Sunday, September 23, 2012

Prehistoric 4th Birthday

So I'm almost a month late in posting this seeing as my son's birthday party was held at the end of August and now here it is, the end of Sept. Oh well. Better late than never.

Maxim. The middle son. He is my heartbreaker, troublemaker and the attention taker.

And this year, he is obsessed with dinosaurs!

His party, honestly was one of the best parties to plan. It was pretty simple. And a lot of the things used for decorations I already had. BONUS! We held it at a local park shelter and it was perfect! The actual park equipment had a rock climbing wall and was all browns, tans, and neutrals. Yes, I am a nerd and actually DO care about what color the park is when planning a party. 

I knew that I didn't want to do a "cartoony" dinosaur party. And Maxim didn't want that anyways so all was good. The only thing he was persistent on was that there would be a t-rex on the cake AND that there would be a BLUE and ORANGE color scheme. (He's a Bears fan) I could work with that.

Goody bags for the kiddos. Easy. Brown lunch bag. Fold over top. Sew zig zag stitch. Finish with label . . .
"ROAR" means Thank You in Dinosaur.
Cake and handmade cake stand {tutorial here}



The cake table! The GIANT t-rex head was hand made by myself. Funny story actually. Well, at least I think its funny. We have had this giant piece of plywood in our backyard since Maxim's birthday LAST year. I originally had it because I was going to make a big Yoshi cutout for his Yoshi Party, but surprise surprise, ended up running out of time and didn't do it. So here it sat. This big piece of wood.

My husband was going to throw it out, but I stopped him. Why waste it?
I decided to use my trusty old Jigsaw and cut out a big t-rex skeleton head. And I just LOVE how it turned out!

The floral arrangements were SO simple too. We had purchase an area rug for our bedroom and you know those big cardboard tubes that they come rolled around . . . yeah, I saved that too. I cut two smaller cylinders from it, wrapped them in burlap and some orange quilt binding I had leftover from making bunting flags and done! Add some giant banana leaves and some jungle looking plants from Hobby Lobby and you got yourself a pretty fine prehistoric floral arrangement.
 

The food table! We did a taco buffet. And let me just tell you, it was seriously the easiest and least costly party food we've ever done! Inside the food warmer was a pan of turkey chili enchiladas {recipe here} and shredded taco beef. We then had hard shells and soft shells for people to choose. Lettuce, cheese, cilantro, onions, salsa and sour cream. And a burlap bag of tortilla chips!

I wanted to stick with the natural look so I picked up some recycled paper plates that were neutral. As sad as it is, I didn't get them because they were "green" I got them because they went with my color scheme. But I'm very happy that they were green too! Some blue and white striped napkins, orange forks and we were good to go!

The bunting flags, I'm basically an expert at making them now. Cut some fabric triangles using pinking sheers and sew them to quilt batting. LOVE!







Ok, it's true. I even dress to match the color scheme. Yes, I know I'm a party nerd.




So as you can see it was a really great party. Kara of Bloom Photography did an amazing job at capturing the true essence of what the party was. I cannot be more happy! 

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Vintage 1st Birthday

I started planning McKinley's 1st birthday right after he was born. He was about three weeks old to be exact. I came across this blog, Young House Love
They did a photo "quilt" with their daughter. It was amazing! {check it out here}
I NEEDED to do this with McKinley! I was too late to do a weekly one, so I opted for a monthly one.
Here's how it turned out!


Now you're probably wondering how this has anything to do with his 1st birthday. Well, really it has EVERYTHING to do with it. I planned the entire party around the colors of the fabrics used in the photo quilt. In fact, I used the actual fabric to make most of his decorations. It truly was so special!



DIY Number Wreath . . . tutorial coming soon! 


The brothers . . .


DIY Hot Air Balloon Paper Lanterns . . .



Notice the bunting flags hanging from the ceiling . . . made from the 12 fabrics!


Vintage paper straws, coordinating balloons . . . a vintage flair.


McKinley's Cake . . . simple . . . DIY Cake topper


Bunting cake topper





DIY Fabric covered party hats



The Food labels were all handmade by myself and coordinated with the invite (below)









DIY hand sewn paper napkins & yarn wrapped letters



Photo credits to the amazingly talented Kim Klein Photography LLC

Saturday, May 12, 2012

Fire Flower Centerpiece | DIY

Supplies

Old Small Rubber Basketball
Scissors
Glossy Red Spray Paint
White Felt
Fuzzy Fluffy Fabric
Hot Glue Gun
2 ft skinny PVC pipe
Two opening bigger PVC pipe
Glossy Green Spray Paint
Rocks


 I found this ball at a thrift store for 25 cents. Using scissors, I cut 1/4 of it out.

 Spray paint it red.

For the white spots cut out white felt circles and hot glue them on randomly.
For the fuzzy white mouth, cut about a 2 inch wide strip the length of the mouth. I used some quilt batting because I had it here and it worked. I did two layers to make it extra fluffy. It all depends on what fluffy fabric you have.


  To make the green pipes, simply spray paint them green. 
To attache to the "flower head" I just cut an X in the bottom center and pushed the smaller pipe through. Because the ball is rubber and thick, I didn't even need to re-enforce it with glue or anything. Just make sure to not make too big of an X. Better to start smaller and have to make it bigger than to start big right away.


Yoshi Birthday Party

So this party was from LAST August. But since I didn't start this blog until recently, I am posting it now. Maxim (my middle son) fell in love with Yoshi from the Super Mario Brothers. Maybe its because he loves dinosaurs in general, but for some reason, last summer was ALL about Yoshi.

So for his third birthday we had a Yoshi/Mario Brothers themed party. This party was SUCH a DIYers dream! Almost all of the decorations were hand made. And they turned out so fantastic!

First off, food labels. Gotta have them! These were simple. Found the clip art from Mario Brothers online and used photoshop to just make simple labels. Then I used pinking scissors to cut them out and glued them onto coordinating cardstock. 

For these food labels I made up funny names that went with the theme. It was a family party and I knew that no one is allergic to anything so it wasn't necessary to put descriptions and actual names of the food on the labels.


Ok, so this might look a little off, but I promise its just food coloring! What Yoshi party would be complete without Yoshi Egg Potato Salad?


Here is the main table. Some apects from Nintendo that I wanted to have were the yellow question mark boxes, the green pipes, a fire flower and a Gumba (little brown thing on top of pipe)


This Cake was the base of the entire party. Maxim saw one online months before and was adamant about having the "Yoshi Race Car Cake". Lucky for me, my mother has a friend who is extremely talented in the art of cake decorating AND she owed her a favor. Works for me! Isn't it amazing!




This was MY personal favorite decoration from the party. Totally DIY! And made with things you never would expect. Tutorial {here}.

And then to make it even better, I stuffed it with Mario Brothers Fruitsnacks and Cinnamon Candy in the top!


Another DIY project. Bought the chair for $5 at Hobby Lobby. I used iron on transfer paper, printed the Yoshi and name on my printer and ironed it on! Special seat for the birthday boy!


We had a photo op made out of matt board and painted to look like a Nintendo game. I made foam mustaches and hats for them to use!






Me and a couple of my closest girlfriends just HAD to get in on a photo too!