ROCKSTAR!

My darlings!  Sorry for my absence - I've just made it through the longest weekend of maybe not my whole life, but at least of the last few years or so.  But I survived!  And Annie's ROCKSTAR! birthday party was a raging success.  We had it in my in-laws' big, shade-tree-filled back yard, which for some reason has an almost drug-like effect on young children.  They just kind of go nuts out there.  So naturally, it's where 100% of the birthday parties in our family take place.  Saturday was really windy, so most of the party decor - pink and black and zebra print, oh my! - went out the window.  I was a little bummed, but the kids didn't notice and couldn't have cared less.  The sun was shining, which is about all you can ask for in Colorado in April.  We had quite a big turnout with about a dozen kiddos running amok, hoola hooping and monkeying around on the swing set between my feeble attempts at organized dance-party games.  There was a piñata and a silly-string fight, and the most glam-rockinest birthday cake EVER, courtesy of my endlessly talented sister-in-law, who should have been a baker, among other things.  But the best part of the whole day, in my opinion, was dressing up.  I just love an excuse to be someone else for a day.  And it turned out the adults were WAY more excited about it than the kids!  I mean Annie was game - we flat-ironed her hair and sprayed the tips pink - and most of the girls got pretty dolled up.  But nothing over the top.  And not one of Annie's male friends wanted ANY part of it!  (Except Annie's little cousin Miles, bless his heart, who is always stuck with a bunch of women and is always down for playing along.)  But some of us so-called grownups on the other hand, well... we really embraced the theme... 

My sis-in-law Lindsay, the eighties rocker
Me, the Woodstock rocker
Benny, the... well he's just a rockstar, duh

Robby and Lauren, who normally don't like to play dress up, but shocked us all
by going full rockstar - guyliner and all-  and totally stealing the show! 
Dig their backstage passes!

Divas!
Olivia, Annie, Lexi and Tessa

Annie and cousin Miles, the tattooed and mohawked rocker

Miss Brooklyn, who is a rockstar every day

Jared Leto, I mean Robby, who is so rockstar he pushed Brooklyn off the tractor
(not really)

Estie and Olivia's little sister Ruby - baby BFFs!

Robby and Lauren with Estie -
practicing for their little rockstar, due this fall!

After we cut the cake, we smashed the guitar over Annie's head -
it was so metal

The aftermath of the mass silly-stringing, which I didn't get a picture of
since the kids started without me

We are just so very glamorous