Lego Birthday Party!

I think it's about time I get a post up here about Kid's Lego Party!

We had a blast! It wasn't complicated and it wasn't very structured. Basically the kids just played a lot between presents and cake.

The decorations were very inexpensive and simple but I loved how they turned out.

I went to the local dollar store and I bought a couple plastic, disposable table cloths, blue, green, yellow. I also bought packages of paper plates that were the same shades.

Then I hung the table cloths on the wall, all together, and taped the plates on so they looked like Large Lego's. I LOVED the effect and received a number of compliments. I only used a few plates for each "Lego" and was able to use the rest for the party food.

If I had a printer (How do I not have a printer??) I would have printed out the word "LEGO" in my Lego font and pasted it inside each plate.


For weeks before the party I was saving empty boxes. When we finished off the pop tarts or the spaghetti noodles or the cake mix I tossed the empty box in a basket for later.

I purchased two packages of construction paper (also at the dollar store) and a few rolls of tape. I then wrapped all of those empty boxes in construction paper. J's cousin came over one night and helped me cut out a staggering number of little circles and we taped those onto the boxes.

Viola! Lego's!

They're not perfect but they turned out really cute! I used the basic Lego colors, orange, green, blue, red, yellow and black.

It took a lot of tape to put these together, for a couple reasons. One, the tape I bought was cheap. Two, Construction paper is stiff. Three, I wanted to make sure it stayed together.

I cut out little pieces of thread, tied them in loops and taped those to the back of the boxes. This took a LOT of tape because the thread slipped right out of some of them. Here you can see the massive tape use in those pictures.

Anyway, I used the thread loops to hang the Lego boxes from the ceiling.

Again, I LOVE the way these turned out. They took a LOT of time and a LOT of cutting of little circles and taping them on but it was totally worth it!

The cake.

Originally I had intended to just make a basic rectangle cake and add either cupcakes, marshmallows or Oreo's to the top to look like a Lego. But, for some reason I wasn't really into that idea. Then, one day while surfing the web I had an epiphany.

I baked two box cake (Yes, I used the box) mixes in round pans. When they were cool I shaved off the rounded top so they were all flat. Then I piled them on top of each other with layers of frosting (That I made myself.) in between them.

I used the rounded pieces that I had cut off for the top. I simply cut a small circle out of the middle of them and stacked them as well.

Looking at it when it was done I sort of wished I had made another cake mix to make it a little higher. But, either way, I really like how it turned out.

While surfing Pinterest (I'm addicted) I came across what looked like a great idea! It was harder than it looked but totally worth it.

I purchased about ten stage 2 jars of baby food. The cheapest I could find was prunes at $.40 a jar. I also grabbed some applesauce. (Kid ate a couple of jars of the applesauce. Haha.)

Most of them I just poured out. I washed and dried the jars and then took half of them outside and sprayed them with yellow spray paint. It did not cover as well as I expected. After about fifty coats (OK, I exaggerate a bit, but just a bit.) I decided that spray paint wasn't really the way to go. The rest I (my SiL also helped) painted by hand.

I then drew faces on them with sharpie markers.

I had some sort of brain lapse with the one that's second from the left. Oops, sorry, upside down Lego head.

I filled them with Skittles and gave them away as favors. I didn't want to part with them, they were SO CUTE.

I had another use for the spray paint as well. I cut the top half of a pizza box out, made a stencil (I can't think of another word, ugh) type thing of a Lego head and taped it to the top of the pizza box. I sprayed (fifty coats, again) of paint on there. When the paint was dry I hand painted black around the edges and cut a hole in the middle. I added a stick so it could be held up.

Lego Kid!

All the kids had their pictures taken with a Lego head.

I acquired a couple boxes, taped them together in the middle, covered them with another table cloth (red) and pasted a few plates to it. One giant Lego.

I put it near Kid for a picture but later moved it outside to greet guests.

The orange thing on the floor is just another table cloth.

Well, that's basically the party. Very inexpensive decorations for a very cool effect.

Now, is anyone having a Lego party in the near future? I have a LOT of "Lego" boxes that I'm about to just toss out . . . It hurts a bit, they took a lot of work.

I'm not kidding . . . Anyone interested?

Random Tuesday Thoughts

Happy Tuesday!! Are you feeling random? I sure am! If you want to share your own random or just read others, grab the box and join the fun at Stacy's!

1. Today is Kid's birthday. He is five years old today. That's a whole hand! That's a big deal!

2. Our McDonald's is money hungry or something. Every other McD's has Small, Medium and Large iced coffee's. Our McD's has Medium, Large and Extra Large. However, the XLarge at our McD's is the same as a large at any other McD's. Strange.

3. I ordered an extra large iced coffee this morning. At the window I was handed a "medium" (Which, at any other McD's would be a small), umm. I said, "Did I not order an extra large?" She told me that the other lady only put medium on the display. However, she traded it out for an extra large. Extra large for the price of medium. Nice.

4. I planned to put a Sean Bean (because I love him) movie in my DVD player today while I do laundry and party prep. However, Syfy had other plans. There is a Destination Truth marathon on today. LOVE this show. Josh Gates make me happy. :)

5. Taking Kid to school today I saw a man at a stop sign. He was in a very nice black car and wearing a suit. You don't see a lot of guys in suits around here. There's just not a lot of jobs that require suits. I miss seeing guy (and girls) in suits. When I lived in Pennsylvania there were suits everywhere. Where, oh where, is civilization?

6. Lion King 3D tonight? Maybe. It's possible we'll try to go this afternoon for Kid's birthday. Since his party is Saturday we wanted to try to make this day a little special and not just like another day.

7. I made cupcakes last night for Kid to share with his class for his Birthday. There were Very happy kids when I walked into that classroom this morning.

8. On that note I'm going to gain so much weight. Cupcakes, Birthday cake, birthday party food. Around here the "Holiday" season starts with Kid's birthday. Kid's Birthday, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas.

9. Party on Saturday, then guess what? I can start the Autumn/Halloween decorating! SO Excited!

I think that's enough for now. I don't want to bore you any longer. Have great Random Tuesday!!

Six Word Saturday!

Six Word Saturday! Join the fun over at Cate's awesome blog. Just click the box and be transported there, it's effortless!

Kid's party in One week! Help!

Happy Saturday!

Kids: To Invite or Not To Invite

Kid is turning five.

Five?

Five.

Wow.

I have a question for the Moms (and Dads) out there. How old were your kids when they started inviting a bunch of friends to their birthday parties?

Up until now Kid's birthdays have basically been family get togethers. But now he's in school.

Although, to be honest, he goes to a private school that only added Kindergarten this year (and at the last minute) so his class is very small and there is only one other boy besides Kid.

Then there's church. Girls there too. Poor Kid is surrounded by girls.

So, do we invite his one boy friend from school and the two girls from church (and OK maybe the little neighbor boy) or do we just do a family thing again?

I have to be honest that my hesitancy about inviting so many is because A. Our house is SMALL (and family is already coming) and B. A bunch of new kids means they're going to bring their parents (I would imagine) and my social anxiety may not be able to deal with such things. Haha.

I really don't know what to do. Maybe we should just stick with the family and the cousins.

OK, and MAYBE his best friend from school.

Sigh. Decision making is NOT my thing.

Random Tuesday Thoughts!

I have not been random (on this blog anyway) in far too long. Today, I shall be random once again. If you would like to be random as well you can click the box and link up over at Stacy's place.

1. September! I. Love. September!

2. Amazon has some free kindle books. This has resulted in my "To read" pile growing far too large.

3. Speaking of my "To read" pile, I've GOT to get my hands on A Clash of Kings. Must know what happens next!

4. Dear George Lucas, Cut. It. Out. It was PERFECT the way it was. STOP changing things!

5. Realized that Kid's birthday is a week away. This means his party is less than Two weeks away! I'm not panicking, not at all! Where's my towel!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

6. If you have any awesome suggestions for a Lego birthday party I'm all ears. (Well, all eyes I suppose.)

7. Ringer starts tonight. I'm sort of excited to have Sarah Michelle Gellar back on my TV.

8. Pinterest rocks! I found a website that suggested making pancakes in mini muffins cups, in the oven. Perfect. No turning, no flipping, just baking and eating. (Bonus if you add chocolate chips and pumpkin!)

9. What's your favorite creepy book to read for Halloween?

10. I love my New England Patriots. Yeah, Baby!

I may have more but I'll stop now. Hey, at least they were all short.

Pinatas and Sugar and Markers! Oh My!!

Well, as I've said a few times already we had our Christmas Party this past Sunday. Tons of food, a bunch of people and fun.

Earlier in the month I had made a pinata for the kids to break at the party. I'm kicking myself now because after all the work of making it I forgot to take a finished product kind of picture. However, I do have a a couple pictures of it in pieces.

Here's the Kiddo, filling a bag with candy.

That boot did not come out of the pinata. Just so you know.

The Kiddo, Neice and Nephew all collecting as many little packages of sugar as they can get their hands on.

And here is my Brother-in-Law and the Kiddo wearing what is left of the pinata.

Between Sunday School, and Children's Church on Sunday morning and the party on Sunday evening the amounts of candy we now have in our house are staggering. I think I could save some for the pinata NEXT Christmas!

Here are a couple of shots of the Kiddo and Neice opening a few small gifts.

Look, markers! Perfect for nice white walls! (I don't suppose I mentioned that they also got 24 packs of Crayola Crayons?)

Have a great day, I think I'll drop by Walmart an grab some magic erasers.

Food! Food Everywhere!

Well the party is over. My kitchen is a mess. My body is so sore. But we had fun! I had fun anyway.

There was SO Much food here it was crazy. Oh yea, it's still here. All the leftovers. Everytime someone was ready to walk out the door I would say. "Grab and plate and take some food, PLEASE?" I think only two or three people actually did.

Now in my fridge (Which isn't very big) there is leftover -
* Lasagna
*Dish of Plenty
*Bologna and Cheese tray
*Lil' Smokies
*Deviled eggs
*Ranch dip
*Salsa
*Chocolate Pie
*Eclair Pie, Cake
*Strawberry Pie
*Mini Cheesecakes
*Pupmpkin Spice Cake Cupcakes
*Buckeye Balls.

And on my counters (Also not very big) -
*Chocoloate Chip Cookies
*Peanut Butter Cookies
*Gingerbread Cookies
*Sour Cream and Onion Chips
*Ripple Chips
*Brownies

If anyone is hungry, just let me know!

Six Word Saturday!

It's Saturday! Do you have Your six words ready? If you do then you really should click the box below and link up over at Cate's blog! Happy Saturday!

Party Tomorrow. SO much to do!

One Week?!

One week until our Christmas party.

I have so much to do!

I've made my list of things that I'm cooking and I've been working today on trying to assign days to them. Like what I can make ahead of time and how far ahead of time they can be made.

I'm going to start working on cookies tomorrow. Then I can do one or two things on Friday. Saturday however is looking like it's going to be a BUSY day!

Plus, on top of the Chirstmas Party stuff I'm also having a small "party" for the kids in the Childrens church on Sunday morning after thier program.

YIKES! I'm tired and stressed just thinking about it all! Should be Fun!

I haven't even made my house cleaning list yet! Okay, I think I need to go now. Whoo hoo! It's party time!

Food and Fun (I need both)

Since the switch in my brain flipped at midnight on November first I've been all about Christmas planning.

I have a Christmas Party every year. It's always been fun. (I think, I hope.) I love planning it. I love the decorating. I love the cooking. (I HATE the washing of all the dishes though.)

On the invitation (It's pretty much only family unless there's a close friend in the area) I request that everyone bring a dinner dish (sort of like a pot luck) and a two liter of soda or something. So the dinner part of the cooking is covered. It's also fun to see what everyone will bring.

We do a "Chinese gift exchange" too. I love that part. If you don't know what that is it's when each person brings a gift (Being the non-rich people that we are I usually ask that everyone brings something valued at 5 dollars or greater. It makes it easier for everyone to play.) and then we draw numbers and choose gifts and steal them from each other and it's a lot of fun!

We usually play games too. When I can think up creative games.

Also I failed to mention dessert. I usually take care of all the desserts. Christmas baking is so much fun!

Which brings me to the point of this blog . . . I'm looking for fun, easy, tasty Christmassy (or not) dessert recipes! (I'll also accept any suggestions for Christmas party games.) I have an array of thing that I could make but I always love getting new recipes. So I thought I would ask around.

Thanks so much, in advance, for your help!

Random Tuesday Thoughts!!!

Happy Tuesday!

Pop over to Keely's blog by clicking the random box above and join the fun!!

1. Today is the FIRST DAY OF FALL!! I'm so very very excited! I've been waiting MONTHS for this! Happy Fall!!!

2. NCIS starts Tonight!!! (I've been waiting months for this too!) I also plan to give the new NCIS: LA a try and see how it is. I hope it will be good but it's hard thinking of NCIS without the original cast. Also, I'm kind of upset they couldn't come up with a more original title.

3. The Mentalist (Simon Baker, Ahhhh) starts on Thursday. Yay! It looks like it's going to be a good TV week. Anyone have any other suggestions for good shows? Right now I only watch NCIS(Tues.), Leverage (Wed.), Ghost Hunters(Wed.), Destination Truth(Wed.), The Mentalist(Thurs.) and Psych (Fri.). I'm told I should watch Bones so I may give that a try, we'll see. Joseph Finnes is in that new show Flashforward. It's on at the same time as Bones . . . I think Joseph may win this battle.

4. Kiddo got a Click Start Leap Frog system for his birthday. I am so very impressed with how well he's doing with it. Amazing! Very good gift (Well done "Mamaw")! I would recommend this one.

5. The roofers started re-shingling my roof yesterday afternoon. Makes for a lot of Thumps, Bangs and Crashes.

6. I posted a blog about the Pirate Birthday Party that we had for the Kiddo. The only problem was that the pictures ended up blurry so I'm going to quick post two cake pics here. I love making cakes. They're not excellent but they're a lot of fun to do! I would have liked to add more detail but the time kind of got away from me. I was happy with it anyway.

7. Watched the Premiere of House last night and was rather unimpressed. I sure hope the season gets better!

8. I grabbed a bag of Marshmallow Matey's while I was shopping yesterday. I always buy these because we do bargain brand around here. Well, I was walking up the isle and noticed that the same size Lucky Charms was cheaper (by 16 cents) than the Marshmallow Matey's so I grabbed it. You know what I discovered? I like the bargain brand better.

9. I'm doing laundry today. What about you?

10. I still don't have my copy of The Lost Symbol. However, I made the mistake of reading the first page in the store. BAD idea! Now I REALLY want it!

Aaarrrrggg, Matey!

The Kiddo's Birthday party was on Saturday. He had a Pirate themed party. Which was actually kind of neat considering that Saturday just happened to be International Talk Like a Pirate Day (Why do we have a "talk like a pirate day?")

Anyway I made his cake. If I would have had more time I would have added some more details but time really got away from me. I think it may have had something to do with staying up all hours of the night for the whole week (especially Thursday, YEAH!!).

He received from really great gifts. Including some new versions of Fisher Price's little people that I discovered at C. Beth's blog. (Thanks so much for the gift idea, Beth!) He also got a Leap Frog system which he LOVES and is doing incredibly well with it. I'm really impressed! J came home and the Kiddo was playing with it and I guess he wanted a different game so he closed out of one to go find another and J said "Hey! He just clicked the X! That's cool!" It was amusing.

He loved his Pirate Birthday Party.

"Aaaaarrrrgghh, Matey!"

Six Word Saturday

Click the cute little box above to pop over to Cate's blog and join the fun!!

"It's time for a Pirate Party!"

The 19th?? Really??

I opened the door the other morning to find a piece of paper stuck to it. I thought "Oh great, now what?"

What did it say?

September 18th or 19th, 2009 Tom Fredericks Construction Company (Names changed to protect the VERY guilty) will start on roof repairs. During this time the roofers will be using your outside outlet on your patio. Thank you in advance for any inconvenience.

Should you have question regarding this or any other matter, please call.

Let's look at this for a moment. September 19th? This is the date scheduled for the Kiddo's birthday party. This means that while they are knocking shingless off my roof my guests will have to climb over and around the mess to get to my door. Then while they are pounding the new shingles on with a nail guns we'll be inside trying to enjoy our day.

Should be interesting . . .

Random Tuesday Thoughts!!!

I'm a huge fan of Tuesday in the blogoverse!!!

Click on the cute little box and join the fun!

1. Leverage is over until January. What am I going to do??? Watch re-runs, that's what! The good news is that NCIS and The Mentalist start SOON. (Plus I get to watch Josh Gates on Destination Truth on Wednesday night. I know they never really find anything but he's such an entertaining host.)

2. Rina was supposed to come today. I was so excited to see her today but, they changed their minds . . . they came YESTERDAY! It's so nice to see her again after so long! Now we shall commence with the talking, shopping, movies and eating until we pass out!

3. Kiddo's birthday party is Saturday (actual birthday is Sunday). Can't believe my baby is going to be three. When did that happen?

4. I didn't watch the VMA's but when I got on Twitter the next day there was quite a buzz. So I watched THE clip. You know the one. That stupid idiot Kanye West interrupting Taylor Swifts speech! How stupid! I felt so bad for that poor girl, I just wanted to cry. (To be fair, he was on Leno's new show last night and he did "apologize.")

5. WHY are none of my favorite restaurants anywhere near where I live???? On that note, if you ever get the chance to eat at a place called Cheddar's Eat there! It is absolutely excellent!

6. "So you're tired and you're beat and you worked all week and you need a place you can let it go, where the girls go wild and the boys play hard and you need a little more than just the radio. Well here's your open invitation, with just a couple regulations. Let me warn you son, only come to have fun, we don't take kindly to serious. So leave your troubles at the door, unless you want some in here. Welcome to my house, buckle up tight." (House Rules, Christian Kane) Could someone please tell me where this guy lives????

7. I'm making a cake for a birthday today. A birthday of someone not in my immediate family. I'm excited and kind of nervous. She's going to be 11 years old and she wants green icing with green decorations. Hehe. Pretty basic!

8. Dan Brown's new book "The Lost Symbol" came out today!!!! I'm and so very excited about this!! (Of course I'm going to have to wait until at least Friday, possibly later, before I get my copy.

Nothing? Everything?

I am totally at a loss for a topic today. What do you want to talk about? What do you want to read about? I've got nothing.

What's on my mind? Let's see.
1. Cleaning my house, preparing for company.
2. Rina is coming next week!!! WHOO HOO.
Haven't seen her in five years! It's about time we get together! She left this morning to head this way. Making a couple stops along the way though. She should get here around Tuesday PM or Wednesday. *Squeee*
3. Planning the Kiddo's birthday party, also next week.
This one really snuck up on me. I'm usually prepared weeks in advance with all my lists and everything but a few days ago I looked at the calendar and just about passed out! I couldn't believe it was that close and I didn't have one list! Luckily we're not doing anything huge, just a simple family get together. Pirate party, here we come.

Alright this is starting to feel like a RTT post. Let's save that for Tuesday.

Random Tuesday Thoughts

Tuesday!



Come play!


1. I HATE fire ants! We don't have them where I live but where my Mother--in-Law lives they thrive! We spent this past weekend there with the ants and they LOVE me. (I think I may be slightly allergic.) Evil little creatures. Noah should have stepped on them both on the ark!



2. One party is over and now it's time to start working on another one. My Kiddo is about to turn Three!!! Yikes! When did that happen? How does a Pirate party sound? I know it's not very origional but he is very into Pirates right now. "Aaarrrrgggg, Matey!"



3. I love the sound of little feet while they're running around and cleaning up toys. The pitter patter back and forth from the toy box. Awesome!



4. This past weekend J, Kiddo and I stayed at my Mother-in-Law's house. (Kiddo and I stayed Wednesday night and then J came on Thursday and we stayed until Saturday.) We all shared my Sister-in-Law's (Bless her heart!) queen sized bed. Where did I sleep? Up against the Wall!!! Where did J and Kiddo sleep? In the middle of the bed! What the . . . ? Needless to say I didn't sleep very well and was VERY happy to be back in my own bed.


5. I have the greatest, most comfortable sheets on my bed. Like sleeping on a cloud.


6. I have never read Pride and Prejudice (I don't know why not, I think I will.) Anyway, I LOVE the movie (Keira Knightly/Matthew Macfadyen version). I think I could watch it over and over again. It's right up there with Sense and Sensibility (Alan Rickman? Yup!!) and Little Women (Winona Ryder version.) These are the movies I decide to watch when I just can't pick anything. Always a pleasure. (Just a note: I like the BBC/Colin Firth Pride and Prejudice too but just not as much as the more recent one.)


7. I hate money! (Well, I would like it more if I had some . . .)


8. If Brett Favre wants to play football then he should play football. I wish he would quit telling us he's going to retire if he's not going to retire. What's the point? Talk about Unstable! This is not because I care, I really don't care anymore. I'm just tired of hearing about it.

Party, Party

As most of you already know we had a party for my Sister-in-Law this past Friday. She will be leaving on Friday, headed north (I’m so very jealous), for college.

Lots of planning, money spent and one failed cake later we had a party. We had a good time and she received many things that she can put to good use while in school.

My addition to the party (one of them) was making the cake. I was very excited about it. I was going to cover a two layer cake in fondant with her favorite colors. I even made all the fondant. When it came time to cover the first layer everything went well. It looked really good and I was very excited. Then the second layer happened. I covered it and put it on the first layer and the fondant started stretching and trying to slide off the cake. I tried innumerable times to fix it and it just continued to pool around the bottom. Finally I gave up. I scraped all the fondant off, trashed it (Can you say “waste?”) and started over.

Instead of fondant I just made butter cream icing and did my best to decorate it without any of my decorating tools. (I had left all my normal cake decorating supplies at home since I was planning on using fondant.) I was actually very happy with the way it turned out.

The kiddo and Niece seem to like it.

I wanted to take a picture of the inside of the cake. By the time I got there it was almost totally gone. I suppose that's a good sign!

---

All in all we had a great time. A plus was that while I was visiting them we had a meteor shower. Sister-in-Law and I laid out in the back of Mother-in-Law's pick-up truck and watched the meteors. So much fun! It was the best meteor shower I've ever seen.

Good Luck, Tam! Have a great time! Praying for you! Love you!

School Supplies

My Sister-in-Law is going away to College in about a week. Friday night we had a party for her. This is what she opened from us: (Minus the handsoap because my Kiddo found it and thought it was lotion.)


Just a few things that we thought would help her out on her new adventure.

I'll post an update on the party probably on Wednesday.

Have a great day!

Six Word Saturday - My first one :)

I'm going to participate in my first Six Word Saturday. Here's goes.

The party's over, time to relax.

We had my Sister-in-Law's Going Away to College Party last night. My post is the result. More on the party when I come home.

Stop by http://www.showmyface.com/ and play along!