What does a 10 year old do for her birthday? Eat bugs and make a sock puppet!

My little girl turned 10 this week. Her requests were simple: A trip to the lake and a chocolate covered ant. Rainy weather and a mixup at the candy shop meant she got neither. But we still had a good time!

• First on the agenda: Take her dad to a children’s museum. Discovery Science Place in Tyler, TX had an exhibit on predators. Even us grownups learned a little!
• Second: Go to the pet store. Ask mom for another guinea pig. When mom refuses, show dad the cute little hamsters and lop-eared bunny.
• Third: Take grownups for a walk at nearby dog park.

It was a full day and I was proud to see how well she handled some minor disappointments. When we got home, we were pleased to see a box from Candy Galaxy by the door. The video below shows how she spent the last few minutes before bed time:

 Party Day

We had her birthday party a day late, so that she could spend some quality time with her dad. The party was simple this year. No splashing in the water and no science tricks. Just a good time making sock puppets and eating cake with a close friend, who has been there for her since kindergarten.

Frogs in the fridge

To fit in with a little bit of a bug theme, we made froggy cupcakes!

The frosting is 1 cup milk, 1 box vanilla jello pudding, and 1 container of coolwhip mixed with some food coloring.

The eyes are made of marshmallow halves and chocolate chips. The nostrils and mouths are made with Cakemate brand decorator gel. I got this idea from recipe.com – telling the brands I used because some people have reported bad results when trying to make these.

My daughter was very excited when I let her pick out 5 tree to top her cake with on party day 🙂

We used a mixture of sewing and super glue to attach buttons, googley eyes, pom poms, and pipe cleaners to the sock puppets.

Sock Puppet