I also add a bunch of cilantro chopped to the food processor, use agave nectar (drizzle) instead of sugar, and lime juice to this salsa.  We served Shiner Family Reunion and "Oscar's Trash Can Punch" - White Wine Sangria for the adults to drink.  Once again used agave nectar to sweeten instead of what it called for.  This baby was potent let me tell you :)

When you entered the party, you were greeted with a table of Sesame characters and an ABC Sesame Street Board Book for Eleanor that also served as a guest book.  We loved reading what people wrote and Eleanor will always be able to see who came to her 2nd bday party!

The dessert table showcased most of the themed food items along with the basis of the favors.  My sweet sisters, Mary and Katie, painted the buckets to look like Sesame Street characters and in each was some crinkle at the bottom, a Sesame Street book, a shovel (for digging into the candy jars), and a note from Eleanor.  The note thanked her friends for coming and reminded them which activities to see while at the party and what to add to their bucket to take home as a favor.    Some of the highlights of the dessert table were - Abby Cadabby's Magic Fairy Wands (pretzel rods dipped in white candy melts and covered in sprinkles), Bert and Ernie's gumballs, Oscar's Dirt - see if you can find "Slimey" his worm, Cookie Monster's Cookies (my gooey chocolate chip cookies halfway dipped in dark chocolate candy melts and covered in dot sprinkles), and Big Bird's "Radar" Gummies (Big Bird's bear is named Radar).  It also had her cupcakes which I broke down and bought this year from Market Street but did make the cupcake sticks on my own.

Some of the activities included Cookie Monster's Cookie Dough Station where the guests played with mini playdoughs and got to take them home and Ernie's Bubble Bath where the party guests got to hunt through packing peanuts (bubbles) to find one of Ernie's rubber duckies to take home.  We put this in Eleanor's splash table and it worked perfectly!  The kids loved it!

The girls especially enjoyed Abby and Zoe's jewelry box where they had so much fun finding bracelets, necklaces, and glitzy sunglasses to wear and take home.  As you can see Belle went to town!

 

Hallie, Annabelle, and Katie enjoying Elmo's goldfish

Eleanor and "Kate" as she calls her...

Eleanor loves Garrett!

Some more of the decor...

 Eleanor was so blessed to have both her grandparents, the sweet Klement family, ALL her aunts and Uncles (Uncle Matt came a little later), my room mom, Robin, her dear mom, Nana, and a sweet student of mine, Tanner, and almost all her best friends in attendance (Reese came the weekend before to celebrate and a few others had their birthday parties at the same time).  We had such a fun time and Eleanor was so tired afterwards she conked out on my chest with a gummy in her mouth.  This was following a pretty bad fall after which she proceeded to do her thing where she gets so worked up she stops breathing but she survived and was ready to go onto Katie's 2nd bday party later that afternoon.

Marmi and Pop Pop

Grammie and Grandpa

Aunts and Momma

Momma loves her girl - I coordinated with bright pink pants

Dada coordinated with his bright blue shirt - you know how I love the matching!

My dear bosom friend and her sweet husband, Jason, and girls, Hallie and Annabelle even got to come from Houston!

We were so excited to have the Dibbles come and it was so cute how much Luke loved Sesame Street too!

The Klements are so special to us!  They often help out with Eleanor as I used to babysit them years ago!

The Jones Family came to play!  Eleanor loves Garrett and Lyla!

I just love this girl! 

Ready to open presents!

She was showered with precious dresses, fun toys including a gardening set, a cozy coupe, vacuum and other cleaning supplies, puzzles, books, a grocery cart, stroller, lawn mower, Aggie chair, and CD player with microphones just to name a few.

After presents we sang Happy Birthday and once again helped her blow out her candles.  She had so much fun eating her cupcake - Mommy had fun using makeup remover to get the icing die off!

        

And yes once momma had seen she was given her cupcake - the dress did come off...

What a Year - 2011/Christmas Card Letter

This, our third edition of the Reinberg Family Christmas card, leaves us feeling utterly blessed by an amazing 2011. We have so many things to celebrate and give thanks for this year. We thought last year was full of firsts and realize that only continued into this year as well. Our family also encountered some trials and hard times that still leave us feeling though, how blessed we are. We pray for those who have endured suffering and strife and are amazed at their strength and faith that God would pull them through.

"These are a few of our favorite things" from 2011:

January - We celebrated our first New Year as a family of three and enjoyed a wonderful celebration with our dear friends, the Vanicek and Jones Families. We decided it would be the first of many New Years Eve parties with kids included and Eleanor had a blast at her first NYE party with friends, Katie (2 days younger) and Garrett (2 months older). Eleanor also crawled for the first time on New Years day!

February - Eleanor got to experience her first real snow and a week of Mommy and Daddy held captive in our tiny apartment as school was cancelled due to icy roads. Andy enjoyed a week of playing old school Nintendo games and Lindsay of course couldn't sit still and organized the entire apartment from the Tupperware cabinet to the ribbon drawer while of course also enjoying a week of non-stop sweet baby girl! Don't worry - none of that organization lasted more than a month or so in our teeny little shoe box.

March - We enjoyed a celebration of Eleanor's first St. Patrick's day complete with a lake house spring cleaning, green beer, and a new family favorite - Lindsay's first attempt at creating Irish Potato Salad - Colcannon.

April - Eleanor's first steps were just in time for her first Easter. It was her Daddy's wish that she be able to Easter egg hunt and boy did it come true. She had so much fun picking up the eggs and putting them in her basket. We had a wonderful time celebrating our Lord's Passion, Death, and Resurrection with the Aldons and awaited only a few weeks until our sweet baby turned one!

May - Eleanor's first birthday will never be forgotten. Her day began with a party thrown by Lindsay's 4th graders complete with animal crackers and goldfish to share. After her first party, she ventured to Houston's with Mommy, Daddy, Marmi, and Aunt Mary for her birthday dinner. Houston's is a popular Reinberg hangout for all things celebration including where Andy and Lindsay went to celebrate pregnancy and finding out Eleanor was a girl so it was only appropriate that we celebrate her first birthday there. The night was capped with Lindsay and Eleanor covered in her first chocolate sundae. Andy's favorite part of May was spending hours and lots of words that shouldn't be repeated putting together our birthday girl's present - a brand new kitchen. What first birthday would be complete without a party? Eleanor enjoyed her pastel pink themed party, cake, and most of her family and friends who also dressed in pink (even her Daddy!). Her smash cake was so super cute and wonderful from tart bakery - Mommy and Aunt Jenna (also her godmother) made the cupcakes, cake balls, white chocolate dipped pretzels and strawberries and the hamburger lunch. There was even a pink drink that many of the mommies enjoyed - a copycat of Cheesecake Factory's spiked raspberry lemonade.

June - Andy and I, after much urging from our parents (on both sides) were blessed with the opportunity to attend a Worldwide Marriage Encounter Weekend where we got to stay in a nice hotel and basically just focus on each other for a weekend. It was a nice break but we also missed being away from Eleanor for the first time! Our first family plane trip brought us to visit Andy's sweet grandparents, Grace and Gene Reinberg in Ft. Davis, Texas. Eleanor had a great time on the plane opening and closing the window and peering behind the seat incessantly saying, "hi" to the man passed out behind us. She wasn't ever phased that he never responded. She also gave us the first of, I fear, many scares as a parent. On this trip (in the middle of nowhere), she hit her head and passed out, and taught us a new trick of hers - she tends to hold her breath when she gets too worked up and makes herself pass out if we don't remind her to take a breath. This is what the EMTs who said she was fine when we rushed her to the local fire station (don't worry, an ER was over 30 min. away) told us and we later learned Andy's dad used to do the same thing as a child.

July - Another first - a trip across the country and Eleanor's first 20+ hours straight in the car to visit Lindsay's Family in Virginia, the Thomasons, Andy's first encounter with our Nation's Capital and any Civil War/Revolutionary battlefield he could get his hands on, a beautiful wedding of Lindsay's cousin, Jessica and her new hubs LJ, and visit to Lindsay's Dad's side of the family in Baltimore, Pop Pop's hometown, then to travel south along the coast to visit Lindsay's 95 year old Grandmother, Grandmary and Aunt and Uncle in Pinehurst, and introduce them to Eleanor for the first time, topped off with a few days by the beach in Florida on our way home. Eleanor was a champ on the trip and loved meeting all her family members along with the waves and sand at the beach. Andy and Lindsay celebrated their second wedding anniversary in pieces this month - one date was a day alone to road trip to Gettysburg, PA, their favorite battle of the Civil War (nerds), another was a date alone to tour the capital, and the third was a steak dinner cooked by Andy with in tow on the actual day - July 18th.

August - Andy and Lindsay BOTH had amazing opportunities come in late summer. Andy, a Varsity defensive football and Head Track Coaching position at Ranchview HS in Carrollton and Lindsay a 5th grade position at Town Center Elementary in Coppell. She has dreamed of working in Coppell since HS and not only was she granted the opportunity to work in Coppell but at (in her opinion) the best elementary school in the district gifted with amazing parents, innovative technology available to students, and a wonderful crop of students with a desire to learn like no other, and a 5 min. commute (as opposed to her 1hr+ to Richardson). Andy had been awaiting an opportunity to coach at a Varsity level and now to also earn the head track coach spot made him even more excited to take on high schoolers! Both miss their friends from their old schools but are so thankful for this new opportunity.

September -Varsity football consumed our lives this month and next. Eleanor loved going to the games and was a trooper staying awake until sometimes as late as 10pm so she could run on the field and see her Daddy at the end of the games. We also earned a whole new family at Ranchview - Lindsay with some wonderful wives to accompany her in the stands, and Andy with a most uplifting and positive coaching staff he could ever dream of. Eleanor also has made friends with the coach's kids.

October - Lindsay celebrated her 27th birthday and Andy never failed to make it special. He arranged for Aunt Mary to babysit on a weeknight and took L to Nordstrom to get her makeup done and some much needed new products seeing as she hadn't bought new in almost 2 years! He also treated her with some perfume and a dinner at none other than, Houstons. October brought a two month wave of viruses for Eleanor - poor baby just couldn't get well. One of those we could actually name being 5ths disease. Eleanor also enjoyed her second Halloween. She was a butterfly (butt-bye as she said) and though she still had a terrible rash from her 5ths disease (she was no longer contagious), she went to a couple houses, including Marmi and Pop Pop's and LOVED her first candy! Lindsay's Uncle David also suffered a heart attack and a couple of months in the hospital and though we missed having Marmi around, were so thankful she could be there with her brother to help. We were SO thankful for the friends and family who helped with Eleanor in Marmi's absence. We are so blessed!

November- Eleanor's sickness continued with high fevers and more we really don't even want to write about which kept us from traveling to College Station to see Andy's family for Thanksgiving. My family also decided not to got to the farm so we had a very last minute/impromptu Aldon family Thanksgiving at mom's house this year topped off with two versions of homemade stuffing I made and LOVED - I will never use a mix again! We also enjoyed our first ENTIRE WEEK off for Thanksgiving break - what a treat!

December - Eleanor finally began to feel better come December and we had a wonderful month preparing for our Lord's birth. A new tradition we began in the Reinberg house as we counted down the days of Advent was that Eleanor got to open a new Christmas book each day. She LOVED practicing unwrapping the gifts and looked forward to opening her new book every night before bed. Lindsay ran her first half marathon this December finishing in 2:08.?? and feeling great! She is either going to run another half and hope to better her time or do a full or maybe both in 2012. She couldn't have done it without the support of her husband and sister Mary (who watched Eleanor and stood on the sidelines cheering in the rain) as Andy ran the last 4 miles with Linds. Andy celebrated his 28th birthday with a 3rd annual trip to Billy Bobs - this time to see Jack Ingram. Andy's almost entire coaching staff game along with his parents for the first time and brother, Tim along with Lindsay's sisters Mary and Kel and Andy's best friend from HS, Greg and girlfriend Michaela. It was a fun weekend as always! Christmas was spent at home and Santa came for the first time to the Reinberg house. We enjoyed 5pm Children's Christmas Eve mass for the first time in a long time and said goodbye for probably a while to midnight mass. After mass we enjoyed a spaghetti dinner and agreed it was a new tradition - way easier than a Turkey and all the fixins. Eleanor put cookies and milk our for Santa and woke up in her own bed, so excited to see what he brought along with eat the rest of his cookies! We then traveled to the Aldon's for a day of fun and just can't reiterate enough the blessing of family.

We are so thankful for all those who are in our lives and pray that God Blesses you and yours this Christmas and in 2012. If we haven't seen you in a while, our door is always open - you might have to squeeze in Eleanor's room on an air mattress but are always welcome!

Love,
Andy, Lindsay, and Eleanor

A New Year - Here's to 2011

Eleanor and Garrett playing

Katie's new thing - she loves to stick her tongue out!

Sweet little Garrett, we loved getting to spend some time with him finally!

Blocks were the hit of the night - probably should wash them after the three babies drooled on them so much!

Play time in the morning while all the Daddy's sobered up :)

Silly David...

We decided to take a shot after midnight to toast 2011...Wes and I had Patron, Andy and David had Jack, and Ashley Peppermint Schnapps, and Kortni champagne. I think that was my first shot in over a year and a half ha!

Hard to believe it is only our 2nd New Years together as Reinbergs! And we have a 7 mo. old!

The Vaniceks, Kortni and Wes

The Jones', David and Ashley

The Jones', Reinbergs, and Vaniceks celebrating a new year - 2011!

So sweet! Eleanor loves grabbing feet

The Coaches and their Babies

Eleanor and Garrett playing waiting for Katie to get there on NYE

PS the pictures are backward in order of when they occurred but I can't get my computer to let me move them so in the very "Beautiful Mess" fashion they will stay as is :)
This year we decided we would celebrate New Years with friends who were in the same boat - a baby under 1 and no money to pay a babysitter/spend a lot on an evening out. We all agreed that decision was so much better than anything else we could have done. The Jones and Vanciek Family spent NYE 2010 with us and we had a great time!

Here is what the Reinberg family did to ring in the new year, 2011:

We invited the Vanicek and Jones families over for a New Years Eve celebration, babies and all. With my dad and sister being gone, mom and Kel were so sweet to take the twin beds in the office and offer up all the queen/king beds to us. So each couple got a bedroom and brought their pack n plays for their baby to sleep in. We put the kids down around 7:30 and spent the rest of the night enjoying food and drink!


I wish I could have taken a pic of the food spread. We had appetizers including spinach and artichoke dip, chips and guac, perrano and brie cheeses with crackers and grapes, veggies and hummus, meatballs in an alfredo sauce, and pepperoni pizza bread. I hope I am not forgetting another. Ashley made this really fun poinsetta punch with 1 part vodka, 1 part cran, 1 part pomogranite and 1 part champagne. The girls enjoyed that drink while the guys drank beer and whatever else they could find.


After playing a few games on the Wii to work off all the heavy apps, we sat down to eat an amazing brisket Andy and Wes had smoked all day. Along with the brisket we had a green salad, cornbread, pinto beans, and a very special recipe for green beans and new potatoes we got from the McGehee family where you put the two veggies in the bottom of the smoker to let them steam and season from the brisket drippings. Probably SUPER unhealthy but it was good!


We then toasted at midnight with my favorite, Martini and Rossi Asti Champagne (well it isn't from that region of France so it technically can't be called that but I call it Champagne anyway). All the women then hit the wall as we usually are in bed way before midnight. We tried to stay awake and chat but eventually all petered off to bed. The guys stayed up playing "champagne pong" and who knows what else.


The next morning brought babies ready to party nice and early. I got up with Eleanor and we made blueberry and apple cinnamon muffins and put out a fruit spread. Everyone stayed to hang out for a while and then went home.


Andy, Mom, Kel, Eleanor, and I rotated napping throughout the day and then the Vaniceks came back for dinner. We have made it tradition to eat chicken fried steak ( I refuse to cook it more than once a year) with mashed potatoes, homemade bisquits, and black eyed peas (and of course a salad or some kind of green vegetable to make us feel a little healthy), and gravy on New Years day. Usually it was to sop up all the alcohol from the night before but I didn't have that issue this year. Also, it is tradition to eat black eyed peas on New Years day for good luck in the coming year. Not sure why but we do it...we enjoyed the rest of the evening once again stuffing ourselves and have now resided that meals in the Reinberg home will consist of salad, vegetables, and lean meat - probably chicken breast, until bathing suit season! I have GOT to get the rest of this baby weight off!


We are so blessed to have been given another year of gifts and blessings and look forward to see what surprises 2011 may bring. 2010 was incredible and I don't know how we could top it but I am sure God has many more exciting events in store for the Reinbergs!


Here are our "Top 10 in 2010":
1. The birth of our first child and daughter, Eleanor Ann Reinberg - May 18th, 2010
2. Celebrating our FIRST wedding anniversary - July 18, 2010
3. Eleanor's reception of her first sacrament and becoming a member of the Catholic church in baptism - June 4, 2010
4. Moving to Lewisville, closer to family and St. Ann - April 2010
5. Getting to meet so many of our friends' children all within months of Eleanor (we can count at least 10 and are probably forgetting some)
6. Trips to College Station to visit Andy's family - August, November, December 2010
7. Introducing Eleanor to one set of her GREAT - Grandparents, Grandma and Grandpa of Maverick, Texas - June 2010
8. Eleanor's firsts including smiling, rolling over, starting solids, clapping, talking (in of course her own language), Halloween, Thanksgiving, St. Nicolas Day, Christmas, haircut, crawling, NYE
9. Andy's nearly (by one game) undefeated football season coaching 7th grade football
10. Lindsay's first time teaching 4th grade and every subject (it has been a learning experience)


Happy New Year and Here's to 2011!