My First Girly Birthday Banners!

Door Banner


After seeing some of the banners I made for my boys' parties, a friend of mine asked if I would help her with some banners for her little girl's first birthday. Of course I said yes! I never get to make anything girly, so this was so much fun! The inspiration was the floral paper on the door banner. Hobby Lobby sells a whole line in this print for birthdays. They also have matching scrapbook paper and wrapping paper too!

Welcome to a Lazytown Party

My son had been obsessed with the obscure Norwegian children's show Lazytown for a year. He dressed up as Sportacus for this past Halloween. He really wanted a Lazytown party, and of course I knew we would have to figure it out somehow! Thanks to ebay and the Nick Jr. website, I was able to pull it off! And thanks to some unseasonably cold temperatures for early May (in the 50s), my little boy's 5th birthday party was his first one held indoors. The picture on the welcome banner above is him at Halloween.

The giant Sportacus and Stephanie were found on ebay, along with the Lazytown mylar balloons.


We used the colors of the three main characters for our color scheme--royal blue, purple and pink. Luckily, my son loves purple! We also focused on the royal blue! Each of the main characters had a centerpiece, made of a plastic bowl filled with hershey kisses and a picture of the character mounted on a dowel rod.










Three flavors of drinks--"Robbie Rotten's Sour Grapes Lemonade," which was purple Koolaid and frozen lemonade mixed together; "Sportacus' Spectacular Power Punch," which was Hawaiian Punch; and Stephanie's Stupendous Pink Lemonade.

My favorite part of the entire party were the favors. Each child received a bubble stick in one of the three colors, AND they got to fill a bag at Ziggy's Candy Bar! Ziggy is a character on the show who LOVES candy! There is no better reason to include a candy buffet at a party! I enlarged a picture of Ziggy to make the sign for the candy bar. I did the letters on my Cricut. The backdrop for the sign is wrapping paper! We had so much fun getting the candy bar together! And everyone loved it!

My Guy's 6th Birthday

These were his treats for school . . .

Turn Out the Lights (the party's over!)

We had the big Go Diego Go party for my youngest son's fourth birthday on Saturday. The only thing that didn't cooperate was the wind! We had to majorly tape some decorations down, modify others and watch some blow away! But at least it wasn't raining, and it turned out wonderful anyway! Here are some pics . . .


We set up a "Follow the Tracks" activity for the kids to find the party in our backyard. There were four guessing stations where the kids saw tracks on brown paper like this . . .
The tracks led to a sign taped to the house. . .
. . . which they could open to find the answer.
Once the kids "found the party," they came to a little table where they could make a video watch. They chose which animal they wanted, glued it on, then I put it on their wrist. They also got a Field Journal (laptop), that had the animals they had to find in a scavenger hunt. They put a sticker beside each animal as they found it. Once they found all 4 animals, they showed it to me and received a reward (beach ball globe that shows animals in their native countries--it's in a picture later).


Here are some pictures of decorations--outside and inside.
See the wind blowing the table trees?
The wind eventually blew the balloon tree tops away!




My handmade vines. I didn't put many outside because of the wind. So, the steps ended up with most of them!



The food was a big hit at the party. We had a kids' table with PB&J and chips, and for the adults, we had a Mexican spread. A taco & nacho bar, cilantro-lime rice, pasta con queso and my in-laws' famous homemade salsa! We also had fruit kabobs, jungle leaf sugar cookies and chocolate covered pretzels.









And don't forget the cake, made by a fabulous local bakery!

Our pinata was a palm tree that I found for $8 at Walmart the week before the party. I converted it into a pull-string pinata.

Bags to put goodies from the pinata in.

We had a rainstick making station on top of our deckbox (which kept the kids away from all the lawn toys inside!) We used paper towel rolls, which I covered with scrapbook paper. I had one end sealed already. The kids added aluminum foil coils, then poured beads in (which I had premeasured in cups labeled with each child's name.) Then they taped on the other end and added a pre-printed name label.

And last, but not least, the treat bags!



Everyone had a great time, especially the birthday boy and his big brother! I am glad, relieved and sad that it is over! A little like the day after Christmas! No birthdays around here until January!