Here are a few ideas:

* Serve iced tea but don’t use plain ice cubes. Ikea has very inexpensive plastic ice cube trays in all different shapes like stars and hearts. They make you laugh.

* You can have lovely ice cubes by putting edible flowers like calendula, or johnny jump ups in the ice cube. Fill up the tray with water halfway, let it freeze and then add the flower petal and additional water, and let freeze. (Make sure you use flowers and petals that haven’t been sprayed with any pesticides.)

* Cut up a lemon or lime and put it in the water glasses. Or add a sprig of mint.

* Place cut flowers on the table. And if you don’t have any flowers in your garden, cut a branch off of a tree or bush in your yard and place it it a vase.

* Light some candles regardless on the weather outside or time of day.

* If your serving a light lunch, cut off the crusts of a sandwich or use a cookie cutter to cut hearts or star shapes. Even peanut butter and jelly sandwiches taste better when you show your guest that you’re glad they are here.

* Use the good dishes that you are always saving. Stop saving them and start using them.

* Put on a fresh tablecloth or a runner on the table. You can also layer tablecloths for a dramatic look.

Stop by the store and come up with a little gift to give them. This time of season is perfect because for under a dollar you can purchase a potted flower. A few packets of flower or veggie seeds wrapped up with ribbon is another idea.

When you let your guest know that you put time and effort into her visit, she feels special. It honestly doesn’t take that much extra time and you will enjoy your time even more.

What small gift idea can you suggest? Or easy entertaining tip have you tried?

Often I bite my tongue and hold my breath as I watch my kids struggle, stumble and find their way through the teenage years and into young adulthood. This transition for me is hard to watch, yet as I let go of my children, I am beginning my own journey into a new phase of my life.

After homeschooling for 19 years and my last three kids now in a homeschool charter school, I’m looking at new options for myself. In the past, my hours were jammed full with explaining the area of a cylinder, verb phrases, piles of notebooks, lost pencils and “yes, you need to read 20 more minutes.” But that now is changing.

Three years ago I took an online writer’s course which changed my life and I began writing part time for regional parenting publications. Writing on a variety of topics including parenting issues and women’s health keeps me invigorated. I’ve interviewed a former Congressman, an Olympic athlete, doctors, authors, and a plethora of psychologists for my pieces.

One of my favorite assignments was about a foster care program called Camp to Belong designed to reunite foster siblings at a week long camp. Sharing my parenting journey and advice about what do you do when your kid wants to go vegetarian was personal yet hopeful for any hesitant parents. (There’s three of us veggies in the house now.)

Additionally, I also discovered that I love being a virtual assistant. I’m managing a Google Group for the 2012 Blogathon and as well as doing research work virtually for a professional writer. I love the variety that it brings, the tech knowledge I learn along the way and the fast pace.

With two recent graduates from George Fox University (Mom brag!) at home, along with their three siblings, my house is still very full, busy and chaotic. I can now share with my oldest, who’s a new personal fitness trainer that he needs to learn how to use Buffer to schedule his tweets and send out his own newsletters with MailChimp to keep his name in front of his clients. Getting a little tech savvy…hmmm?

Confidence comes with age, and I want to take on dreams that I’ve held on the back burner. As I’m transitioning into a new phase, I’m blogging this month about an honest fear in own life. It’s been worth the risk of sounding a bit whiney and feeling vulnerable because my fears have connected with people. And as those fears are losing their grip in my life, other fears don’t seem to be that big any more.

 (Kayaking was not my idea of fun but because I’m a bit scared of the water, I had to try it with my hubby. It ended up being a thorough work out and I felt so empowered that I faced it.)

What fears do you face in your newest life transition?

1. Celebrations at Home – Inspiration for stylish entertaining: I love this site for all the colorful ideas and the energy it produces when I read it.

2. Party Blueprints Blog – There’s no place like home…for a party: The authors, Dawn Sandomeno and Elizabeth Mascali are also the authors of Plan to Party.

3. Reluctant Entertainer: Sandy Coughlin’s blog started me thinking about this very subject. Her book, Reluctant Entertainer is filled with ideas and tips to invite people into your home. In fact, she’s going to be on my blog next week where I’ll be having a giveaway of her book!

4. Pizzazzerie – Entertain in style: Here are pages of party ideas for all seasons and all ages.

5. The Celebration Shoppe: Custom invitations, creative party decor: Inspiration in crafting and creating.

I’m always looking for new ideas. What is your favorite party/entertaining blog?

By Estelle Sobel Erasmus

Planning my now three-year-old toddler’s birthday party every year usually takes on all the stealth of a military mission. Cake ordered. Check. Dora topper for cake that birthday girl-to-be requested. Check again.  Every day it seems another item has to be ordered, planned or purchased. And it goes on and on until the very moment the party is launched.
So, to help you put your own mission- toddler party into action, here are a few steps I have taken so I can give my daughter an age appropriate party her friends (and their parents) can enjoy.

1) Send an Early Save the Date

After I cobble the guest list together, based on my daughter’s input, I make sure to send out an early save the date email (nothing fancy, simply covering the bases–What, When, Where and What Time. Now when I say I send the save the date out early, I mean usually two months before the party. Why so early? Because my daughter’s bday is in the Spring, like lots of her friends and classmates; and most parents actually do plan their social calendar that far in advance. This also gives me the opportunity to get the date scheduled for the party that I want before the other parents call dibs on it during the same popular birthday week.

2) Location Location Location

For my daughter’s one-year-birthday it was perfectly fine and acceptable to have her party at my home, with a few other babies (barely walking), and a local guitar-playing music teacher. Now that she just turned three-years-old, those days are long over. If you think you would enjoy having a bunch of screaming toddlers running all through your house, then have it. But don’t come crying to me when one of your guests flushes your new iPhone right down the toilet (true story, it happened to a friend of mine). You’re far better served by reserving a time at a play space or gym like Gymboree, Little Gym or Kidville, where the toddlers can run free and burn off that prodigious energy. Let it be the staff’s job to corral and entertain them…not yours.

3) Make a List of Preferred Presents

Inevitably, people will ask what to get your child? Be ready for them, with a short list of favorite characters from TV show and movies; and also take notes on what your child likes to play with on play dates at other people’s homes.  In my case, I told people that my daughter loves Dora (and the year before I told them she loved Elmo). I also mentioned what present from the line of Dora products she already had (the dolly with the pink streak in her hair, that came with the comb and attachable hair additions). I also told my parents that my daughter liked the Barbie guitar, she had seen (and appropriated for the afternoon) at her friend’s birthday party.

4) Get Crafty

Toddlers love to do crafts, so why not make it a part of the party. My daughter had made a door hanger at a get together, and I saw she enjoyed putting stickers and coloring on the cardboard paper. I knew I didn’t want to do a craft with a glue stick (it always gets on anything anyway, who are we kidding), so I browsed through the craft items at Oriental Trading, and came up with the perfect one: A small sippy cup with a removable insert that the parents could take out when the cup was washed and then put back in. I spread crayons and markers on a table and tons of stickers and let the kids have at it, while eating their pizza and cake. They loved it; and so did the parents because it was one craft that the kids were able to do without the help of the adults present.

5) Get a Great Goody Bag Gift

A great goody bag is always a hit at a party. It leaves the kids something to look forward to and when they are brought out it is a signal that the party’s over for parents and kids alike. I check the $1.00 bins at Target; where I’ve found great attractive containers that I can use to fill with goodies like markers, washable tattoos, stickers, small balls, inexpensive sunglasses and other items. I can always depend on Oriental Trading for wonderful, budget-friendly items.

Because I just can’t stop at five, here are a few more tips I’ll throw in for free. Stick to pizza, cake and cupcakes for the food. Most children love pizza (and there are vegan options and options for those kids who are lactose-intolerant). Never have your toddler open his or her presents in front of the other children (unless you want to see a sitcom-like play of “that’s mine,” “no, that’s mine,”. And finally, and this is really important: always send them home right after they have had cake. Wait too long, and you will be dealing with their sugar rush, not their parents.

For more party planning information, check out this post from my blog

What kind of easy tips can you share about throwing your child a party?

Party on!

Estelle Sobel Erasmus is a former magazine editor, journalist, author, columnist and blogger who can be found at her author page at Estelle Sobel Erasmus and on twitter at @mommymusings011. Her blog is Musings On Motherhood, Mid-Life and Other Forms of Madness.

When my kids were younger for four or five years in November, we opened our home to 20 or so teenagers along with some parents to have an early Thanksgiving dinner. We supplied the turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy while everyone brought a dish as well as various toys to fill the Samaritan’s Purse Christmas shoe boxes for kids around the world. Our home buzzed with activity those evenings with laughter, singing, and crazy fun.

Our home has supplied “a home away from home” for various college students who needed a place to crash over the weekend or if they needed a ride to the airport from school.

I tell the kids to make themselves at home and anything they can find in the ‘fridge, they can have. They’re not guests so I’ll yell at them just like I’d yell at my kids. And somehow they just seem to grin.

I want my kids to learn that you can throw together food and provide a fun atmosphere for their friends without a lot of work.We do get too busy sometimes but this Mother’s Day, I’ve had to remember what is important.

Food shared tastes so much better than eating alone.

How do you open your home to friends or family?

List’s always make our planning easier.

Yet, it’s a fear that runs through my head and stops me from having people over. And since this is my time to face my fears, I want to confront this thought.

I’d like to blame the media because it’s so easy to but I’m the one who sometimes looks at decorating blogs or buys magazines with pictures of beautiful, large homes. And those pictures are staged. The dogs as well as the kids were probably locked out of the room as the photographer was taking the picture.

Yes, it’s fun to visit someone who has an unusually large home but my friends all have nice sized homes with average furniture and an average dog and an average family.

I want to be invited into a home that I may have to move a laundry basket off the couch so I can sit. I want to have a cup of coffee with a girlfriend while she picks up the breakfast dishes as we talk about our kids. The human connection is what is important and not size of the home.

My house is just fine. It doesn’t need to change. When I see my fears down on paper, they lose their grasp on my heart. I can brush them aside and keep planning for my party.

Have you ever worried about the appearance of your home? (And yes, these photos were just freebies.)

However, when it comes to a party, I need to settle down and actually do some planning for the big day.

A tentative schedule that includes a calendar of what needs to get done by when will keep me organized. I know the schedule will help me not stress as much, and I’ll be far more calmer on the actual day of my event.

My plan right now includes:

* Deep clean house a week before the party so I’ll only have to do light cleaning a few days before.

* No new recipes: Don’t experiment on my guests. Pick a recipe that I can make the night before.

* Decide if I want music on low in the background. Ask kidlet how to set up iDock/Home.

* Find candles and matches.

* Pull out any fun dishes and USE them. Stop waiting to use my good dishes

* Plan my purchases: food, flowers, and any party favors.

* Ask the master baker (AKA as hubby) to plan on making his delectable chocolate cheesecake.

These are just a few suggestions for my event.

What would you have to put on your planning list?

My brother, Rob took this amazing photo in Laguna Beach, California.

Here are a few of my favorite party books:

These books on entertaining are filled with tips, too, on what to watch out for and provide you lists of planning steps.

I’m a bit of a party book addict so I’ll be sharing more titles in the days to come.

(And please remember, sometimes reading books can be a bit intimidating because they are so over the top. Yet, think through their ideas and see how you can make it work for your party.)

Where do you go to find party ideas?