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Entertaining

Crafts, Entertaining

Charlotte’s Birthday – Decorations and Favors

When we first started talking about Charlotte’s birthday party months ago she said that she wanted to have a bouncy slide.  We asked her if she wanted to have her party at the inflatable place in town and she told us that she wanted to have it at Memma and Papa’s house.  After getting approval from them we moved on to a theme.  At first Charlotte said that she wanted a cupcake party.  But a week or two later she said that she wanted a Minnie Mouse party.  So we rolled those together and added her favorite color and created a purple birthday party with Minnie and cupcakes!
We set up tables for the kids to eat cupcakes on the patio area.  I got balloons from our local party store with purple weights to weigh them down.  But it turned out that the day was too windy for the weights to keep them down so we cut some of Mom’s hydrangea’s and put them in cases to hold the balloons down.

From the beginning Charlotte requested cupcakes with purple icing.  So that’s what she got!  We served these purple cupcakes on Minnie plates with Minnie napkins and cups.  Charlotte also requested cherry lemonade so we had some of that along with regular lemonade, water, and Arnold Palmer’s (half lemonade, half sweet tea).
When I was trying to decide if we should have a small cake with the cupcakes I looked up Minnie cakes on Pinterest.  I was letting Charlotte look through them to see if she liked any (she didn’t, she stuck with purple cupcakes) she saw some cake pops and after asking what they were decided that she needed some cake pops at her birthday party.  After that if you asked her what she wanted for her birthday all she said was “Cake Pops!”
I didn’t think it would be hard to find a bakery who makes them but I was wrong!  I had gotten some recommendations from Facebook but the places I tried from those suggestions either didn’t make them anymore or there was some confusion.  I finally found a bakery in our hometown to make them and KayKay and GrandDavid were nice enough to pick them up for us!  Funnily enough, Charlotte didn’t even eat her cake pop (they were actually balls without sticks but that was the best I could do!) until two days after her party!  But she did enjoy it then!

We decided instead of just getting a bouncy slide to get a bounce house with a slide.  This was the perfect decision because the kids had so much fun!  We used a local rental place and they were fantastic.  They even brought it and set it up early that morning because they had free time so we got lots of extra play time!

For favors, I made play dough in fun colors (pink, purple, red, green, and blue) and put them in bags for the kids to take home.  I used this recipe from How Does She.  I hadn’t ever made play dough before but this was really easy (and gave me an arm workout stirring it on the stove!).  The dough is still really soft and feels great.  I will probably make this recipe again when I make more.  I made a recipe of each color and found that I could get about 10 silver dollar sized balls from one recipe.  So if you’re making it for favors keep that in mind.
I worked hard on these and stressed about them that I would have enough for the kids that hadn’t replied but might show up.  And in the end I walked back inside after the party and realized that I forgot to hand them out at all!  I didn’t want them to melt in the heat outside so I left them inside and they didn’t even cross my mind when people started leaving!  Oh well! I’ve run some around to the neighborhood kids but if you leave out of our neighborhood and came to the party I owe you some play dough!

Entertaining

Charlotte’s Birthday – Invitations

This year I continued my trend of taking a picture of Charlotte and making my own birthday invitations.  Charlotte kept going back and forth between wanting a cupcake party and a purple Minnie’s Bowtique party so I went with purple and pink cupcake invitations.  The back had the pertinent information like date, time, place, etc.

I made these cards with the Make a Wish template set from My Lil Creations.  I bought this back in 2010 when Tina had a big sale and have never used them until now but they were perfect for these cards!  I have been so pleased with everything that I have bought from My Lil Creations, so if you’re looking for a good supplier of Photoshop graphics, she is definitely a place to check!

I have the invitations printed from Pro Digital Photos.  I used their press cards/ploppers setup to order 5×7 cards.  I used this company to order our Christmas cards this year and was very pleased with the quality and quick turnaround.  I originally ordered the 5×7 cards on the linen paper which is the same as what I used at Christmas.  They came and the fronts looked beautiful and I flipped them over and saw that I made a typo in Charlotte’s name on the back!  Jason and I had both proofed it but must have flown right by it!

So, in order to save a little money on the re-order I re-ordered them in just the card stock.  I was so surprised the next day when I received a call from someone at Pro Digital Photos!  They had printed the original invitations and when they started to print the repeat they called to make sure that everything was ok.  They wanted to make sure that I was happy with what they had sent me the first time.  And even after I told her that I was re-printing because of my error, they gave me a credit for half of the re-print cost so that I wouldn’t have to pay full price twice!

The cards came in (correct the second time!) and I loved them.  Thanks to their awesome customer service, quick turn around, ability to upload your own images, and great quality I’m not sure that I’ll ever print invitations/cards anywhere else!  Check them out if you need cards because they also have beautiful card designs that you can order just like any of the other online photo sites.

*Disclaimer: Neither of these vendors know that I’m writing about them and I wasn’t compensated in order to write this post, just given a credit because they’re a great company!

Entertaining, Recipes

The birthday before…

So far I’ve considered Jason and I to be in our mid-twenties but I think with Jason’s birthday just past and mine approaching I don’t think I can consider ourselves by that title anymore.  This was Jason’s last birthday before the big milestone and it probably couldn’t have been celebrated in a less low-key way!

It always amazes me how quickly Jason’s birthday approaches after Christmas.  I know March should seem like a long time since December, but somehow I’m always taken aback when it rolls around!  This year I had a meeting in Tuscaloosa the day after his birthday so we celebrated the night before his birthday.

When we started talking about his birthday Charlotte decreed that he would have a birthday cake with polka dots.  By the time it was time to make his cake it had morphed into a cake with polka dots AND sprinkles! Such is the life with a two year old little girl making your cake decisions!  Thankfully, she did acquiesce and let us make the yellow cake with chocolate icing that he requested, she just had rule over the decorations!

I wasn’t sure how to make polka dots but remembered a pin on Pinterest about making candy dots.  I figured that candy dots on a larger scale would be perfect so Charlotte and I set out to make them.  They turned out great but to warn you, this recipe makes a TON of icing!  We still have three almost full cookie sheets of dots and hearts and letters in addition to what went on our cake.  That being said though they were really easy to make and very fun to write with and they still taste yummy a week or so later!

Charlotte chose purple, pink, and green polka dots! Sorry Jason!

This was the point I realized we had waaaay too much icing!  I had done all this, still had most of the bag of pink and the larger bag of purple and the smaller bag of green!

Thankfully Jason is easy to please and he didn’t care what his cake looked like as long as he 
got to eat it!

Charlotte loved the cake!  She ate it in big huge bites!

However, when she finished her piece it cracked me up so much that I had to take a picture.  Charlotte takes after Mom and I in many ways, and one of them is eating salty things along with her dessert.  Case in point here, she was eating her cake along with sweet potato fries and a dill pickle (that’s what’s on Kitty’s head).  The funny thing is that she ate around the icing (which is also what my Mom does) but then took one bite with the chocolate icing and refused to touch the rest of it!

James enjoyed our celebration from his bouncer with his elephant!

Even though our celebration was a day early it was still a day to celebrate the wonderful husband and father that Jason is.  We are so blessed to have him and are so thankful for all that he does for us!

Christmas, Entertaining, Family, Friends

3rd Annual Christmas Party

Four Christmases ago (how was it that long ago?!!?) we decided with our friends Kelly and Tripp to throw a Christmas party.  Kelly was pregnant and we did all the cooking ourselves.  We also went all out on desserts and made a chocolate raspberry cake!

The next year Caroline had arrived and I was pregnant but we wanted to have the party again so we again made everything ourselves.  And that year we went ALL OUT and made a Southern Living cheesecake-stuffed chocolate cake that was fantastic but took so much time to make!

Last year….well, we were tired.  We had recently moved and had a six month old, Kelly and Tripp had an 18 month old, and we just couldn’t pull it together.

But this year we wanted to pick it back up and I’m so glad that we did!  We did the smart thing this year and catered the party.  Although there were problems with the caterer we still ended up with tons of food that was really good (Kelly and I decided that we aren’t comfortable with the amount of food/drinks/cups/plates/etc that we have unless we’re sure that we have triple what we need!) and no one other than ourselves (and now all of you!) knew that there was a problem.  We had a great turnout with some friends that we’ve had for forever and some new friends.  It was so good to see everyone and enjoy some Christmas merriment without the kids around.  And it was the first party where neither of us were pregnant so we really got to have fun! 🙂

We took some pictures before the party really got swinging and I’m so glad we did because hosting you never get to stop and take pictures during the party.  I love these!

We even got to grab a picture with Jason’s brother Kevin and his girlfriend Stefanie before it got crazy! Does anyone else think I don’t belong in this picture?!?! Kelly and Tripp literally burst out laughing when they saw us stand together.  Poor, short me!

Overall we had such a great time at the party and are looking forward to working out the kinks and continuing the tradition next year!  I’d say the party’s a success when your last guests leave at 11:30 and it doesn’t even feel like it’s 11:30!

Charlotte, Entertaining, Family, Friends

Boo!

On Friday we hosted a Halloween playgroup and has so much fun having our friends over.  I had a good time putting together some fun Halloween treats and using playgroup as an excuse to get a few more Halloween decorations for our house.  We had a great crowd — 20 people in all! — and had a great time together! I can’t wait to do it again soon!

I had fun putting together some Parenting treats.  (The recipes will be featured during this weeks Recipe Wednesday!)

Marshmellow Ghosts

Witch on a Stick
I had gotten a foam pumpkin kit and some of the kids had fun putting them together. 
Charlotte, Joshua, Caroline, and Rylie

Caroline showing us her beautiful pumpkin!

Rylie put hers together all by herself! As the oldest at playgroup Rylie was so sweet to all the younger kids!
There was lots of playing going on! Our den was basically a sea of toys, kids, and mommies!
Charlotte loved playing with baby Reese!  She kept reaching out and kind of air petting her.  She doesn’t know what to do with such a cute baby!

William had a festive Halloween passy!

Reese was all smiles all morning! She is a great baby!
Kate was so sweet all morning! 

Charlotte kept everyone entertained with her unique dancing! She continues to be baffled as why everyone laughs when she dances though.  She has her own moves and I LOVE watching her dance! I hope she continues to dance for a long, long time!
The boys were a little more rambunctious than I was used to so it was harder to catch them for pictures but I did happen to get Charlotte close to them for a few!
Thomas was a little unsure about Charlotte.  He might have see her dancing earlier! Maybe we’ll get to use this picture at their rehearsal dinner! 🙂

But I did convince C to give Thomas a hug.  She decided to go for it while his back was turned.  (Her hugs just involve her leaning her head in to you which is what she’s doing here.)

Then she went and gave William one too! He’s pretty unsure of C also! Haha!

Charlotte held her arms up to Miss Kelly when she saw that Caroline was distracted! C loved getting a quick hug from her!

But she wasn’t too interested in getting her picture taken with Mommy….

Overall, we had a great morning and were so glad that so many of our friends were able to come.  I love playgroup because it gives the kids some kid time with other kids and also gives the Mom’s some time to chat and catch up.  We missed our friends that weren’t able to make it but are looking forward to the next playgroup!
Entertaining

Invitation Templates

I don’t know if anyone has a need for this but I just found out about site site and wanted to share.  It’s called Download and Print and it has beautifully designed invitation templates FOR FREE for you to download and print.  It would be a little bit of work because you would have to buy the nice cardstock and envelopes and then cut the invitations out but Hobby Lobby sells great, fairly inexpensive paper cutters that would make the cutting pretty easy.  Anyway, there are some really gorgeous cards and I wanted to make sure and spread the word.  Enjoy!