Few of My Faves: Designing Kids Birthday Parties - Link Up Party!

So I know I've been a little forgetful about my favorite lists but here is another one that is very fitting with this week for me! My daughter turned four years old and we had a family birthday party as always. I've had a lot of fun planning my kids birthday parties and I always try to make money go towards the presents and not the decorations or the cake. So I make my own! Make sure to check out my cake page for some easy DIY cake ideas! But here are some birthday parties I have done and a Few of My Fave ways to save for their parties!

1. Themed after a favorite movie - we did a fun Wizard of Oz party and everything was rainbow themed - especially the food. We had rainbow colored jello cups (complete with clouds!) and we used Koolaid ice cubes that were put in 7-up (Yum!) Other fun movie themed parties could be Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory or maybe Swiss Family Robinson. 

2. Themed from a book - I took a favorite kids book - The Hungry Caterpillar and used cupcakes to make the caterpillar and then we ate the food that was in the book! Great fun! Just look very carefully at the book and use the colors or the designs for your decorations! 

3. Themed from a favorite character - this is one of my least favorite ways to do it because I don't get as much of an opportunity to be creative but it usually means picking up the stuff from the store and making a cake. For Aimee's party this year we had a Tinkerbell party and the cake was pretty fun to make. Other characters that would be fun are Clifford, Winnie-the-Pooh, or Monsters Inc.

 

4. Themed after a favorite animal - for example a butterfly theme! Honestly I chose this one because I thought the plates at the Dollar Tree with butterflies were adorable and BOOM - I had my party! Other animal ideas could be wild jungle animals, farm animals - one party I saw was all cows and they decorated everything with cow spots!

 5. Themed after a favorite toy - One year we had a Tonka party! We decorated everything in yellow and I used yellow and red balloons and with an ink pad I "drove" one of my sons cars on the yellow tablecloth for tire tracks. Then we ate Dirt Dessert instead of cake! Fun toy themes could be Jack-in-the-boxes, Music boxes, or Little People.

6. Themed after a favorite board game. I haven't done this idea yet but I would LOVE to do a Candy Land theme or Hungry Hippos or Memory. How fun! I've been waiting to do this until my kids are old enough to have friends over to play the games with them. 

7. Favorite color themed party - I did a princess/pink party for my daughter that was really fun! Just pick a color and make everything that color! Pretty easy! 

So there are a "Few of My Faves" for this week! Link up your own list of faves whatever they may be! Just make sure you include the Few of My Faves image and link back to my page! Thanks! 

Birthday Party for Cody!

This past Saturday was a blast! We celebrated Cody's 2nd birthday! He doesn't actually turn two until the 8th but this was the best time for family to get together. I loooove planning my kids birthday parties and had a ton of fun with my little boy's favorite toy theme - TRUCKS!!! and constuction and dirt movers and all of that!

I used a yellow plastic tablecloth and used a stamp ink pad and the wheels on one of my sons trucks and made tire tracks all over the tablecloth. 

I used Cody's various yellow trucks as my centerpieces (including some new ones!) 

the dump truck was filled with yummy DIRT Dessert - first time I've done something other than a cake but took a ton less time! 

Cody IMMEDIATELY found the new trucks and had a blast! 

This year he knew exactly what to do about that candle! And with just a tiny bit of help he blew it out! :-) 

The "dirt" passed with flying colors and even Nana requested this for her next birthday party! (note to self - watch Cody to make sure any other dirt is not consumed especially not as readily as this dirt was!) 

It became pretty clear what Cody's favorite part of his party was - PRESENTS!!! 

This gift was a ton of fun! 

 Aimee was the train "deductor" for quite a while too!  

 Overall, Momma's boy had a WONDERFUL birthday party and Momma survived to live another day - *sigh*!

 

Another Cake with a "Warhammer" theme

My "little" brother Scott turned 15 this month. (Yikes!) Since he is usually up at Camp on his birthday it had been a while since he had a complete party on his birthday. I called mom and asked what he was really into right now. I was expecting Star Wars or Eragon or something like that. Nope - Warhammer. Now understand, I have NO CLUE what Warhammer is all about. I called my other "little" brother, Paul for some pointers and he actually came over and helped me accomplish this feat. I think it's the worst cake I've ever done because it looks so hideous. However, it was a good 5-10 minutes before the guys cut into the cake to eat it they were all so excited about it! Here are the pics! 

I colored the icing a tan color then sprinkled the landscaping with brown sugar. The "river bed" is chopped up butterscotch chips and chocolate chips. The water is thin blue icing. The road is also made out of chocolate chips. The bridge is made out of Tootsie Rolls.

My brother told me that these "guys" are messy so their houses have to be a mess too. Mission accomplished. 

Make sure to check out my other cakes on my cake page! The other ones are waaaay cuter!!! 

My baby is 3!

Inevitably it was bound to happen, my baby girl is growing up! She now insists that she is not a baby but a little girl. In honor of her we celebrated in style!

She was a princess for a day!

and what would a princess do without a castle?

(for more pictures of the cakes I've made go here)

or a royal carriage to ride on? (okay okay, I'm done! ha ha!)

It was a wonderfully fun day celebrating Aimee's birthday. It seems like only yesterday that she entered our lives and turned everything upside down! But since then it has been a complete joy to be her mother and I couldn't ask for a sweeter little Aimee.

Cakes Cakes and More Cakes!

I enjoy making cakes for my family and friends. But I do not want to do anything professional because I don't enjoy doing it for strangers. Half of the fun is seeing the faces of everyone when it is revealed! Here are a few cakes I've made that I'm sure anyone can do if they have the idea! 

I did these for my friend's bridal shower - her wedding colors were purple and blue and with butterflies! I just used 3 different sized round pans and cut them in half and angled the halves to become wings!

Birthday cake for my mom and grandma!



Birthday cake for a friend!

Here is a WarHammer themed cake for my brother. I colored the icing a tan color then sprinkled the landscaping with brown sugar. The "river bed" is chopped up butterscotch chips and chocolate chips. The water is thin blue icing. The road is also made out of chocolate chips. The bridge is made out of Tootsie Rolls.

For my dad's 4th of July birthday! 

Here is a cake I made for LAFF (Ladies at Faith Fellowship) because Mrs. Gutwein came and gave her famous "Silver Boxes" devotional. Unfortunately my black coloring that I purchased must have been switched with a PURPLE coloring and I didn't have time to go and purchase more black and make more frosting so here is a PURPLE box! ;-) But I simply poured one cake mix into a loaf pan and it automatically created the shape of the box for me! Very easy! 

This is a cake I made for my daughter's birthday. It is one round cake 12in. that is cut in half and turned round sides together then angled and cut to make it look like a butterfly. I used jellybeans and marshmallows and other candy for the top. And the daisies are real! :-) 

This is a cheesecake that I made for my dad's birthday on the fourth of July. I used strawberries from my garden and blueberries. Yummy! 

This is a cake I made for my postman father-in-law. This was really hard to just use one cake mix to get proportions right! 

Cody's First Birthday cake and for this one I used cupcakes and shaped the caterpillar.

One of my favorite cakes, I used various size pans, bowls and whatever to make the "mountain" then used fondant (which I will never use again because it tastes nasty!) I had to paint food coloring on the road to get it so bright and the inside of the cake was rainbow colored cake too! 

I made this cake for my mother-in-law. She loves to wear bright colors and jewelry, so I made it like she is - fun, bright and cheery

This is my most recent for my hubbie's b-day. I cheated more than normal and used a Wilton shape pan but I made my own frosting. The fret board or everything dark brown is dark chocolate that I poured into the Wilton pan for the shapes that I needed.

This is a cake I made for my dad who is a firefighter - this is after the sparklers were put out!

Here is a cake that I made for Scott for his birthday - much cooler in person!

My sister's baby shower cake - the toys I had really added to it.

Those are the cakes I had saved on my computer. I also made a cake shaped like a teapot which I never got a pic for! :-( I can't remember all I've done but maybe you can take some of these ideas and use them for your own family birthday parties.