Spring Has Sprung

With the lime green blanket that has covered the foothills in Northern California, the excitement of Spring is in the air.  I love this time of year.  We escape the gloom of winter and get to enjoy warmer weather and the new green, the lime green of freshly budding leaves and new grass.  When the trees start to pop with buds and blossoms and the daffodils and irises sprout up everywhere, I can understand why the term spring fever was coined.  

 My family was enjoying the beautiful weather and the first day of spring break today.  The little ones gave me with best gift, a huge basket of wildflowers!  

 We filled multiple vases with these unusual beauties.  While some would consider these weeds, my children saw the beauty in these unusual plants.

  Grouped together, the spiral white flowers are so interesting, they remind me of an exotic plant.

 I am so grateful for my kind generous children who amaze me everyday!  Thank you for the happiness in a vase.

What is your favorite thing about spring?

Princess Party

For my little girl's fourth birthday, she requested a princess party.  So I planned a princess party -country style- outside in the dirt lay a little fancy princess oasis.  It was fantastic day and suited my daughter just perfect.  The mixture of little girls dressed in princess costumes and running around in the dry grass represents the complexity of my girl's personality.  I love her so much!!!

I used the Paper Doll Dress Up Cricut Cartridge for the invitation.  The idea for the layout was actually found in the handbook as a princess box craft idea, but I thought it would make a super cute invitation.  The invitations were relatively simple to make and using my Gypsy to get the scale correct made it a snap mass produce.

I cut various crown and wand shapes out for decorations using a glitter card stock.  The main colors for the party were purple, raspberry (my little girl's favorite) with accents yellow.  These decorations were attached to ribbon and hung from the trees. 

I recycled decorations from last year's fairy party.  The tissue paper flowers were bunched together to create a faux pomander.  These were hung in princess tent (where the girls eat and do crafts).  The bright colors of the tissue paper always make me smile.

As accents on the food table I used some free printables from the Green Apple Paperie.  The colors worked perfect.  The tented food cards even had the purple and raspberry flags.  Similar flags were made from satin and ribbon and strung among the trees. 

My little girl requested a "Belle" cake from Beauty and Beast.  This was as close as I could get since the doll part of the cake looked nothing like Belle.

And we always need a second cake...

After much work, the day turned out nicely.  My little girl started out with a beautiful princess dress on but ran inside after the dress interfered with her running and playing ability.  At least she wore the crown.  You know it is a fun party when you forget to take a ton of pictures. 

The princess theme could not have been more perfect for this little one's 4th birthday.  What is your favorite type of party for 4 year old little girl?

Cars Lightening McQueen Cake

If you spend anytime with my nephew, you know he loves anything CARS.  One of my fondest memories happened last Thanksgiving evening after the celebration of day was winding down.  The kids settled in to watch a movie and snuggle with their stuffed animals.   Max declined an animal.   He was set- he had his matchbox cars to snuggle with.  So, it was no surprise that when he turned three, he had a CARS themed birthday party.  My sister in law was so sweet to let me to make Max his cake.

 At the time of the party, I did something a little new for me, a character cake on top of large 16" split and filled round.  The bottom cake was covered in fondant and the top character layer was decorated with butter cream. Since then I have made this cake which is another character cake on top of a large round.

Wilton Race Car Cake

This is the cake pan I used.  I modified the race car to create "Lightening McQueen." for the top.

The party was super fun and I am so glad I was able to celebrate!

Happy Creating,
Stacey

Superhero Cape

Recently, my son wanted a Superhero party for his birthday.  To add to the party fun and to create a homemade party favor, I made some superhero capes.  

Cookie Pops

When it comes to cookies, the bigger the better!  Unfortunately, a bouquet of over-sized cookies expertly decorated are beautiful but typically taste like an arts and crafts project- paste and cardboard.  I wanted to create a large themed cookie to be used for a cookie pop for parties or gifts but it needed to be tasty.   Sugar cookies are the traditional cookies to decorate for this purpose, but I only like sugar cookies if they are soft.  So I began exploring the quandary.  A cookie that is soft enough to taste yummy and freshly baked, but firm enough hold up when attached to a stick and vertically displayed.  

Superhero Cake

This year, my boy had a Superhero birthday party.  He loves all superheroes is fascinated about the different super powers.  I knew I had to make him a cake that would encompass more than one character.  After my friend sent me a couple of pictures of some amazing superhero cakes, I knew I could tackle my own version.    

A couple years ago, my mom and my kids made a superman cake for my husband's birthday from a vintage Wilton character pan.

Superhero Party

 When my little boy turned 6 this year, we celebrated Superhero style!  He recently became aware of Spiderman, Superman, and Batman.  Since his favorite character kept changing every week, I needed to create a collective superhero party.  A Super Hero Academy type party would allow me to use general super hero decor with a mixture of known characters, and the kids can do some "superhero training" as part of the party entertainment.

Excited to use the Cricut, I made the invitations from my Paper Dolls Dress Up cartridge.   Some research on the Provo Craft website brought me to sample invitation that was perfect. Provo Craft has changed their forum and I can no longer find the invitation that I used as my template, but if someone has the link to the original creator, please let me know.  I would love to share it.