The littlest Mermaid Party

 

(Crowns here)

My little KaiKai turned 5 in July and for weeks she has been planning out (along with my giddy self) a mermaid party. I tried to steer clear of the commercialized "mermaid" and successfully did so until the day of the party. I showed Kai the cake and she said, "Where's Ariel?". Dang it! Almost did it. So I quickly printed off an Ariel and plopped her in the cake somewhere. It turned out great though. More important, the birthday girl loved it. 

 The cake was easier than it looks. I baked two cake mixes; one in a 9x13 pan and the other in 2 loaf pans. I trimmed the 9x13 and then stacked the 2 loaves on top each other. With the extra trimming I added the two square pieces on top. I also used 5 ice cream cones. For the sand I crushed 2 different colors of cookies (graham and pepperidge farm chessman cookies).
Coat everything in icing, including cones, and add the crumbs all over. I also made some glass candy for the sea glass arch. The purple fringe cake bunting can be found in my ::Party Accessories:: shop here :)

 This little pinata was fun to make. I bought a "hula" girl, luau, party pinata and transformed her legs and hair. It turned out better than I had originally planned.

Some of the favors: a pocket mirror and a "Dinglehopper"

The table decor included a name card, mermaid head crown, a 'scale' table runner and some other shells and sand decorations. It helps to live near the ocean. I found almost all thecoral, shells and sand.

Blue Ocean Juice (my daughter called it Mermaid Water) was made of blue Powerade and some sprite. 

After the party I always ask myself why I do such crazy things...  as I'm left exhausted. But when the next day comes I'm already thinking of what we can do next year. I'M CRAZY!!!

Kai loved it and her friends had a blast.

Thomas the Train birthday party

I'm alive! Yes.

I just wanted to check in with the www and post a few pictures of my son's 3rd birthday. He is obsessed with Thomas the Train so we decked out the house with painters tape and made a train track for him to actually ride with one of his ride able push cars. He was in heaven.

I also made a Thomas the train cake. It was fairly easy, just really time consuming. You can find out how to make any type of number from cake on this website (thatslife).
After making the cake I covered it in frosting and made the tracks with hershey's chocolate bars (only took about 2 regular bars) and some black frosting. 

I also lined the cake with his favorite candy, M&M's. It took a little bit of work and time but it's all worth it for my little boy's face of complete happiness. :) The things we do for our kids..... :)

Parenting Magazine shout out

Let me gloat for a little while here.... Because I'm SO excited that Parenting Magazine decided they wanted to feature one of my little party hats in their May issue. Its out as of a few days ago, so go grab one and look at page 1 and page 80 for the little beauty. You can also read the online version with Zinio. Tip: you don't have to sign up for a few peeks. They let you read a few pages as a trial.

Can you spot it?

 Here is a close up

Page 80

Close up

Coming Soon

... Flowerlets!  Perfect, 1-2 inch mini flowers for confetti or decoration filler. 

Alright, all you amazing readers of this blog...

... I do realize that I mainly have this blog for myself and don't rely on a lot of feedback, comments, or worry about popularity on stats.  

And I am lucky if I even get 5 people to read this actual post.  

But I feel that (you 5 out there) should be awarded. So if you are reading this and are wanting anything in the shop, go ahead and get it because the shipping is on me! 

That's right, FREE SHIPPING!

Just use this code when checking out: 

BLOGFREE2SHIP

Tell your friends and neighbors too!

Oh, and grab your chalkboard painted Easter Eggs while you can!

Favor Pouches

I've been making these for a little while now, but only now decided to list them up to sell in the shop. They are the perfect size for a little treat for any party guest. AND perfect for Valentine treats. I just may be making them for my little 3 year old and her preschool friends.

I'll be adding different patterns soon- for baby showers, birthday favors, etc. So stay tuned. :)

Thunder and Lightning party/ Thor

Spotted this party on The Sweetest Occasion

I love the little details in the party favors

see more here

 

How to: Plastic Pom Garland

I wanted to make a pom garland for my son's birthday, but being in a rainy climate I couldn't rely on the normal tissue poms (especially since we did the decorating the night before).
So I created a plastic pom using strands of cut plastic table coverings. It worked out great because it matched the tables perfectly.

Here's how to make them

You'll need:

• Scissors
• Plastic table covering- the colored ones at a party store (or any type of thin plastic. you could even use strips of plastic bags)
• Twist ties or thin floral wire
• Staples and stapler
• Twine or string

1. Cut strips of the plastic about 1 inch thick and between 4-6 feet long... depending on how thick you want your pom to be. The longer it is the thicker it will be. Thicker meaning the pom will have more poof in it. Make sense? I cut mine the length of the whole table cloth-  6 feet.
2. Take each strip and wrap the whole thing back and forth around the width of your hand. This really depends on how big you want your pom to be. The wider the wrap, the bigger the pom. Sorry, don't have step by step photos of this.
3. You should have rounds of plastic now around your fingers. Next, grab the middle of the plastic and tie it up with a twist tie or floral wire. 
4. It should look like a big bow (with numerous bows). Now, cut every loop on each end. 

You can fluff and move it around to form more of a ball shaped puff. 

Should look somewhat like this:

       5. To attach them to a string to hang, simply staple a few strands of plastic, closest to the core of the pom, to the string. Like image.

That's it. Just hang it up and admire.

Tip: to take them down I pulled out the strings from the poms and stored them separately. If you leave it in it will become easily tangled. Theses poms are great because I just threw them in a plastic bag and they can be stored forever and reused in so many ways. It's not a high maintenance kind of decor. 

DIY Party Animal Candles

Bring the party animal out of someone with these adorable DIY party animal candles. 

Tutorial and images from The Sweetest Occasion

 

Miss Kai Kai's Balloon Birthday

My daughter turned the big 3 last week and we had a little celebration for her. 

The night before I spent about an hour filling up balloons.

tip- there are cheap hand pumps at Wal-mart for about $2-3 in the party supply section.

It will save your diaphragm from bursting.

I pumped about 100 and then decorated the house with them.

These signs and garland led her to our downstairs after she woke up,
to where all the balloons were. 

When she got downstairs and saw everything she whispered, "wow!". 

It was a priceless moment and, to me, worth going to bed at midnight the night before.

Then, she just sat in the middle of them all for a little while.

We celebrate every meal with some candles and the song "Happy Birthday".

This was dinner. She had strawberry cookies instead of a cake
since we were having cake the day after for her party. 

Invitations I made for her party

-it was really simple:

I had some scrap paper with clouds on them 

(you can even draw clouds on paper too)

I then cut out small circles of washi tape and

placed them on the paper like balloons. 

Next, draw strings with a pen and 

then write the party info along the cloud lining.

Back it up with card stock and ...

Viola!

::The Party::

The birthday girl

My daughter loves lollipops, and since they are pretty much in the shape of balloons, I had to make some. I made li hing mui lollipops

(recipe here, I altered it a bit and added jello powder for color and flavor instead of t

he recipe flavor and coloring. I also omitted the powdered sugar. 

After pouring it into molds, I dropped a li hing mui seed in the center). 

The kids liked hitting the water balloon pinata's! 

We eventually had to tape a plastic fork to the bat so they would break.

They were tough balloons!

Since our house was filled with balloons I used a few and strung them on a string for a garland outside.

The favors were personalized water guns and sponge poms

They are easy to make too:

Cut a sponge length wise into three strips.

Cut as many as you like for each pom, just as long as you can tie them.

I used 2 sponges, 6 strips, per pom.

Then, stack them together and tightly tie a string in the middle around them all.

Happy Birthday Miss Kai Kai!!