Our Special Girl's Night Out - Making Earrings

    Having 4 children is a blessing.  There are times when people ask what it is like to have a large family.  I always give them this blank stare, because I don't feel like we have a large family, and yet I know that it is.  In our house it is never quiet.  Someone is always singing, laughing, shouting and / crying, and sometimes all at the same time.  Loneliness is a word that I am not acquainted with.  There are times that I would like to feel lonely, just for a few minutes (during my bubble bath for example).  Having said all of this, there is also very little time for one on one attention.  Everything must be shared, like it or not, this includes Mommy and Daddy's attention.  There is just not enough time in the day for "one" person, and this includes me.  If we want to have one on one time, we have to really carve it out.

    Our library, The Tweed Public Library  www.tweedlibrary.ca has been offering some wonderful classes to the children in our community.  There have been art lessons, sewing lessons, knitting, crochet, dance and my girls favourite the beading class.  Cindy Crowson from Bead Girl has been coming to Tweed to teach beading.  Riley loves it!  She looks forward all week to Wednesday nights.  Because of scheduling (that means overlapping children's schedules) Grace has only been able to do one class.  The girls love it so much that I decided maybe we could do something special, just the big girls.  I made invitations and they each handed them to friends inviting them and their moms to a "Make and Take Christmas earring making party".  It would be real quality time with my big girls.

    We rented the library's meeting room.  In the end there was just a small intimate group of us (8).

It was a beautiful evening.  It was just so nice.  It was quiet, with the occasional giggle from the girls.  I have to admit that I love the sound of their girly giggles.  All of the girls were beautifully behaved and so polite, it was like heaven.  

    We made 7 sets of earrings.  Cindy would stand at the top of the table and give us a step by step on how to make them.  She would then walk around and help anyone who was having trouble.  I'm sure that my Mom and Glenda were getting tired of me uttering with a happy sigh " Oh this is just so nice."  It really was just so nice.  It was nice to take a break from high fevers, puking kids, and life's responsibilities.  It was nice to watch such simple little things like beads, come together to make something that is beautiful.  It was nice to spend quality time with my big girls and their big girl friends.  It was nice to spend time with my Mom and to spend time with my friend, it was just nice (could I say "nice" anymore times).  I guess that the word "nice" to me if we were doing word association means "calm".  Calm is something that I don't get as much as I would like.

    When we got home, the girls were so excited to show Daddy their treasures that they had made.  I will admit, the earrings were beautiful.  Honestly the earrings look like something that you would buy in an upscale boutique.  I acted cool about it, but really I wanted to push the girls out of the way to show Christopher my own treasures.  I just could not believe that I had made such beautiful things with my own hands.

    The idea behind us doing the earrings was to spend time together, but also for them to make gifts.  They would be giving their teachers earrings that they had made themselves.  The problem is that the girls LOVE all of the earrings that they made, and apparently do not want to part with any of them.  They looked hurt when I reminded them "that" was the whole idea behind our evening.  "But they are too pretty to give away!" an affronted Riley gasped.  I guess that we will just have to see who can part with their treasures.

    So the end of the story, we had a really wonderful night, grown-ups included.  I think the general consensus is that we need to do this again after Christmas.  I think this time we may travel to Cindy's shop, although that could be expensive (I think I'm addicted to jewelry making).  It was a nice way to spend creatively, with nice girls, and their nice Moms.  

    If you are as impressed as I am with the earrings and want to buy the kits, then visit www.beadgirlonline.com