My Super Sweet 5th Birthday
When my brother and I were kids, birthdays were a simple affair consisting of a few family friends, their kids, a cake, and my mother cooking up a storm. Instead of my birthday being about a theme or expensive loot bags, it was about hanging out with my friends and having good, home cooked food. Despite the simplicity I always recall having the best time on my birthday! I’ll spare you the pain of hearing my version of the “I walked in 2 feet of snow to get to the bus so I could get to school,” speech, but I must say, oh how things have changed.
Maya’s real birthday is actually tomorrow, March 15, but we celebrated it yesterday. Initially I wanted to do a Fancy Nancy tea party for her and her little friends, but somehow a small gathering of about 10 kids morphed into a huge event at my in-laws house for 75 people. And despite not lifting a finger in the kitchen I was still busy doing 100 other things yesterday, and for the weeks leading up to yesterday. Favors, decor, outfits, activities, and more…planning a kid’s birthday is a full-time job.
It was freezing cold outside yesterday, so instead of setting things up outside we went to Plan B and set up tables for the kids in the house:
We arranged the party favors: Fancy Nancy favor boxes for the girls, coloring books and crayons for the boys, and I had placemats made for all of the kids.
We blew up about a million balloons and set up the dining table, the appetizer area, and the drinks:
Thanks to Royal Kabob, the food was fabulous. We had samosas, three different kinds of chicken, rice with peas, naan, spinach paneer, daal, and salad. There was also fruit and kulfi (Indian ice cream) for dessert.
After lunch, Maya and the kids took out some of their aggression on the poor pinata:
We encountered a pinata malfunction which resulted in my brother having to empty the candy manually. This resulted in candy being hurled from great heights:
Which resulted in a small stampede and a few injuries:
But it was nothing a two layer Fancy Nancy cake, complete with feathers, a boa, a crown, and butterflies, couldn’t fix:
There were a few scary moments when Maya caught other little guests trying to blow out her candles. She screamed out a big “NO” and then knives were drawn in protest:
But luckily no injuries were sustained.
After the cake fiasco, we moved downstairs for coffee. My friend Nadia enjoyed a coffee lesson by my father-in-law:
I subjected my family to more pictures:
And cigars were smoked by the adults while kids worked off their cake in the jumper.
Since Maya literally has every single toy in the world, we requested that guests donate books for the Developments in Literacy book drive in lieu of gifts. I am thrilled to report that we collected at least 50 brand new books to send to Pakistan. This is definitely a great organization, and they take used books as well, so if you are looking for somewhere to donate children’s books, please check out their site or contact me for more information.
Our generous friends and family still brought gifts for Maya…she scored some gorgeous Fancy Nancy ensembles, a trampoline, a bowling alley, a tent, a new bedspread, an air hockey game, lots of great books, and a pair of cute Burberry shoes. Don’t be surprised if her shoes mysteriously disappear and you see me wearing identical shoes in my size.
All in all, the event was a success. Now I just need to get through the birthday celebration at Maya’s school tomorrow and I can breathe a sigh of relief before I have to start planning her 6th Birthday….
Fashion Backward
Considering that I live in my sweats, one would never know that I actually have a great appreciation for style and nice clothes. But I do! And as much as I dislike shopping, I do enjoy looking at nice clothes online and in catalogs. My favorites are the J. Crew catalog, Anthropologie’s website, and of course Old Navy for the basics.
I love the idea of pairing clothes and accessories that are cheap and expensive. My mother-in-law is especially good at this. She can wear Jimmy Choo’s with a shirt from TJ Maxx and she always looks like a million bucks. I like to think that I have just a tiny bit of her style and so I was very excited to have an opportunity to pull together such a look for the fabulous fashion site Signature9.
Signature9 is a daily guide to the products, places and things that define signature style. I love their site and am pretty honored that they would consider me style-worthy enough to be a contributor!
Check out my article titled Quick and Chic: 5-Minute Dressing and let me know what you think.
What luxury item(s) would you buy if you had $5,000?
Bonus Time
While most people look towards the month of March with excitement and enthusiasm for the long-awaited spring season, my family and I look towards it with trepidation. Why? Well because for the millions of people who work in investment banking, my brother included, its bonus time. And anybody who knows anything about banking knows that bonus time is stressful for all involved. Things could be very, very good…or very, very bad.
We’ve been living life on pins and needles for the last few weeks, but I’m happy to say it was unnecessary since this year’s numbers were good! My little brother did quite well for himself. Better than I have ever done or may ever do. But you know what? If anyone is going to one-up me, I’m glad it’s him.
Last night, after I pushed my jealousy and bitterness aside, my mom and I decided to throw my brother a little last-minute celebration.
I made a few of my brother’s favorites, including date muffins and pasta with a ground turkey-tomato sauce…
I even broke out my precious Williams-Sonoma bowls in his honor, but as you can see his bonus didn’t merit me ironing any of the placemats. The iron is on the lengthy list of things I am allergic to, you see.
Since my mother was present, I actually set the dining room table instead of having everyone serve themselves from the stove.
The table was complete with flowers and proper serving dishes. Shocking, no?
Dinner included some roasted sweet potatoes and asparagus…
My mom brought a chocolate cake…
As always, Maya was only too happy to help her uncle celebrate once she knew chocolate cake was involved.
And in case you are wondering, I still haven’t figured out how to take a non-blurry picture.
My brother eats dessert only once a year on his birthday so we were all shocked that he decided to partake in some cake.
He had two pieces, hence his guilty smile. It’s okay Has, you deserve it.
Since I find it much easier to write things than to say them aloud, allow me to take a minute to tell my brother how proud I am of him. Considering he works from 5:30am to 5:30pm, takes few vacations, and spends weekends in the office, he absolutely deserves his bonus and a whole lot more.
Now we just need to find him a nice girl….any takers ladies?
While I'm not going to win Mother/Wife of the Year Award anytime soon, I haven't killed anyone yet or shot myself in the head. And that, my friends, is how I calculate success these days. 
FANCY THAT FANCY THIS 
