Monkey Party

My little pumpkin monkey turned 3.  I decided to throw her a monkey themed party because she can be found swinging on door handles, scaling kitchen cupboards, dangling from cupboard edges, jumping off couches and doing summersaults all over the place.  A monkey party was the only fitting theme. 

In case a monkey party is a suitable theme for one of your children I'll share a few of the details.

This coloring page was my inspiration for most everything.  You can find it by going here

I used the coloring page monkey to design and create the invites.  The mouth opens to reveal the party info.  I printed the party info onto a sticker sheet (I found them at Office Max).  I cut around the information and stuck it inside the monkey mouth.  A link to print off the monkey card pattern is at the end of this post.

Snack cups-filled with my monkeys favorite: Dorritos.  These are Martha Stewart inspired.  The monkey face is created with circles (one large for the mouth-cut in half and two small for the ears).  The eyes and nostrils are drawn on with black marker.  The cups are from the Dollar store.

Party guests included these super adorable Dollar Store monkeys.  I added pink tutu's and hair bows for the girls and bow ties for the boys (see end of the post).  The hair bows and bow ties are attached with a piece of sticky velcro.  The monkeys were a huge hit as a take home prize.

I wanted to create monkey treat bags but didn't have time to cut out all the pieces from the monkey face invite to put on the bags so instead I printed off the monkey from the coloring page, chalked it, cut it and hung it by it's tail on a ribbon.  The treat bags held non-edible prizes mostly (since her birthday is on Halloween and the kids don't need any more candy).

Toilet tissue roll binoculars were for the banana hunt and monkey hunt we did in the yard.  I wanted to make these super cutesie but I got a reality check and decided that since they were for 7 kids under the age of 5 they didn't need to be fancy.  Duct tape did the trick.

A simple monkey cake.  For some reason a cake and candles are the last thing on my mind with birthday parties.  I almost always forget-hence the super simple cake design.

Monkey cupcake toppers on chocolate cupcakes watched over by this handsome and furry guest.

We played pin the tail on the monkey

Then each kid got a pair of binoculars so we could head to the backyard to find all the bananas those silly monkeys spread everywhere.

The bananas were made out of Dollar Store paper plates.  I taped candy on the backs of some and spread them all over the yard.  The kids had to find some and put them in their paper sacks so they could feed the monkeys later.

After they found all the bananas they set out to find the monkeys.  It just so happened that there were a bunch hanging from this tree.

Each kid got to pick their own monkey pal to take home.

Then there was cake and goodies and opening presents.  It wasn't until the presents part that my little pumpkin monkey finally decided having a birthday party was alright.  The mom's loved all the details even if they were lost on a 3 year old.  

Here's a close up of the treat bags.

Mr. & Mrs. Monkey

Here is the link to the coloring page I used to create the birthday girls special shirt

And lastly here is a copy of the monkey card pattern pieces.  Happy party planning.

Scan Doc0001

We are getting ready for another party

Well I am alive-just overwhelmed (slightly) by these 3.  

 I want to write on this blog all the time but really if I have a spare minute I would prefer to pee or get a drink or talk to a friend so the time to actually sit and type something is very limited.  But we do have some really fun stuff coming up at our house because these little monkey is turning:

 Yep-3.  And since she is my Halloween baby I always love throwing her a party.  This years theme is monkeys.  We aren't have a monkey party because she loves monkeys but because she is a monkey.  So here are a few sneak peaks.

These are the invitations (a pattern will be coming)

Part of the party favors-Dollar Store monkeys with homemade pink tutu's

Treat bags

Stay tuned everyone (and I mean it-I promise to be back) with more monkey party ideas and patterns/links.

Small Fry's 4th Birthday-Rainbow Style

I don't know if anyone even reads this any more but I keep doing fun things and thinking, "man I have to blog about this" and then I remember I am taking a break from blogging.  But I just couldn't hold out any longer.  I had to share something.  What better to share then Small Fry's rainbow birthday party. 

 The rainbow shirt was made by me.

 She isn't into really one thing in particular so we chose rainbows because they are springy and fun and perfect for our beautiful weather we have been having (except on the actual day of the party when it was cold and so windy that we had to have the party indoors). 

Here is the table (minus the punch but it is pictured below).  I had rainbow cookie pops, rainbow cupcakes in a jar, rainbow cake pops made by my amazing brother, a mini rainbow cake for the b-day girl to blow candles on, and treat bags that contained rainbow gum balls (forgot to get a picture but I do have a link to share) and rainbow glow wands.

 These are the rainbow cookie pops.  You can find the directions and recipe here.  The recipe is for edible playdough.  I have a post coming about the whole experience-which was fun and yummy (a big hit with mom and kiddos alike).

 You can find paint chip everything these days.  I wanted to make a few garlands for the party and my eye just couldn't get over the paint chips at our local hardware store.  Aren't they perfect for a rainbow party.  You would pay a bunch to make this from cardstock.

 Utensils wrapped in napkins with rainbow napkin rings (made from cardstock).  Little utensil pockets made from paint chips would be cute too.

 I made another garland out of these kind of paint chips (I just cut them in small triangles).

 In all my preparations I forgot to make an actual little cake for the candles to go on so my aunt and I ran to the store and bought this mini carrot cake.  I scraped the frosting carrots off the top and sprinkled colored sugar to make my rainbow on top.  It was perfect and easy.  I think I would do it that way again on purpose.

 These are cupcakes in a jar.  I think they are my new favorite thing.  I didn't take the time to make them perfectly layered as a rainbow but they still turned out beautiful.  The cake was so moist and because they nearly filled the jar there wasn't much room for frosting so they weren't sickening sweet.  They were a big hit with old and young at the party. 

 Rainbow cake pops made by brother who is working hard to become a famous pastry chef.  My husband said he could have eaten 40 of these.

 Rainbow juice (the cheap cheaters method).  I wanted to have a rainbow assortment of juice for the party but I had 2 set backs.  #1.  I couldn't find all the colors of the rainbow in juice containers and #2 the ones I did find were too expensive.  So I bought clear koolaid mix (it is flavored but not colored).  I made 2 batches and then poured it into my cups.  Then I added a tiny drop of food coloring to each cup, stirred and TADA!!! You could make it in 6 colored batches as well but I didn't have enough juice holding containers to do that.  It was fun because the kids were dead certain some tasted different than others.

All the printables I got from here

And this is the link to the gumball ideas as well.  Mine said, "I hope you had a ball at my party.  Thanks for coming."

Isn't it such a fun party idea.  I didn't even touch unicorns but think of what you could do with rainbows and unicorns for a little girls party. 



Look Hoo Turned 2

Wanted to share a review of the big 2 birthday party.

The cake

Take home prizes for kids and adults

Owl masks for the little kids

Candy bars for the kids

Cupcakes

Graham crackers (note-don't make the night before-oops)

The birthday girl

Loaded up with all her knew loot.

Owl Treats-Owl Birthday Week Day 5

No actual pictures from me today as I am busy making these

 and these

Both are the last of my owl creations before the big party.  I will post pictures of the event in a couple of days and pictures of my sweeties in their Halloween costumes-you will not want to miss those.

Hoo's Hiding -Owl Birthday Week Day 4

For my pumpkins birthday party I wanted to do a hidden owls type game.  I had originally thought about sewing a bunch of small owls but when I started that project I instantly realized it would be way more work than it was worth.  So after some trial and error I came up with these: mini paper bag hoots.

They are made from a regular lunch sack paper bag only cut down about 3-4 inches at an angle (to form a point).  I fused some fabric to the front for the belly (using heavy duty Wonder Under) then I stuffed the bag with a piece of newspaper.  I folded the top of the bag over and stapled it to form the head of the owl.

 Then I added eyes and a beak.  I love how these look like they have so much attitude.  They were so quick and easy to make (and would be even faster if you had a circle punch or two to help). 

 I think I made a least a dozen.  The plan is to hide them all over the backyard for the littler kids to find.  They can keep one if they want or we can just hide them again and play again.  The game is meant for little kids (under age 3) so these won't be terribly hard to find but they are kind of sneaky.

See what I mean.