Birthdays and Calendars

I've added a calendar link to my sidebar. I've often lamented that my area doesn't have a good one-stop source for information about family friendly happenings and we often don't find out about some great event until we read the story about it in the newspaper after the fact. So, I've collected event information from many local sources and combined them into one calendar. I've tried to keep the focus on low cost options and so I've highlighted free events in green as a reminder to myself that we don't have to spend a lot of money to live a good life.

On an unrelated note, we recently celebrated my step-son Ethan's 11th birthday at home which is something that we haven't done in a few years. While I strive to strike a balance between fun and frugal when it comes to the kids' parties, we've been holding them offsite for the past few years simply because it's easier. No cleanup afterwards. No worries about things getting broken with 15 kids running around our small house. This year, however, we had a simple birthday celebration and it was a nice change. Ethan decided ahead of time to have a family lunch party at home and then Dad took him to meet up with his friends at the mall that afternoon to go see the new Narnia movie.

The decorations were simple. I hung the birthday banner that I made last year and hubby and Anna took a walk and picked these beautiful lilacs.

The table was very simply set with a vinyl tablecloth that could easily be wiped down (because I have three nieces and nephews under the age of five) and I didn't want to stress over trying to keep a nice cloth one clean. What I really would like to find is a clear, plastic one to protect my nicer cloths.

We had barbecue chicken sandwiches that were cooked and kept warm in the crockpot, potato salad, veggies and dip, and chips. I made a pitcher of pink lemonade and set out another pitcher of ice water. The napkins were left over from last year's party.

The cake was a bit lopsided but yummy. The two layers were filled with strawberry frosting. Here is a picture of the birthday boy blowing out his candles.

Anna's 9th Birthday Party

We celebrated Anna's 9th birthday last weekend with a pool party at the YMCA.

The birthday girl requested a chocolate cake with purple frosting.

There were some other yummy snacks.

Note to self: next time don't fill the pinata so full. It was so heavy that it broke our broom handle.

The Birthday Book

Since it seems like there's a birthday happening around here every few months, I've decided to corral all of our birthday related material into one spot for easy reference. Hence the birth of the Birthday Book.

• I created a section for each person where I can keep notes on party theme ideas, party invite lists and gift ideas. This is handy because we tend to invite the same kids each year and it seemed like I was always hunting for addresses.


• There's a section on party games and instructions for making crafts such as pinatas, paper party hats and goody bags.


• There is a section for party food. I'm always seeing cute cakes and kids party ideas in magazines so this is where I save them.


• I also keep a section with information on area fun parks, party places, arcades, bowling alleys, gyms, and sport parks that offer kids parties. Instead of calling around every year, I keep a list of their phone number, website, pricing information, and related information.

Cupcakes

There's a fourth grade class who will be enjoying these dark chocolate cupcakes with purple-ish vanilla buttercream frosting today. Perfect treat for birthday girl to bring for the last day of school before the Thanksgiving holiday break.

While I was making these last night, I thought about how special I would always feel whenever it was my turn to bring treats in to school for my birthday. We'd get to bring a friend along with us to help hand the extras out to the principal and the ladies in the office who would all 'ooh' and 'ahhh'. I made sure to make lots of extras for birthday girl to share.

Aren't those the cutest cupcake toppers?

I printed them from this template at Martha Stewart's website and then taped them to toothpicks. So much fun.

Birthday Luau

When Anna turned 7 we asked her how she wanted to celebrate. A luau? In November? In New York? OK.

We bought leis at the $ store and handed them out to everyone as they arrived along with a nametag sporting the Hawaiian pronunciation of their name. On the invite we encouraged guests to wear Hawaiian shirts and my husband even sported a straw hat! This was a great theme and it was easy for everyone to get involved.

We crushed up graham crackers to look like sand and sprinkled this over the top of the cake. A dashboard hula dancer and paper cocktail umbrellas finished it off.

We also served fruit kabobs, pineapple smoothies, and Hawaiian pizza.

The Entertainment:

• We played 'Hot Coconut' (played like hot potato). A coconut was passed around and once the music stopped whoever had it was out. Afterwards, my husband took the coconut outside and cracked it open so that the kids could all try some coconut milk.
  
  
• Of course there was a Limbo Stick.


• I love piñatas because they’re relatively cheap to make (a balloon, some newspaper, flour, water, and paint) and they serve several purposes. They act as a party decoration, a party game, and also can be substituted for goody bags. For this party though we found a parrot shaped piñata at a garage sale over the summer for 50 cents.
  
  

Hamburger Cake

Here is the Big Mac cake that I made last year for my step-son's birthday.

It took me a lot longer to put this cake together than I was expecting and it was a tad difficult to transport. All the ooohs and ahhhhs more than made up for it though. I used the Woman's Day recipe, but replaced the pine nuts with slivered almonds.

Birthday Garland

Since birthday season is in full swing around here, I've been wanting to make one of those Martha Stewart-esque paper garlands.

I printed my letters onto colored paper using a really big font. To form the circle shape, I traced around a coaster and then cut them out. Then I glued the colored circles to pieces of card stock that were a little bit bigger (I used a slightly larger coaster).


Next, I punched two holes near the top of the circles and strung them on two different lengths of yarn, but I think next time I will use thin ribbon instead.

Here they are hung up for my husband's birthday dinner. I plan to use them for the girl child's party next weekend too.

Princess Birthday Tea

As the girl child's birthday party approaches, I thought it an appropriate time for a visit from the ghost of birthday parties past. Last year, we hosted a Princess Tea Party for my step-daugther's eighth birthday.



For the The Invitation:

I used Microsoft Word to format the wording and print the text for the invitation using a royal looking font. I also used a crown clip art image. I printed these out on regular paper and then aged them by painting them with coffee and laying them on the kitchen table to dry. This caused them to get wrinkly, crinkly and brown (and to smell very good). I then cut the text to fit on a half sheet of card stock in a parchment looking color. I folded the cardstock in half and glued the invite text inside. For the front of the card, I cut out and aged the crown design, glued this down and used jewel stickers from the dollar store to embellish.

The food

• Since there were so many goodies, we skipped the cake and opted instead for cupcakes arranged on a pretty cake stand.
• Chocolate covered strawberries
• Peanut butter cracker sandwiches
• Ham and cheese roll ups
• Hot cocoa and warm cider were made ahead of time and kept in some pretty coffee carafes.
• PB&J, tuna salad and chicken salad sandwiches were made and then cut into heart and flower shapes using cookie cutters.
  
  

Decorations

• We made place cards for each of the girls by writing their names (using non-toxic gold markers) on a green apple and setting it on their plate.

• The table was strewn with curled streamers and gold wrapped chocolate coins.

• We used real table linens and china for an authentic touch.
  

The princess opening her gifts.


The Games

• We made a prize basket containing one prize for each game (plus one extra just in case). These prizes came from the $ store and my gift closet. The winner of each game drew a prize from the basket with their eyes closed.
• Princess Mix Up – This one is played like Telephone. The birthday princess was trying to get a message to the queen. We didn’t give out a prize for this game, but it was a lot of fun.
• Ladies Relay – We had the girls split into teams and relay raced balancing books on their heads. If they dropped their book they had to start over.
• Royal Pictionary – We used a whiteboard and markers and had the girls draw clues for all to guess. We used royal words, such as, crown, prince, knight, etc.
• Pin the kiss on the frog – My talented husband drew a frog onto green poster board and I cut lips from red paper. I wrote each girls name on the lips ahead of time. We gave the girls tape for the back of their lips, blindfolded and spun them around a la pin the tail on the donkey.

• Poison apple – The girls sit in a circle on the floor and when the music begins they pass around the Poison Apple. When the music stops whoever has the apple falls asleep. We continued to play until there was only one girl left and she was the winner.
  

This party really was a lot of fun. When the girls arrived they were greeted at the door by the servant (my husband). He welcomed them, took their coats and showed them into the back room where he announced them as Princess So and So. We printed out some princess coloring book pages ahead of time put them on the table with a bucket of crayons to occupy the girls who arrived early. Once all the girls had arrived, the servant announced that the tea was to be served in the royal dining room. I (the queen) ate at the table with the girls and we were waited on by the servant. This was a lot fun too and we even used a little glass bell to summon the servant. Partway through tea, we were entertained by the jester (my step-son) who told some royal themed jokes. After tea we went into the living room and played a few games. Then we had a special throne for the birthday girl to sit in as she opened her gifts.