Party Day

As promised, here are some pictures of how the party turned out. The first picture is my only kitchen counter space and hour before the party began.

My little Strawberry Shortcake

I reused the canopy I made for L's birthday party last year.

I went with the berry theme for the food too. L loves berries.

I can't believe how time flies! It seems like just yesterday when she was a cubby rolly polly crawling around on the ground, now she is such a big girl.

Strawberry Shortcake Birthday

L turned 4 and loves Strawberry Shortcake. We decided to go crazy with Strawberry Shortcake for the party.

First, I got a little Strawberry Shortcake dress and I needed leggings to go with it. It was so hard finding the perfect stripes, but this is the fabric I got at M & L.

I used the little green striped for the pants, it looked better then the big stripe and the medium was not in a knit. The medium was what I wanted, but I was very limited on what I could do.

I think it turned out pretty cute even if it wasn't the exact stripes that the "Real" Strawberry Shortcake wears.

Then with the pink polk-a-dot and green medium stripe, we made purses for the girls. C and L now have their own fabric scissors so they can help whenever they want.

The purses were a little small, but turned out pretty cute. They were so simple to make too. That's the best part. It only took me a couple hours to make 7 purses.

We got some Strawberry hand sanitizer for the purses and...

the girls got to pick out some flowers we made for their hair.

For the party we painted nails and did hair. Here is L modeling a couple of the sample hair styles.

I still have way too many flower barrettes now.

Stay tuned for more on the actual party.

Ballerina Birthday Party

When my kids have a birthday, I usually go onto Birthday Express, pick out what I like and let them choose from there. L recently turned 3 and I had about 8 themes for her to choose from. As soon as she saw the ballerina one, she was set. It was a ballerina party. She was so excited. Everyday, "Can I look at my birthday party pictures?" I knew I had to do something very girly. So, I thought, lots of tule and just went with it.

First, I got L her little dance leotard and made her a tu-tu to go with the color she picked. Luckily, she wanted purple and I happened to have these little bows.

Then, I thought all the other little girls needed tu-tu's also, so I made each little girl one in their favorite color. These went home with them instead of goodie bags. I am not into candy filled goodie bags.

For the boys at the party, which was only about 6, I made capes. We were going to do crowns, but the capes were easier and I thought they would last longer.

Then, I wanted something really fancy and girly for the main room the kids would be playing in. I saw some canopies on-line when I was looking and remembered some fabric I used to make curtains a while back for someone else. He had extra fabric and was very kind to hand it over. The extra fabric gave me plenty to make this cute little canopy.

It was very easy to make. I basically cut 2 pieces the length I wanted then hemmed the bottom. Next, I took the top, twisted and rolled it together making a loop, which I slid some white yarn through to hang the canopy from. The last part of the canopy was a little tricky. I borrowed a hula hoop for the ring at the top. I wanted the hula hoop to be removable so I made 5 cloth strips and sewed snap tape to the ends. After that, I sewed one end of each strip in, set the hula hoop in and snapped it closed. It worked perfectly.

I hung the canopy from the ceiling above the kids table and on the table I put crayons and a bunch of ballerina coloring pages I printed out from the internet. I also had a bowl of hair ties and cut up ribbon for the older girls to make their own hair bows to match their skirts.

The cake was made by a friend who does this professionally. I usually make my kids cakes, actually this is the first time I have not. I just didn't think I could pull of a girl cake. L was set on having her cake be, "A girl." So I had it made. She turned out very cute.

L was very happy and had a ton of fun. She is still asking, "Mommy, when is it going to be my next birthday?"

Just as we started singing "Happy Birthday" she got off this stool and crouched on the ground until everybody was done singing.

We had about 30 guests and the whole party ended up costing under $200. We tried to do it very limited and only invited the friends she sees on a regular basis. That helped, but doing a party at home and making things instead of buying really cut costs. 


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Making the World Cuter