Desserts March 2, 2017

Party Animal Theme Birthday Party

It’s becoming increasingly difficult to come up with unique birthday theme ideas. During baby D’s birthday planning, I would say what helped the most to come up with a theme was asking the golden question, “What is he absolutely in love with right now?” and the answer was easy, animals. He loves nature, animals and everything beautiful about our planet Earth. Our back and forth chatter is a lot of “Oh look! Trees!” and his reply is a mumble-y, “Where’s the nest? Eggs!”. Looking forward to the warmer weather so we can build a few bird feeders together and put them up in the backyard. So what better theme to choose for his 2nd birthday but party animal!

For his party animal themed birthday there were a few things that I made sure had that animal touch, I say a few things because I don’t like to go nuts with themes and make everything animal etc. Learnt my lesson with my bridal shower when everything was Alice In Wonderland theme and it was just way too much work. (Details here.) This time, I’m a massive preggo and don’t have as much energy as I normally do, so keeping it sweet and simple was going to be it.

We had Pawsitively Pets join us for the birthday to present about 12 different animals to the children who were at the party. It was an extremely interactive event and he really could not retain his excitement. I had to actually sit with him and hold him back a few times because he was so excited about the animals. We learnt facts about the animals being presented and everyone got a chance to hold them as well. I highly recommend them for parties! Also, we had a super fun bouncy castle and an automatic train that moved on tracks. The kids were crazy about it! You can book them both here.

For the dessert table we had spread out little animal figurines, my favourite ones are by Schleich. They make toys that look extremely realistic and the quality is just excellent. Indigo online sells them or you can find them on Amazon.ca like I did. Colour theme was blue, white and yellow, hence the yellow flowers and the balloon colours.

Baking a buttercream cake isn’t as easy as it looks. Lots of steps, tools and patience needed! Maybe I’ll share some tips in a future post! Let me know 😉

For the little party hats I got the inspo from this blog post. So here’s how I made the little hats and banner:

Supplies needed
Glue gun
2 sticks (to hold the banner)
Scissors
Template
Fun paper – not too thin so it stays straight for the banner and holds well as a cone for the hat.
Thin yarn like string

STEP ONE

Cut out the shape of the birthday hats. Use the above template link! Super helpful.

STEP TWO

Use your glue gun to glue the hat once the length and size of the hat is achieved. I played around with mine for a bit. Kept turning out too long so cut the bottom little bits at a time, until I got to the length I liked. That only happened because I didn’t use the template at first, so there shouldn’t be a problem if you do use the template. 😉

STEP THREE

Take the thin yarn in a small amount, roll it into a tiny ball and glue it on top of the hat. You can also use little pom poms that you can find at an arts and crafts store, but I used this thin yarn so that I could use it also for the banner. Double use saves you a few bucks I guess.

LAST

Put some glue around the bottom trim of the little hat and place it on to the head of the animal.
When the event is over you can easily pop them off and the glue comes off effortlessly.

BANNER

Wrap the string on both sticks and cut out small triangles with your child’s name spelled out, each triangle being a letter. When you’re done just glue each triangle onto the hanging string. This party animal birthday theme was perfect! Even the adults had a lot of fun!

Party favours, we got some animal plush toys and teddy bears and attached cotton candy packs to them for a sweet touch. Check out C’est La Puf that does numerous amount of flavours of organic cotton candy. You can also follow them on Instagram or Facebook.

Whatever theme you decide on for your little one’s special day, just remember to keep in mind the fine details. I’m a crafty person so I truly enjoyed putting this together. How about you? Do you have a great idea for children’s birthdays?

easy lemon bundt cake recipe

DIY June 11, 2015

DIY – Tie Dye Pillowcase

Estimated reading time: 3 minutes

When it starts getting gloomy outside and I’m stuck indoors, I get an itch to start a new project. A simple DIY does the trick. Have you ever tried to tie dye anything?

I was going through the spring issue of Style Advisor and noticed this page of tie dye cushions that inspired me to do my own!

What you need:

1 pillowcase
1 Rit® Dye colour
1 cup of salt if your pillowcase is made with cotton
Rubber bands
Hot Water
Bucket
Scissors

Directions: Gather the center of the pillowcase in your hand and wrap a rubber band around it.

Continue wrapping rubber bands all around the pillow case by twisting different sections and tying tight with rubber bands.

Fill your bucket with 2-3 gallons of hot water and put in the cup of salt. Stir. Now put in 1/2 the bottle of dye. Make sure you wear plastic gloves. Soak the tied up pillow case into the dye water. The longer you leave it in and the hotter the water, the darker it’ll turn out. Also.it may look dark because it’s wet. Confession: I didn’t follow instructions on how much water to use, to wash the pillowcase prior to dyeing and didn’t use any particular method in tying the rubber bands as some people would.

Take out the tied up pillow case and carefully cut the rubber bands off with scissors. Rinse the pillowcase until it rinses clear water. Wash the pillow case by hand and then put it in the dryer.

5 ways to wear a womens necktie

DIY October 31, 2014

DIY Pumpkin Decor – No carve solution

DIY Pumpkin Decor

Every year before or on the day of Halloween, we look to our creative juices to come up with the next awesome idea to carve into a pumpkin. But what if you don’t want to carve a pumpkin and have an itch to do something more artsy?

Then here are some great ideas of what you can do with your pumpkin:

Set up your work area with magazine tear outs, newspaper and all the tools you’ll need to create your masterpiece.

Sequin flowers all around!

What you’ll need:

White acrylic paint
Sequins
Glue gun

Directions:

Paint your pumpkin white and then let dry. Once it’s dry, go over the pumpkin with one more coat of white paint. You’ll need six/seven sequins for each flower, glue on with your glue gun. Be careful: Sequins are small, glue from a glue gun is hot and it can get tricky placing sequins on areas where you’ve set glue. Press the sequin down gently first and pressing with your gun is your safest bet.

Tiffany blue glitter

What you’ll need:

Tiffany blue acrylic paint
Glitter glue

Directions:

This is really easy. Paint your pumpkin,dry and do a second coat. Once the paint is dry, paint the pumpkin with the glitter glue.

Fuzzy Wuzzy Pumpkin

I got mixed reviews with this one. Some people said it looks like this pumpkin just burst into “pretty” coloured warts and some love the fuzzy texture and 3D effect. Halloween decor is meant to be weird, funky and even ugly at some times.

What you’ll need:

Pink acrylic paint
Mini pompoms (Make your own: here)
Glue gun

Directions:

After you’ve painted your pumpkin with a double coat. Place glue gun glue in place where you’d like to place the pom pom. Press firmly and then let dry.