Circus Birthday Party Invite...

I figure by the time my kids are old and no longer loving my carefully planned themed birthday parties, I will have the largest selection of random themed invites to remember each party by!

Circus Birthday Party...

We finally got around to celebrating Cannon's first birthday; in true circus style.

We had family come over to help us celebrate the big day (and to help us eat all the really healthy food we provided!). Steve doesn't usually question my party ideas, I just run with it. Yesterday he started to ask some questions.

Steve: So what are we eating for dinner at this party?
Kara: Hot dogs
Steve: What else?
Kara: Peanuts, popcorn, circus cookies and cotton candy
Steve: But what else?
Kara: That's it.
Steve: That's not a meal
Kara: It's not supposed to be - it's a circus.

And if I could've figured out how to mass produce funnel cakes, I would have! This was definitely not a meal you want to have more than a few times in your life...but let me tell you it was heaven for the kids.




When I was putting Hunter to bed I asked him what his favorite part of the party was. He grinned and said, "I had three bags of cotton candy." Awesome. We only let them have 10 pieces of their Halloween candy and he probably consumed more sugar in cotton candy! You're little brother only turns one once, right?

I printed off his weekly photos and had them on display. When Steve first saw it a couple days ago he thought he had come across his Christmas present because he's been asking for something like this. I missed the boat on that one - Steve already has it by the back door ready to go to work with him tomorrow!


Cannon reacted to his cupcake about this same way he did when we shot his original birthday cake. Not so much a fan.




Cannon had his cute moments but for the most part he wasn't overly happy for his party - of course the song, "Its my party and I'll cry if I want to" kept coming to mind. Perhaps circus theme wasn't his thing. Maybe he's more of a sock monkey kind of kid. You just never know. Luckily the rest of us had a good time.

Have your cake...

And eat it too...

Actually - there wasn't a whole lot of eating. His first go at sugar and he wasn't a big fan. The minute he got it on his hands, he cried and started flicking frosting everywhere.


And after he flicked frosting everywhere, he finally got some in his mouth and kinda liked it.




And then he was done and he turned over the plate to let us know he was done.


He didn't dive into it like the kids were hoping and cheering him on to do - and he left quite the mess which is all we expect out a first cake experience! I'm sure the next time he sees cake he'll put a little more in his mouth.


Check out Hunter's first cake and Bennett's first cake.

Lego Party Details...

This is how a Lego party goes down at our house. Both Hallie and Hunter had helped on decor and treats the week before but when they got off the bus and saw it all put together there was a lot of excitement. Hunter exclaimed, "This is the best party ever." I love that my six year old is as enthusiastic about parties as I am.


When friends arrived they each colored a Lego mini figure. Not surprising all but one chose to make it look like Emmet or Wild Style from the Lego Movie.



We had a photoshoot with our Emmet photo board for each kid.

We also had each kid build a rubber band lego car. This took much longer than I expected but they were the perfect ages for the activity. We raced them and tried different sized rubber bands to see what changes it had. The thinnest rubber band gave the most favorable results!




This boy was on cloud nine. We took his favorite toy and mixed that with his favorite people and he was beyond happy. His friend asked if we could keep everything so he could have it for his birthday party in a couple months. Flattery from a six year old is priceless!


Source List:
Lego Invites with printable
Lego photo board
Yellow Cups - draw faces with marker
Gift bags - White bags from Target (comes in pack of 8 for $4) with a yellow lego head cut out and "thanks" written on it.
Lego Candy
Bags for lego candy - 1" x 8"
Sparkler candle - Party City
Lego Jello Mold
Yellow tablecloth roll
Happy face balloons
Blue Legos hanging above table - blue poster board with foam adhesive behind circles
Red/white checked background - wrapping paper
Duplo Legos built around cake and candle

Lego Birthday Treats...

The key to throwing a party is to enlist the troops - even when they're six and eight and even when the party is for them!

I had Hunter and Hallie stuffing little bags of lego candies - making patterns - we should've just counted it as homework for the day!






We also wrapped chocolates for the gift bags - which ended up not going in the gift bags until they were going home because it didn't cross my mind that the chocolates would melt in our warm fall weather!




The biggest hit was the lego jello. My kids love jello molds and we have them for all the holidays. I saw these on Amazon and I was skeptical that they would actually work - they were awesome! Besides, jello always tastes better when it's in the shape of something cool.

Lego Birthday Invite...

These are about as easy and inexpensive as they come. Print off some blank lego guys (download here)


Then download a lego font and type up your details. (I found LegoThick here) Connect them with a color brad and they are good to go!

Lego guy face cut-out...

We've been prepping for a lego celebration for someone special's birthday party coming up. We made a surprisingly easy Lego guy face cut-out for kids to take their pictures with. The best part: no paint required. You need a poster of the image, spray adhesive and a piece of wood or even cardboard.

I searched high and low to find a printer to print a 4ft tall picture of a Lego guy. I had quotes coming in at $80, which was not happening for a kids birthday party. When I had nearly given up hope of a photo op station - I came across Walgreens who prints banners - 2'x6' for $25 (they always have coupons for their print shop which can get you 40% off). I was a little skeptical at the quality for that price, but I was pleasantly surprised. It printed true to color and was as crisp as the original photo.

The banner came 24" wide, which is exactly the width of "Project Boards" from Home Depot, so no cutting of wood. Keep your banner rolled up because it makes it easier to work with. Spray the top six inches of the board and line up the top of the poster and press into place.

Spray the next 6-8 inches and slowly unroll the banner smoothing out as you unroll. Keep spraying, smoothing and unrolling until you reach the bottom.

Hunter was in heaven. What kid obsessed with Legos wouldn't love a life size mini figure?!

I told him I needed to cut out his face and a look of horror came over him. "Don't ruin my Lego guy". The only reason why I made this guy was to cut out his face! I let it hang out in the house for a couple days and after the newness wore off Hunter wasn't nearly as sad to see his face go.

I used a jigsaw to cut out a circle. I first cut picture side up (which leaves a rough edge) so I could see where I needed to cut and then I flipped it picture side down and went around the circle again to create a nice clean edge on the front.

The kids then took turns pretending to be Emmet. Pretty entertaining. Especially the voices.

You can download the file I sent to Walgreens here. It's set up as a 2x6 banner - although the graphic is only about 2x4.

Wedding fun...part one...

Tossed in with the fun of our anniversary, Christmas, my birthday and New Years - we also attended the wedding of our oldest niece Brimley (and our oldest nephew ties the knot in just a few short months, so fun!) To say that I completely adore this girl would be an understatement and watching her get married made me feel older than I really am. (Just another perk of marrying the second youngest in a family of nine siblings - you have nieces and nephews not too much younger than you.) At college, Brimley found a real gem, Scott, and I not-so-secretly wished they lived much closer. They're fun, energetic and they've got all sorts of style. Love that they found each other. They were married in the Mesa temple and had a reception at their house the same evening. I can't wait to see all their gorgeous photos, but of course I couldn't help but snap a few myself. It's in my blood. The beauty from the day:

Each table had random facts about the bride and groom - which made me walk around to each table to read them all, some were quite funny. The reception had a waffle bar and other breakfast related foods including donuts, so of course guests had to go home with fine label "McGrath" syrup. The donut cake was a work of art (didn't manage to get pictures of that before people started diving in) and I caught Brian working on the "groom's" donut cake. His and Her cups to toast their new life together. More pictures to come...