Saturday, June 2, 2012

Photobooth Dr. Seuss Style : Parker's 3rd birthday

One of my favorite things about my sons Dr. Seuss party was the photo booth. I love to take pictures (DUH) and wanted to have something really cute where the kiddos and adultos could get silly.
I posted some pics of the photo booth on his birthday site (listed above) but this is a whole blog on his booth and all the pics we got to take in it.
this was an easy set up. Striped wrapping paper, bunting, tissue paper flowers, and props... speaking of props here they are.
The Props Included Lorax mustache's, cat in the hat hats, a chalk board, Big money, and Parker faces.
personally I think the little lorax's below are cuter then the big lorax's above :) don't you??
 
We  had a blast!!! Hope you enjoy!

Kid car wash sprinkler DIY

I saw this idea on pinterest here and fell in love. I decided I wanted to do it for my sons third birthday party and we did. However I had my husband get it up and running weeks before the party for our kiddos to play in becuase it was just too cool!!
The DIY kiddy car wash!
this is our version of the car wash at Parker Party
and more pics of it in action before the party and at the party.
 I mean really what is the point of a car wash with a clean car??!!
Hope you enjoy our version of the car wash. The kids seriously love this thing. Ours ended up costing us about 40$ it says on the site its only about 30$
what I did different:
  • spray painted it (my hubbys idea!!)
  • used plastic table cloths cut into sections as the end colorful "thingys" what are those called anyway
  • I got cheap sponges and different ones ALL from different dollar stores . I read alot of people spent their money on the sponges mine were $1 a peice no more.
  • Added a road! I mean come on how much cuter. We did this two ways. 1st way we tried with the black garden fabric it worked great kept the kids feet from hurting on the mulch or grass and kept them from being too hot... BUT it sank the wetter it got the more mushy (we did have it on mulch so that may not happen on grass) 2nd way and what we stuck with was black plastic from lowes. This isnt cheap but we used it for 3 other projects so 9$ broken down into 3 projects with extra left over is not bad! for the stripes we used yellow duct tape.
  • we added flags to ours.
  • we did not use the stop and go arm , no point when running through!

and there you have it!! if you missed the link at the top on how to make this you can find it here
ENJOY!! my kids are!

DIY HUGE picture!

Ok So you saw on the Harry Potter Birthday I did the HUGE picture of my step son.
and now with my sons Dr. Seuss Party another HUGE picture and some big pics like 8x10 on a whole page made into photbooth props.

and everyone keeps asking how in the world did you do that. This was 5$ and I'm not kidding...
the tutorial on how to do this is here
The only thing I will add is she mentions you can get these at any office store. YOU CANNOT. I have tried. STAPLES is where you will need to go. If you are local then I suggest going to Murfreesboro over Smyrna. The machine in Murfreesboro is slightly bigger and you can get the print bigger. Another detail I will add you cannot spray paint the foam (some of you may be saying DUH but I learned from experience this didn't work)
Also she said she duct taped hooks onto the back to hang it I had no issue with this method at Devin's party but at Parker's I did and they were the same size. I ended up having to saturate each section of ribbon I was using as "a hook" with hot glue and let it completely dry. On both of these I was not using them for home decor (altho I may now) so I just did it quickly and not to perfection. I am sure there are lots of other methods of making a hook for the back.
Hope you enjoy.. I have one more to make for Kaitlyn's party and then I will do 4 brand new ones to hang in my home once our new baby is here and I have updated pics of all the kids.
I was amazed by this and glad to share!


DIY Lorax Pinata

Ok I had to share the Lorax pinata tuturial. I am actually going to post the directions to the tutorial I used and then just tell you how I changed and tweaked it to work for me.
Here is my Lorax
Here is the tutorial  I found On pinterest on how you can make your own

What I did differently:
I used a button nose. Button eyes. I liked the character it added to Lorax. My tissue paper was glittery it was the only orange tissue paper I could find.. I think it worked well cause Seuss is always whimsical. I made my a normal sized pinata... well kind of Its not near as small as the one calls for in the directions. I had enough candy for everyone of the kids who participated to get some to take home. Warning... This is not as easy as the directions make it out to be... It was not completely clear to me on all things. I suggest drying each layer of newspaper before continuing on with  a second layer, however its very difficult in a circle to tell where your first and second and third layers end and begin so I just covered it as well and thick as I could. With painting I used CHEAP paint that was waterproof and kid friendly. I only used one coat because you are covering it in orange tissue paper so no need to go painting it all crazy. Have fun make it your own and good luck!
here are some of the good ole Lorax in action



Happy Birthday to me today I turn 3 : Dr. Seuss Party Part 1

My son Parker's birthday was coming up (and when I say coming up I mean 6 months away lol) and I began to think about a theme for him. I chose Dr. Seuss because this was going to be the last year mommy could pick as he was becoming a big boy with big opinions. I adore Dr. Seuss always have Parker was actually thing 2 for Halloween and my whole family dressed up as "thing _________"(whatever Parker called them, I was thing mommy and so on) so I knew this theme could be awesome. With a lot of pinterest and research my creative juices were flowing. I am just going to throw you right into the party because overboard is an understatement here. I probably am going to have to break this party down into at least two parts maybe more because the party was so detailed and big. Here is Part 1 Lets go inside shall we?
The front door: I made Parker's wreath out of a pool noodle that I duct taped together. It saved me 7$ from the foam wreaths and I found it at Dollar tree for $1 I wrapped it in yarn and decorated it. added a pic of him and a quote and walla. I found this cute door seuss characters at the parent teacher store so they had to be mine. Then I just made a billion flag buntings for his party and this one got hung here. balloons of course to add to it. And Welcome to seussville.
Parker: Today you are you! That is truer then true! There is no one alive who is you-er than you!
Next lets walk right into the Favor table because it actually was the next table you would see when entering the house. I decided I wanted to do favors that were a. like Dr. Seuss books and characters and b. have some different stuff. I set  up the favor table as "Seuss Mart" the kids could then go get one of each favor and fill up their "Seuss Mart" bag with goodies.
Ok this is where the huge details and multiple blogs will probably have to kick in. I know we just started. I will post several pics in this Part 1 and then have an actual blog with all of Seuss Mart pics.
I pretty much made everything for his party that I physically could. This back drop is made out of paper plates glue onto one big foam board I got the idea here. The top is wrapping paper draped down with labels, signs, pictures, and buntings added for decor.
"Why fit in when you were Born to stand out" - Dr. Seuss
Here are a FEW of the party favors. Again I will post another blog Here with the entire party favors and Seuss Mart.
The Jar that is holding these silly straws actually says "sip sip hooray its Parker's big day"
I got these free printables for the straws here i loved the idea and it went so well with this theme
I got this cute idea on pinterest from this website.
I saw this cute idea on pinterest too from this site. I found the mustache mold on amazon for like 2 bucks. It was a simple treat and yummy made out of yellow candy melts :)
there were so many more favors but this is all I am taking up on this blog. The last pic of Seuss mart is a pic of the favor bag and every favor the kiddos got.
each child got a toothbrush, a lorax chocolate mustache, a silly straw, a bag of gold fishes, a striped lolly pop, a thing of green tic tacks labeled Grinch pills , a gummy fish skewer, and a chocolate turtle for yurtle the turtle.
another cute pinterest idea was the birthday book. I actually had already ordered Parker this book off amazon and was giving it to him as a birthday present but then I saw that this lady on her blog (cant find the blog now to reference the book sorry lady) had people from the party sign the book for the birthday boy! I loved it!
Ok on to the next decor. I am going to skip to the Photo booth which was out back on my patio. I will have an entire blog with ALL the photo booth pics here because there were so many but for now here is the back photo booth set up. The Photo booth is literally two rolls of Striped wrapping paper taped up on my back porch with a photo booth bunting I made and tissue paper flowers hanging from the top which I also made.
a few of the pictures in the photo booth. Now on to the fun props that were used!
Beside the photbooth was a big dresser we actually lucked out and found the day before for $20 at a yard sale!! here is the Photo booth prop sign for folks to understand what this cute little dresser filled with goodies is all about!
Seuss buntings everywhere to add to the theme a chalk board for the booth to say whatever you want even your favorite Seuss quote and Lorax mustaches I mean really we love Lorax! You can find the template for them here
The last three photo booth props are cat and the hat hats which I found at Michale's during Dr seuss' birthday week and glued them to dowels big money found at the dollar store and then of course my favorite Parker faces!! These were big pictures I got printed off at staples a whole page of them for 5$ (called an engineer print, here is the blog on how to do that) I made little party hats for his head out of cute paper added the "happy birthday to me today I turn 3" label. I just glued these to dowels. I loved them!!
Parker Faces LOVE THEM!!!
here is the pull back of the photo booth props and the activity table which brings me to the next part of the party. The Activity table. we can just jump right into that.
Here is the activity table. It included a bubble refill station. balloon pong which the kids could color their paddles. and a fish bowl of water guns. beside the table were water balloons.
The large picture of Parker is the same kind i did and talked about at my step sons birthday Party its an engineer print from staples it was 5$ its four foot by three foot! this pic was one I took of Parker at my brothers wedding. I love these pics. they add so much to the party!
Activities are fun pick one!
Balloon pong.. saw this on pinterest too... remember when you and your brother or sister or cousin or friend or whoever used to hit a balloon back and forth and whoever made it hit the ground died?? here is balloon pong!  this is paper plates glued to sticks I chose to do plane plates so the kids could color them. They use these as paddles and pass a air filled balloon back and forth. Fun right!
another brilliant pinterest idea from this site. So i got cheap walmart cups a cute jug labeled it bubble refill station filled it literally with all the bubbles I could find in my house  then I collected all the bubble wands I could find put them in a cute bowl and walla bubbles!
Ok to be totally honest with you the kids did not TOUCH this table lol.. the reason why?? oh a little thing called a GIANT water slide... so on to the next section of the yard (don't worry we will get back inside to the food and cake)

"the big Kahuna"
This slide was a hit and sooo much fun!! Parker actually picked it out and I love how the colors and two red fish matched his theme!
we had a section of baby pools which I will have pics of below. In front of the baby pools was the lorax and his truffula trees. I know its spelled wrong on the sign :( I  was in a hurry as usual and am not a speller. sorry.Anyway I will have a tutorial up later on how to make the truffula trees they were crazy cheap and easy (messy but worth it) I like these better then any other ideas Ive seen out there. The wonderful little Lorax was drawn by my awesome sister onto card board so he was free :)
I saw this idea here
I will have more pics of this section on the tutorial on how to make the trees.
"Jungle of Nool swimming pools" We actually had a large baby pool that was supposed to be set up here too but we had issues and when we rushed that a.m to take it back they were sold out being Memorial day weekend and all.. so two baby pools is all we had for the littles.
Compliments of my sister again for the wonderful Horton drawing again drawn onto card board so therefore free...Love free.
Isn't Horton so cute :)
next over to the "who ville car wash" Thanks to my lovely husband who built this for the kiddos. I actually had him build this several weeks before the party because it was just soo cool. here is the tutorial on how you can make your own... its all diy and sooo cool!! best sprinkler ever! we added a road to ours to make it cuter and more fun. More pics of this on the tutorial.
So we have a trampoline. The kids love it. decided I would incorporate the trampoline into our world of Seuss. SOOO Dr. Seuss has a book called "great day for up" i covered the trampoline in balloons. I really love the turn out.
Love my Seuss buntings too.. they just added so much to the decor I think!!
Ok now onto the last section outside... this is one of my favorite pieces of decor that I thought the kids would LOVE but they didn't barely pay it any attention either.. that darn water slide....
Have a gander at "Parker's who fort"
we had some issues with the door staying on.. don't mind my sister in the background getting it all decorated up. My dad built this for Parker out of foam I ADORE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I mean does it get more Seuss than this?
Our poor door.. I wish this was made of wood and could be a permanent playhouse for the kids.... hmmmm idea... project gramps ??? Moving on.
here is my DIY lorax pinata... I absolutely loved this little addition to the party and it was pretty easy (messy messy) to make, here is the tutorial on how to make this on your own.
Now back inside... I told you there was alot.
love Dr. Seuss quotes.
soooo I used alot of old soup and food cans (of course I cleaned them out after we used them) covered them in paper and stuck them to things to make levels and stands. Wrapped the silverware in fun napkins i found on sale back at Christmas and walla a cute table of things you must have at every party with food!
Onto the main table. The Food and Cake!
The striped awnings if you will over the windows are that cool wrapping paper again. Tissue paper flowers and more buntings!
Prepare yourself this is about to get overwhelming.. and there is no way I could do all of the food even on several blogs.. so on Part 1 I will highlight some of the food and add some more photos in Part 2
The Cake :) Parker loves balloons LOVES them, and I found a couple cakes on pinterest I loved and so I kind of combined them and made my own. I love how it turned out.. the 3 is a balloon did you get that?
 Parker's Cupcakes. Parker always says P is for Parker... he says it everytime he sees a P and so I saw someone do this for the ABC's of Dr Seuss :)

lots and lots of snacks and food. And it was fun thinking of rhymes and way to incorporate foods with Seuss books.
& of course we had green eggs and ham
& hop on pop chicken
remember the sneetches?? Yummy Star belly cake pops!!!
ok I was soo upset with how these turned out I had a huge vision for them, BUT we could not find the right cotton candy and it was so hot the second I put the cotton candy hair on the icing it starting to melt down. So anyway these would be soo cute for a winter party and with carnival cotton candy which we could not find!
o, you know another food table..... Ok Im stopping soon with the food... I mean really.
Now lets blow out the candles!
we opened presents as one of the first things becuase we got Parker and the kids a puppy :) My camera actually decided to have an error and quit working that morning so I had to use one my mom had it was a good camera but I am used to  my other. So anyway! I hope you enjoyed checking out this party. I know we really enjoyed having it and I know I know I went overboard but anything for my babies! Check back for Part 2 for more pictures and details.
Happy Birthday Parker!!