Elyssa's Pink and Orange Party

My Baby had her 10th birthday this weekend. I can't believe it has been that long. 

When I asked her this year what kind of party she was going to have she said, "orange". I asked, "Orange and what?" And she replied, "Orange and Pink!"

And so it was! 

I tried to keep everything in the orange and pink with out introducing too many shades. Also I was very careful to only use orange and pink no matter how many times I was tempted to throw in a green or purple. 

Almost everything I purchased was from the dollar store.

So here was my first project. 

I saw it at a baby shower I helped to host at the beginning of the month. My Best Friend made these, and when I asked where she found them she told me about the Duggar Family. I must be the only person on the planet who doesn't know who the Duggar's are!

Any way she said that Momma Duggar made these as a decoration for her daughter in law's baby shower. (no doubt she probably used different colors)

I was completely blown away by the simplicity! So easy, yet they have huge impact in a room. They can be used as center pieces or whatever. I think we even gave them away as gag gifts at the last baby shower. 

So you take a roll of toilet paper and center it in the middle of 2 sheets of gift wrap tissue paper. Pull the tissue paper up around the TP and tie with matching or contrasting ribbons. 

 I made 6 of them.  It took about 10 minutes. (We had the TP and the tissue paper cost $2) I had 8 sheets of tissue paper left over

Then we decided that we would  make some head bands for the girls. These were very inexpensive, and easy to make, but a little more time consuming.  We made them while watching a movie.  (total spent on these was $4)

For the boys we decided we needed to have masks. 

I went to michael's for these and spent $4.47 for 9

My cake plates were left over from the wedding I catered in November.  I used 5 minute epoxy from the hobby store to glue the $1 plate to the $1 wine glass. I have used these over and over. These ones are stacked Just for the photo. I stacked 3 of them, and they are all different heights. I spent $1 on the netting to tie around the stems.  

I used these as cupcake holders. I taped them around my finished cupcakes. The ribbon was $3

Elyssa and I made tissue paper flowers just for fun. 

Then we decided instead of loot bags or goody bags we were going to make candy leis. They were super simple and not very time consuming. especially if you make your kids help. 

I spent $6 on candy but, I had a lot left over.

I needed to dress up my kitchen door. So where the curtain rod (that is still empty) is I taped some of the ribbons up. Now I get to take them down and use them on gifts.  RECYCLE!

We made some pinwheels to hang from the ceiling.

 I got the pattern from heartland paper on their website. It was a free down load with 3 different sizes. They are super simple to make, it just takes a while to cut out all the pinwheels. Then I taped a streamer to the back and we tacked them to the ceiling. I had all of the paper, so the total cost was $1 for streamers. We are going to hang them in her bedroom. RECYCLE!

here are the cupcakes they had pink and orange frosting and a coordinating peep on top.

I wanted to have something a little bit healthier and as I was looking through my cupboards for inspiration I found 4 half empty bags of trail mix all different kinds. With lots of dried fruits and nuts and seeds. So I poured in some dry cereals and found these wild pink banana candies at walmart. So I poured those in as well. Total cost $1.50 for the banana candy.

Here is the table before I filled it up. $2 for table cloths.

More pinwheels above the table.

Here are some of the kiddies feasting. I also made a healthy options tray. for the adults that stayed.  It had celery and carrots, wheat french bread cubes, cheddar and swiss cheese slices, broccoli, apples and ranch dip. Then in a pink bowl I had some cheddar crackers in the shape of farm animals.  I was given a huge tray of cookies!  and I made punch. It was pink lemonade with sprite and raspberry sherbet. 

I think this was one of my favorite parties. We played easy games. 

 The first one: I had 4 buckets of water 2 were full of water, and had 6 sponges in them each. Next the kids were divided into 2 teams of 6. They had to transfer all of the water from 1 bucket to the bucket on the other side of the yard just using sponges.  The team to empty their bucket first was the winner. 

The second game we played: Was an egg race. I gave each of the kids a spoon and an egg. I did not tell them that I had hardboiled the eggs. I wanted them to think they were fragile!

Next with the egg on the spoon and one hand in their pocket they had to get the egg safely across the finish line and if they dropped their eggs they had to go back to the beginning. well guess what? This was too easy for even the small ones. So we made them do it with their opposite hand. Still to easy so we made them carry the spoon in their mouth. That was more of a challenge for some. 

The last game we played: Was like a cake walk the only difference was, we were not playing for cakes we were playing for some cool sunglasses. 

I think we all had a great time. Elyssa loved her party! 

I had decided not to do a family party or go to dinner or anything like that. We just had a kids party and called it good. I thought that it would be a lot less stressful! And it was! 

Mini Figs on Parade

My kids have become bloggers. Big surprise. RIGHT?  Well after having taken all of the proper safety precautions I finally gave in and let them have their blog. It is a blog dedicated to Legos and all the stop motion videos that go into their kind of play. I encourage you to stop by and check it out.

www.minifigsonparade.blogspot.com

It is a sad day!

My camera went missing last Saturday!
 I Don't know what happened to it but it is gone. I am hoping it turns up soon. I don't know if it got put somewhere out of the way or if it is just hiding somewhere. I know that there was a lot of confusion during clean up of the baby shower. I know I was in a hurry to get to my next meeting. I know I am sad. I like my camera. It is not fancy, But it is mine. I know that camera intimately. I know the favorite settings I have on it. I know it like the back of my hand. OH, camera please come home!!! I miss you! I need you! I want you! My blog needs you! what will I ever do if you do not come home?

February Photos of the Month

These are February's photos! I did not take too many this month and I am kind of bummed about it. The ones I did manage to take are great. Maybe not technically great photographs but they represent great memories or experiences.

This first photo is of Ashton, he is very much into the stop motion videos. These videos are created when you take one photo at a time and each time you make a very minor adjustment to the subject in the photo. Then when you put them all together and play them fast it looks as though they are moving. Kind of like the old animation. He makes these all the time and he has such great patience! In this particular video he has the chopper blades spinning and from the right side of the screen some little ducks made out of legos surround the chopper. He has even uploaded some of his videos to youtube.

Here is Elyssa's domino version of the Eiffel Tower.

Last week while playing with the dog. The kids discovered that she is missing some teeth! You can see that her front bottom tooth is gone and there are a few others not visible in this shot. She is getting old, 10 years as of December.

This is the bright spot of my kitchen. I am forever trying to buy flowers from walmart on clearance to brighten up the place I spend most of my time. Lately looking out this window has been so dreary. The weather and inversion are gray all the time and I needed something "sunny". My husband does not bring me flowers EVER! So I buy my own. HE makes up for it in the fact that I have not had to put gas in my car in over 5 years! I don't know if I even know how? He makes up for it in other ways as well. His love language is service. He is always doing something for me!

The last photos are of our future garden. We decided that we were having major spring fever so we started some seeds. You will have to scroll to the bottom to see the first pic. this is the last pic. All of these seedling pics were taken during the the last week. We taped our camera to the counter top and decided to take a photo every couple of hours. Ashton will eventually take all of the photos and make a stop motion video. I have only included a few of the pics we took. I had to eventually stake the seedling to bamboo skewers. (not shown) the tall plants you will see are white patty pan squash. The plants in the foreground are green onions. In the very middle row we planted bell peppers, but they are not up yet. All of these photos were taken over a 4 day period. I have peas in the window, but there are no photos of them, because my camera was taped to the kitchen counter.

Car First aid kit winner!

I got 2 whole comments on this blog post! I really thought that to be fair I would make up 2 car first aid kits and send them both to the people who posted a comment!

So Jolene and Melissa, watch for your kits next week!