It's a Pirate's Life for Kyle!

For Kyle's 5th Birthday we decided to have a Pirate Party.   Everywhere I looked I was inspired with new ideas for it.  I didn't go overboard with this party in terms of decoration.  My main focus was activities.  This was the first time we were having a party that was comprised mostly of Kyle's own friends.  (still, we somehow managed to have more adults than kids...)  Our main activity, and the one Kyle was most looking forward to, was a Treasure Hunt.  I so badly wanted to do this outside, and was determined to do so.  After all, in upstate New York, by the end of April we can usually expect at least decent weather, if not lovely weather.  The weekend of his party was forecasted to be chilly, but dry.  The night before his party, I decided that yes, we would do the hunt outside regardless of weather.  I spent 2 hours coming up with clues and making treasure maps-everything looking authentic-of course.  Much to my dismay, I woke up to rain, and we had to move everything indoors.  But, as they say, the show must go on.  Lucky for me, the kids were still thrilled with the treasure hunt.  At each stop the children had to perform a "pirate" task in order to earn their pirate gear.  The change from outdoors to in made these tasks a bit challenging-but here they are!

Stop number 1:  Rescue a parrot from a cage.  They had to open up the cage, each rescue one parrot (we used various bird beanie babies for this), and then toss the bird into a bucket, which was "safe".  Once they'd done this, they earned a pirate bandanna, which I made using pirate print fabric.

Stop number 2:   Swim through Mermaid Tunnel.  We have a light blue tunnel, so I put some of our mermaid friends around it, and had them "swim" through on their tummys.  Once they completed that, they earned an important piece to their pirate wardrobe-their eye patch!

Stop number 3:  Walk the plank! This was fun, and really easy.  It was the one game I was able to bring inside that I had planned for outside.  I had purchased a piece of  scrap wood from our hardware store for $1, and painted "Walk the Plank" on it. Once they did that, they were given their final clue to go search for the sword which was needed for:

The Treasure Chest Pinata!!

We even had a pirate to guard the treasure! The kids each had a turn with the (plastic) sword to try and break into that treasure chest.  I even took a whack at it, with no luck!  It was a lot of work, but the kids loved it!  The treasure chest was filled with gold coins, golden jewels, stickers, ring pops, bracelets and various candy all wrapped in gold.  The kids dug right in, just like real pirates!! 

For food for the party, I made "grub bags" for each of the kids.  In each bag, there was a sunbutter and jelly sandwich (safe for our friend with a peanut allergy), a pouch of apple slices, a pouch of goldfish, and a juicebox.  For the table I made a mast and sail, and each spot had a pirate activity placemat.  

Even though I hit a few road blocks while setting up for this party, everything went off without a hitch.  Kyle loved having all his friends there, and they all had a great time! 

Happy 5th Birthday to my sweet little Pirate! Wow, how time flies! 

-Lindsay 

Sunshine Party for "One"

First birthday parties are fun for me because I get to pick the theme.  Babies aren't really "into" characters yet, and don't really care what the cake looks like, or who you invite.  For Lily's first birthday, I chose a "sunshine" theme.  I love singing "You are my Sunshine" to her, like my parents and grandma sang to me... and I actually got the idea for our blog title while planning her 1st birthday party.

  Recognize this brand new "sunshine" baby... only 5 days old in this picture, born the same day as Lily, 1 year and 30 minutes later!  Carlyn, at her first party!!

I had so many ideas for this cake, and ended up doing this VERY simple cupcake/cake from Martha Stewart's website.  She made a Sunflower cupcake cake, and I just adjusted the decorations slightly, to make it a sun, instead of a sunflower:) 

The little circles above I made using the computer, and hung them across the ceiling, near the windows.  There was one "sun" for each month of her first year.  You can see below on the table, I attempted to keep the food in a "yellow/orangey" color theme.  Nothing too crazy, because cooking scares me way more than baking.  In the kitchen we had a sub tray.  It wasn't allowed on the yellow table, because it did not match :) 

On a side note, I looked EVERYWHERE for a yellow party dress.  I couldn't find one that I liked anywhere, until I stumbled across this little outfit at Target!  I love Target!

Happy Sunny-day! -Erin

Cow-GIRRRLLLL Party

Ella was seriously into Toy Story prior to her second birthday. For her party, I wanted to incorporate her love of all things "Ka-bee" (or Cowboy/Woody-to non-Ella speakers), but also her love of all things fancy. Enter-Ella's Cowgirl Party! I found a pair of adorable pink cowboy boots and a pink tutu for her to wear, and I went from there with her party theme. This party has been my favorite to create, as I found a lot of great ideas, and was able to really personalize them to my taste!

Next on my to-do list was the cake. I knew I wanted a cake covered in cow spots. I decided to make a double layer 8" cake. I filled the cake with buttercream frosting made from scratch, and then frosted it in the same buttercream. (this was before I knew to fill cakes with pudding-YUM!) I tinted some of the buttercream pink, and piped that around the bottom of the cake with a star tip. Next up was the fondant. I purchased pre-made fondant and tinted it brown. I then rolled it out, and cut out cow spots with a sharp knife. I laid them carefully on the cake, and was really pleased with the way it turned out. The cake was still missing something, so I decided to make a cowboy hat, and the number 2. To make the hat, I rolled out 2 circles of pink fondant and one strip of the brown fondant. I carved a small divet into the top of a large marshmallow, and covered the marshmallow in buttercream. Then I covered it with one of the pink circles. I then placed the pink covered marshmallow on top of the other pink circle, and added the brown strip around the base of that hat. I curled up the sides of bottom circle. When I was finished, I was impressed that it actually looked like a hat! (all that time watching cake shows on TV paid off!) To accompany my cake, I made about 40 chocolate cupcakes and frosted them with pink buttercream, and topped them with brown sprinkles-cute and easy-peasy!

For decoration, I used several paper lanterns in pink and white, and hung them from tree branches with ribbons. I also made a few signs with pictures of Ella, and added some cute "cowgirl" sayings using Picasa and Picnik. My favorite sign was this one below. I blew it up to an 18x24 print, put it on foam core, and added a long dowel. I tied ribbon around it and stuck it in one my hay bales.

We used the hay bales as seating for the kids, but they made for a great place for a photo op too! We even got a picture of our pug, Jax!

In order to keep with the theme, I wanted to serve Cowboy grub. We had pulled pork sandwiches, corn on the cobb, baked beans, mac and cheese and corn bread. I ordered the pork from our grocery store, and was able to make the rest in advance, so that I was able to enjoy the party and not have to worry about the food! I also made some "smore's on a stick" using marshmallows, chocolate, graham crackers(or sometimes sprinkles) and lollipop sticks. The kids loved them! I didn't plan for any games at this party because Ella was only 2, and not into that yet. The day was beautiful, and we just enjoyed spending time with our family and friends!

-Momma of a Cowgirl, Lindsay

Easter Rainbow Cupcakes

I spend a lot of time decorating the outside of cakes and cupcakes, but I never think to much about the interior.  It should be moist and delicious of course, but as long as I bake it completely, I don't put much more thought into it.  I don't make cake from scratch, and I have no cake loyalty....Betty, Dunkin, Dough Boy...whoever is on sale!  On one of my Pinteresting evenings over the weeks preceding Easter, I noticed everyone posting Easter crafts, and desserts (which I had done none of).  I also noticed a post for someone making a rainbow themed birthday party.  I am done throwing parties until next winter, so I can't steal the rainbow party theme, BUT that doesn't mean I can't make rainbow cupcakes...I will just use Easter colors, and they will be Easter cupcakes!!  Well, come to find out this idea was not original, as others had already created "Easter rainbow cupcakes."  Someday, I will come up with some creative treat all on my own, until then, here's some Easter cupcakes, Erin-style:)

This is Classic White, Pillsbury box cake mix, divided into 3 bowls.  I had my kids pick out 3 colors from a few options I gave them.  I only added about 3 drops of gel food coloring, so that my colors would be pastel.  Brayden choose green, Lily picked yellow and pink. 

When I "craft" I can't do it alone... if my children's eyes are open.  They will NOT leave me alone, so regardless of if I want their help or not, I'm getting it.  Brayden is the cleanest 4 year-old I know.  Lily is a typical, messy, loud, quick-moving 2 year-old, and can create a mess as fast as you blink your eyes.  I-never-learn... she had this yellow batter up and over the entire circumference of the glass bowl with 1 single rotation of the spoon.  And then puts her whole face to the table, to lick it up.  Mmmmmm cake!

our colors

I put each different color in a 1 gallon plastic Ziploc bag and cut and VERY small hole in the tip.  Cake batter comes out super fast (compared to icing) and if you are trying to layer the colors, you want it to come out s-l-o-w-l-y. 

Ohhhh quick, Lily is watching Lion King, we can put the batter in the cupcake pans without her "help."  Brayden did the green, mommy layered pink and yellow. Add a very small amount of each color.  Remember you're still only filling about 2/3rds of the cupcake tin, or you'll have overgrow when you bake them. 

Well, Lily is back, but Simba distracted her long enough for me to finish filling the pans.  She was so excited to see all the colors!

Here's the "after" baking picture.  I liked how they looked better, un-iced, however, my kids don't eat the cupcake- just the icing- so if I wanted to share these with them, they had to be iced.  

 I did not come up with anything creative at all in the icing part. I didn't even make it from scratch. I piped it with a tip and added Easter sprinkles!  And then immediatly ate 2:)

Happy cup-caking! -Erin

Dinosaur Par-Tay

dinosaur cake

After a full year of dinosaur obsession, Brayden decided he wanted to have a dinosaur themed party for the big #4!  Shocking!!!  Now... Brayden doesn't have a favorite dinosaur show, or even dinosaur.  He just loves all things dinosaur.  He loves big scary dinosaurs, small baby dinosaurs, dinosaur eggs, dinosaur fossils, dinosaur nests... you get the idea.  So, that gave me a lot to work with, and of course, I wanted to try to incorporate everything.  Again, I always like to start with my cake idea, and go from there.  I do a lot of buttercream cakes, although I LOVE the look of fondant, I hate the fact that most people peel it off, don't eat it, and toss it in the garbage.  I know I do!  So, I've been practicing a lot, on making smooth buttercream cakes.  It's an obsession.  I think I did O.K. on smoothing the dinosaur cake, but I could have done a lot better. Below are a few pics of my dinosaur cake creation process.  This was a total of 3.5 hours.

 For the bottom of the cake I used 9 inch cake pans, and created 3 layers filled with chocolate pudding.  I leveled the top of the cake, stacked and iced.  The cake was from a box, the buttercream was from scratch.

just keep icing

I made the top layers of the cake using a 6 inch cake pan.  This was also 3 layers.  I used a 6 inch round cake board, and straws I made Scott take from Starbucks, to support the cake.  (Starbucks has great straws, they are thick, and do not bend).  You can see the cake board in the above picture, but eventually it was covered with icing.  There are 4 straws under the board, going through the bottom cake to support the top layer. 

After icing the cake, and used ABC fondant cutters, to make his name out of bright orange Wilton fondant.  Because the buttercream was fresh, the fondant letters stick right to it. 

 I made the dinosaurs with fondant too.  I cut the fondant with dinosaur cookie cutters, and added some fondant spikes, spots and eyes.

The volcano was the final piece.  I just used a small pyrex backing dish and when the cake was cooled, I cut around the top to make it rounded like a volcano.  Red buttercream piped down the sides to look like lava. 

We held this party at a local park building.  The picture above, is a dinosaur "cave" with a nest inside.  The cave is streamers hung from rope.  Inside the cave is the nest made from long pieces of brown packaging paper.  There are spotted balloon dinosaur eggs and blow up dinsaurs.  ROAR!

dinosaur nest and eggs

tar pit!

To get into the dinosaur cave, we played a game where they had to jump over the "tar pit". Scott tossed dinosaur egg balloons out, and the kids had to run around and retrieve them, without falling into the pit!

kids running around collecting the dinosaur eggs!

I also created small dinosaur eggs, follow this recipe but instead of usIing coffee, I used dirt.  If you use too much water they will take a really long time to dry out...like days, so give yourself plenty of time.  At the party we hid the eggs, the kids had to find them, and then hammer them open to find the small plastic Dollar Store dinosaur inside.  This activity was a huge hit with the littles!!

finding dinosaur eggs

smashing them open!

I tried to make the food dinosaur themed too.  We had dino shaped chicken fingers, dino shaped PB&J sandwiches (made by daddy), and colors of food that matched the party.  The banner I made with scrapbook paper, dinosaur die-cuts, and letters printed of a Word document. 

dino nuggets

dino PB&J

Happy Dino-sauring- Erin

A party for a little Birdie

I love themes. I love to make a theme out of everything. Party gift? Themed! Bedroom decor? Themed! Birthday Party? You bet your rear it's themed! For my daughter Carlyn's 1st birthday I'd decided to create a bird themed birthday party for her. My inspiration was her bedroom, which is also bird themed. I'm not some kind of crazy bird fanatic or anything-it just happens that there is a lot of cute bird stuff-especially early in the spring, which is when Carlyn's birthday is.

Fun fact: Carlyn and Lily share a birthday...one year and a half hour apart. So, while Erin was busily working on hair for Lily's Tangled party, I was busily building nests for Carlyn's Birdie party.

Erin has much more patience than I do when it comes to details for a cake. Don't get me wrong, I love making cakes and cupcakes for my kids parties, but when it comes to decorating them, if it's not easy, I lose interest fast. I'm a fan of sprinkles and fake items to adorn the cake. We were hosting 2 parties for Carlyn this year because having 60 + people in our house at one time was just overwhelming. I wanted to make it simple. For cake, I decided to make 60 cupcakes, and 2 small "smash" cakes for Carlyn (one for each party). These were pretty simple and I was able to do all the decorating in the morning before her parties. I did however, craft a "nest" out of twigs to place under my cupcake stand. Here it is!

and her "smash" cake

One of my favorite details from the party was the cake pops nest I made. All the cred. goes to Bakerella for the "how to" on cake pops. They are adorable, fun and kids LOVE them! I made mine into little egg shapes, covered them in pink and white chocolate, and put cute spring colored sprinkles on them. I love how they turned out! I purchased planter holder from a craft store that had the shape of a nest, and placed foam blocks inside it. Then I layered brown moss on that. I stuck in the cake pops and viola! Cake pops in a nest!

I did a few other crafty things to prepare for the party. Months in advance I made tissue paper pom poms to use. They were hanging in my girls bedrooms ready for the taking. I made a "Happy Birthday" banner, as well as painted a few bird houses (with help from the kiddos!) for decoration. Here is a picture of my mantel with some of that work!

For party favors we did a gift bag filled with mini bird houses and paints, as well as a few kid friendly treats, and probably some candy-because I can't not include candy!

And finally, here is a picture of my sweet little birthday girl!

Happy Birthday to my sweet little Birdie! I hope she had as much fun at her party as I did creating it for her!

-Lindsay

Organizing toys

Lindsay is full of the great organizing ideas.  She blames Sean and his minor OCD on some of the organization, but she's the one that keeps it all together on a day to day basis.  Toys are always in baskets in special spots.  Cars go with cars, and trains go with trains, baby squishy toys go in baskets that are easy for baby access.  She has drawers and baskets for all things baby or child related.  Go Lindsay!  Lindsay found this fun little cubby bin at Target to help organize toys in her play room.  Several of our friends, including myself, have also purchased this cubby bin because it is, just that great! 

luggage labels from Target

I added self-laminating luggage tags from Target, with pictures, to my bins so the toys stay organized in the correct bin.  This does work sometimes, but I think it might be more for my benefit...and now for yours:) 

see puppet bin

I also use this shelving unit, also from Target, with added baskets, and my labels for more toy organization.  This bin is in my foyer!

Happy Organizing!!!  Erin