Lola's 11th Birthday

A few weekends back we celebrated Lola's 11th birthday with a small Animal Crossing themed party. If you've been following along on Instagram you've likely already seen it, but as always, I love to share our parties on the blog too.

As with last year, we kept Lola's birthday party pretty small due to the pandemic, so we celebrated with neighbors and friends who we actually had not seen since Lola's 9th birthday party. Keeping the party small seems like it would mean less work for me, but there was still a piñata to make, a cake to decorate and themed party bags to put together. I love preparing everything for parties though, so I'm totally in my element when it comes to this sort of stuff. It's the only time I really get to do something creative (apart from Halloween) so I really enjoy it.

Let's take a look Lola's party...

Lola's Potato Party

A few weekends back we celebrated Lola's 9th birthday with a potato themed party.

Ok, I know what you're thinking... A potato themed party? Huh?

I know, it's a weird one, but if you've ever met Lola then you'll know that she tends to be, well, a little weird at times too!

I have no idea what this potato thing is all about, but Lola and her friends at school have a potato club and so it seemed only fitting that it should also be the theme of her birthday party - especially seeing as most of the guests are members of this esteemed club!

So just what does a potato themed party involve?

Potatoes, of course!

We smashed a fancy potato pinata that I made (although it looked a little more like a Mr Monopoly egg due to the balloon shape!), we played "Pin the Top Hat on the Potato", sang "Happy Birthday" over a cake featuring a fondant kawaii potato (not all potatoes are fancy!), ate Irish potato candies that I remember from my childhood and potato latkes, handed out realistic looking potato stress balls as thank you gifts, and Lola wore a potato t-shirt.

Here's a look at all the fun - well, some of it, because the kids spent half their time playing hide and seek in the house and it's hard to take photos of them when you don't know where they're hiding!

Lola's Emoji Themed Birthday Party

Last weekend we celebrated Lola's 8th birthday with an emoji themed birthday party. There were smiley face emojis, heart eye face emojis, winking face emojis, and, yes, plenty of her favorite: the poop emoji!

We had a beautiful sunny day here in Berkeley and celebrated Lola's birthday up on our roof deck as we usually do. It wasn't even windy, which is pretty rare! In fact, we were even able to light a candle on her cake without it blowing out straight away. I don't think that has ever happened at any of our parties!

The emoji theme was spread across all aspects of Lola's party and I'll have lots of fun (and simple) DIYs coming soon. I made emoji face decorations and photo props, I baked emoji cookies, cupcakes, poop emoji meringues and a rainbow poop emoji birthday cake, we had an emoji face piñata, emoji themed gifts in the party bags and pass the parcel, and the girls wore emoji t-shirts. So many emojis!

Lola's Art Party

October is always a super busy month for our family. Between Halloween and all its preparations, visiting a pumpkin patch, school festivals and harvest festivals it's already a pretty crazy month. Throw in Lola's birthday right in the middle of the month and crazy takes on a whole different meaning!

This year we celebrated Lola's 7th birthday with an art themed party. As usual, she came up with the theme and was eager to help plan all of the fun. It was such a great party theme with endless options for creative fun. Let's take a look...

For the party invitations I had a ton of different ideas going through my head (as did Lola) but none of them seemed quite right. Then an image of Lola as an artist popped into my head and I knew that it was perfect. So she dressed up in a striped shirt, placed a beret on her head and added one last touch - a paint brush balanced perfectly on Lola's duck face pout! If you know Lola, you'll know that she is the self described queen of duck face (take that Kylie Jenner!) so it seemed only fitting that her favorite selfie pose be included on the invitation. Plus it totally worked with the whole French artist look!

A visit from the Tooth Fairy

Lola lost her first tooth yesterday at school!

Well, I say it was her first tooth, but really she had one pulled out by the dentist when she was 5 due to a cavity (eek!), but this was her first tooth that fell out on its own, and therefore much more exciting.

Lola's Rainbow Unicorn Party

Yesterday we celebrated Lola's 6th birthday with a rainbow unicorn themed party on our roof deck.

After the grey and rainy weather of last weekend (when it was actually Lola's birthday), we were in luck with perfect weather for the party. It was a little overcast, and the view over the bay was foggy, but the sun was shining and the temperature was just right. Not too hot, not too cold. 

Orange & Green Karate Belts

My two karate kids, Ava and Lola, had another belt test yesterday and I'm happy to say that they both passed. Hooray! Ava is now a green belt and Lola is an orange belt. These kids are accruing karate belts faster than I ever imagined.

The girls and their classmates did such a good job. Everyone passed the test and we now have three green belts and three orange belts in the class. The test was held in the park where we meet for classes. There were quite a few other people around but the kids were so good at staying focused and weren't bothered by all the people watching them or the kids and dogs playing nearby. As you can see, it was quite late in the day so the sun was starting to set as the test progressed. It made for the most beautiful light.

Back to School 2016

Yesterday was the first day back at school here in Berkeley and you know what that means...

Lots of photos of cute kids with backpacks! Ha!

I know, I know... Facebook and Instagram are filled with back to school photos right now, but I just have to share ours too.

Lola's Metal Detector & Penny Finding Party

This weekend we celebrated Lola's 5th birthday with a birthday party with a very specific theme: Lola's Metal Detector and Penny Finding Party! Lola came up with the theme herself and I have to say that despite it sounding kind of weird, it was one of the most fun parties we've ever thrown.

Wondering how such a party theme came about? Well, Lola is kind of obsessed with finding pennies. It's amazing just how many she finds when we're out and about. She's so good at finding pennies that she refers to herself as a "penny finding machine"! That said, quite some time ago she decided that an actual penny finding machine (ie. a metal detector) would help her find many more pennies. I have no idea where she got the idea about a metal detector from (presumably tv), but she has been asking for one for her birthday or Christmas since she was two! I figured she was a little small for a metal detector back then and told her she'd have to wait until she was at least five. Well, she didn't forget and when it came time to start planning her party this year she came up with this wonderful theme. Of course, that meant that a shiny new metal detector was unwrapped on the morning of Lola's birthday!

52 Weeks: Week 41

Week 41: Happy Birthday Lola

This past week Lola turned five!

To celebrate Lola's birthday we had a big party with friends over the weekend. I'll have a post about the party coming soon, but for last week's 52 Week Project post I wanted to share Lola's actual birthday day.

Lola's birthday fell on a weekday this year and now that she's a big school girl, she spent her special day at school. Usually the birthday kid gets to have a special celebration at school but because Lola is in Transitional Kindergarten and ALL of the kids in her class have birthdays in either September, October or November (they're the kids who just miss the Kindergarten cut off) her class just has one big celebration at the end of each month instead. Her class did sing Happy Birthday to her though.

After school we headed to the girls' karate class where once again everyone sang Happy Birthday to Lola. The girls' karate sensei is also an amazing artist and she gave Lola the most adorable water color portrait for her birthday. I still can't get over how cute this is and what a special gift it is. Thanks Sensei Julia! (You can see more of Julia's artwork here).

First Day of School 2015

Yesterday was the first day of school for the new year - and the first day of school ever for Lola!

I can't believe I have two school kids. Ava is now in third grade and Lola is in Transitional Kindergarten.

Transitional Kindergarten (TK) is a relatively new class created for kids whose birthdays fall just after the cut off for Kindergarten. In the past kids were allowed to start Kindergarten if they turned five by the end of December. Over the past few years the cut off date has crept forward, and as of this year kids now need to turn five by the first day of school. Lola misses out by just over a month, which really sucks! I would have much preferred for her to go straight into Kindergarten but at least we had the option for her to attend TK.

The girls were pretty excited as they got ready for school in the morning. Ava was obviously eager to get back to school as she woke up around 6am, made herself breakfast, and was dressed and ready to go by 7am! School doesn't start until 9:10am so that gave her plenty of time to play Minecraft. Lola slept in a little longer, as usual, but was excited about her big day none the less.

School's Out!

School's out!

Summer vacation has officially begun!

It has been a busy week here in the Little Hiccups household with all sorts of preparations happening for the end of the school year (and other exciting things that I'll share soon). Ava finished second grade yesterday. Her class had a little breakfast party in the morning, they signed each other's year books and then spent the rest of the day watching movies. The day before they went bowling. Ah, the last week of school. Always such hard work!

Finishing second grade is no mean feat, however the bigger event this week was Lola graduating from preschool on Wednesday. My little girl will be a big school girl in the Fall. I can't believe it. My mornings are going to be so much easier with just one school drop off!

52 Weeks: Week 11

Week 11: Our new walker

This week saw a huge milestone for our family. Our little Mathilde is now walking!

Last Thursday, at ten months and sixteen days old, Mathilde decided she was ready to set off on her own and she has been walking ever since. Crawling is still her chosen mode of movement much of the time as it's faster, but every day she walks a little more, and crawls a little less. Oh, she looks so proud of herself as she toddles along. It's the most adorable thing! Just look how happy she is below. So happy, that little tongue can't stay in her mouth!

Both Ava and Lola started walking properly just after their first birthdays so it feels a little weird seeing Mathilde toddle around while she's still so small. Plus, didn't I just give birth to her yesterday?! I swear I did. She is certainly growing up way too fast.

52 Weeks: Week 10

Week 10: At the Salon

This week Ava and Lola went to the hairdresser for a trim. Little Miss Mathilde doesn't have quite enough hair to warrant a hair cut yet (although her fringe does get in her eyes) so she just watched - and pretended to get a haircut from Ava!

Ava and Lola both really enjoy going the hairdresser. I take them to my hairdresser rather than a kid's salon and they love pretending to be grown ups. I guess they feel like they're being pampered too. They always sit so still and never complain about the water splashing while their hair is being washed or the brush hurting when it snags on a knot. I wish they could be like that at home! Maybe I brush too hard and splash too much water on their faces!

Here's a look at our visit to the salon...

Popcorn Ice Cream Cones

Ava's recent birthday party at Fenton's Creamery was a first for me. It was the first time that we hosted a party at a fully catered venue. All of the food, entertainment and decorations came part and parcel with the booking. Apart from the invites, cake and party favors there was nothing else I needed to do. I kind of felt a little lost. Usually I'd spend hours scouring through Pinterest for ideas for party food, party games, party hats, photo booth backdrops... This time there was none of that.

There may not have been much for me to prepare for Ava's party but there certainly was for Lola's ice cream themed birthday back in October. In fact, I made so many ice cream themed goodies that I never got around to sharing them all with you! So before Ava's ice cream party becomes a distant memory like Lola's, let's have a look at some of the ice cream treats I made back in October. Same theme, different party.

First up I'm sharing this super easy recipe for Popcorn Ice Cream Cones. Think Rice Krispie Treats made with popcorn instead of Rice Krispies shoved into an ice cream cone and covered with sprinkles. Actually, that's pretty much it! So easy they almost don't need a recipe, but I'll give you one anyway.

A picnic with Yuba Flip Flop

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by Yuba Bicycles. All opinions are my own.

If you follow Little Hiccups on Facebook or Instagram you've probably already seen Lola's new wheels. For the last few weeks Lola has been zooming around Berkeley on a bright pink Yuba Flip Flop balance bike. It goes everywhere with us: preschool, karate, swim class, the playground, the supermarket... If Lola's there, there's a good chance her Flip Flop is too. And now it's here on Little Hiccups!

I'm so excited to share Lola's new bike with you. When I first heard that Yuba Bicycles were releasing a balance bike I knew we had to get one for Lola. Our Yuba Mundo cargo bike has been such a great ride and I knew that Yuba's offering for the littlest members of the family would be just as high quality and as thoughtfully designed. And I was right!

Ice Cream Party Invites

I can not believe that my little Lola is going to be four tomorrow!

We'll be celebrating her birthday this coming weekend with an ice cream party. Lola chose the theme for this year's party quite some time ago. In fact, I believe it may have been right after her last birthday party finished!

Lola has been super excited about having an ice cream party, and I've got to say that it's a pretty fun theme to get creative with. I've got all sorts of ice cream and popsicle themed activities and accessories lined up for the party and I can't wait to share them all with you.

So let's start by having a look at the invitations...

An ice cream party needs tasty invitations, right? These little chocolate covered popsicle invitations do the trick. I made them three dimensional complete with popsicle sticks, a bite taken out the top and a wrapper. Don't they look delicious?

My Karate Kids

If you've been reading Little Hiccups for a while you'll know that Ava has been taking karate lessons for just over a year now. Over the Summer Lola joined in the karate class so now I have two karate girls.

This week the girls took part in a belt test. For Lola this was her first test (for her white belt) and for Ava it was her third (white belt with two black stripes).

Father's Day Portraits

Last Sunday was Father's Day in Australia. 

I've already shared the card that I made for the kids to give to Kim (you can see it here) but I also wanted to show you the fantastic drawings that the kids drew for their Daddy.

Ava is quite the accomplished little artist and has been drawing beautiful pictures from a very young age. Can you believe that she started drawing pictures recognisable as people before her second birthday? Crazy, right? It completely took me by surprise when I found her drawing an army of chalk people on our driveway a month before she turned two.  

Lola hasn't been quite as keen on drawing as Ava. Her drawings tend to be mostly squiggles and she gets frustrated very quickly if her picture doesn't look like what it's supposed to be. She'll draw if asked to but she won't sit down and start drawing of her own accord. Until now. In the last few weeks everything about Lola's drawings has changed. She's drawing people with bodies (not just heads with arms and legs sticking out!), she has started adding scenery and details, and - the best bit - she has started drawing without being asked to. Hooray! 

So here are the girls' Father's Day drawings. Ava drew the whole family with a beautiful sunset over the water because Daddy likes watching the sun set. Lola draw herself and Daddy at the beach. She even included the blue hat that Kim has been wearing lately (you'll see it popping up everywhere in my upcoming Seattle and Portland posts!).

Ava's Family Portrait

Lola's portrait of her and Daddy at the beach

Hooray for little artists!

Back to Preschool

Last week it was back to school for Ava. This week it's Lola's turn.

Lola is back at her preschool for another year - maybe two seeing as she won't turn five until just after the school cut off next year. But that's a whole different story...