Let the EPIC tea party begin...

It's Sunday and yes my house is cluttered, there are toys literally EVERYWHERE, and the laundry is in the middle of being done. The only room in our house that is cleaned is the kitchen. My philosophy is the whole house can look like a bomb has gone off as long as the kitchen is cleaned. That's where our food comes out of and it's #1 priority every week to at least scrub it from top to bottom. Bathrooms come second in that long list of priorities that I know I should be better about, but I've said it a million times before, "I'm not that kind of mom." At least I can be honest about the way I mother. I've known I've been this way since, well pretty much forever. I'm a clutter bug. Clutter doesn't bother me, filth on the other hand bothers me a whole bunch. 

A few weekends back my bestie and I decided to take a couple of hours for ourselves and get together and go hunting. Hunting for what? Anything that struck our fancy. On those special trips that she and I get together for I'm never really on the hunt for one particular thing, but I'll definitely know it when I see it. On this particular day I had no idea what I was looking for, but GOOD LORD I knew it the second I laid my eyes on them! Elements off of Main, a super cute shop in Columbia, IL, where I grew up has some fantastic finds! I love going there, and on this particular day I hit the "MOTHER GOLD!"

My EPIC Find!

Before I was a mother I wouldn't have given these little cups and saucers a second glance. On this day I felt like I had won the lottery! They were beautiful and sweet just like my little girls that where at home, and who I knew would love them for years to come. How many wonderful memories could we make together with these simple and inconspicuous little dishes? I even thought the colors were perfect!

3 little cups

So when I got these home I stashed them away and planned over the next couple of weeks just how to surprise my littles with what I would consider an EPIC tea party. Columbus Day I had the day off and I spent it by myself. I baked cookies and prayed that the rain would stop so that I could surprise them when they got home from school. Unfortunately, man plans and God laughs. The rain never let up and my hopes for our tea party were drenched just like every stitch of ground outside. That didn't stop my dream of giving my girls a great time. I kept out a couple of cookies and froze the rest. Mitch was wondering how this was all going to play out and was happy that I left some cookies out for him. 

He's such a great dad, and told me that he would help me out taking pictures when the weather finally let up. That gave us the window that I was hoping for. He's all for helping me out when I want to create memories and have photographic evidence for later when I'm older. I want to be able to remember how it felt to be young and have my girls stay young forever too. There will come a time when they get bigger and leave to live their own lives and I can keep our memories alive one picture at a time.

Hot Cho Cho and Chocolate Chip Cookies!

I prayed all last week that this weekend would give me the weather that I'd been praying so hard for weeks. I checked Weather.com and it looked PERFECT! I was so psyched. My philosophy with gifts, surprises or anything that I do for others is Go Big or Go Home! If you are going to make the effort to do something for someone, better do it all the way; I don't like to do anything small. So with that in mind I figured the best thing was to keep it a secret as long as I could. So on the way home from the park today I told the girls I had a surprise for them after nap time. The only hint that I gave them was that they had to dress up for it! There was a light that sparked in their eyes when I said they had to dress up! My girls LOVE to dress up! It starts when you're about 4 and never really stops for girls...or so I've been lead to believe. 

Let the party begin

I loved every minute of this

After they got up for naps, I told them they had to go into Sophie's big dress up suit case and find some great dresses for our big surprise! I thought they were going to fall over each other trying to get down the stairs! We decided on hot "cho cho" and cookies. Sophie couldn't say cocoa when she was littler, it came out cho cho and it just kinda stuck. I believe it might forever be hot cho cho in our house for the rest of our lives. I'm okay with that. 

What's a tea party without stuffed animals? You can't leave out the friends!

This is what happiness looks like!

Percy's, like the sons I never had!

They are as much a part of Sophie as anything ever will be.

Gotta share with our animal friends.

THIS look was worth the weeks of waiting!

So all in all the weeks of waiting were totally worth it! The girls were surprised and they really loved it! Roo even said, "Mom? Can we PLEASE do this again next weekend?!?! I really loved this! Can we even eat dinner out here too maybe?" It's the little things like this that make having girls such a blessing! I will be able to get so many more tea parties out of those $12 dishes and make so many more memories with my littles before they get to big. Then we'll be having grown up girl parties and we'll switch out the hot cho cho with adult hot cho cho! 

Even the Percy's had to lay down and rest after the festivities!

Till next time...

Hope you all had a great weekend too!