Category Archives: Party!

Collage Eggs

03 Tuesday Apr 2012

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We made these eggs for our friends last year.  They are simple for kids to decorate and a good way to use up some scraps from past projects.  You will need:

*Card stock

*Scissors

*Glue

*Collage Materials (We used scrap yarn, fabric, cupcake liners, glitter, sequins, googly eyes, doilies, watercolors and crayons).

1.  Draw large egg shape on card stock and cut out.  Our eggs are 4″x 3″.

2.  Trace this egg pattern onto the other card stock pieces and cut out.

3.  Hand over the glue and let the kids decorate away.

4.  Wait for glue to dry and place in vellum envelopes.  These make great Easter cards or basket treats for the grandparents.

Coffee Filter Flowers

22 Thursday Mar 2012

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This was inspired by the new Martha Stewart issue.  We are ready for spring and Easter colors around here!  These flowers are made by gently folding painted coffee filters into petal shapes.  Ada liked using the paints and watching the colors bleed up the filters.  The finished flowers can be combined into a bouquet, tied onto gifts, or planted on the wall like we did.  You will need:

*Coffee Filters

*Watercolor Paints and/or Food Coloring (I used both, but kept the kids away from the messier food coloring)

*Bowls (for mixing the food coloring with water)

*Paper or Scrap Cloth Towels

*Green Pipe Cleaners

*Painters Tape (for wall hanging)

1. Separate filters into stacks of 4 to 6 each.

2. Fill bowls with a small amount of water and a few drops of food coloring.  We used about five drops in shallow water.

3. Dip the bottom edges of filter stacks in bowls and/or paint edges with watercolors.  More pigment and less water=brighter colors.  Filters can be dried and more colors added until you like your results.

4. Place filter stacks on towels to dry.

5. When stacks are still slightly damp, pinch the back center of the flower and twist all the filters together, (middle photo).  Secure with pipe cleaner and gently unfurl petals.  If you used food coloring, a bit may transfer onto your hands when flowers are wet but should stay put when dry.

6. When flowers are completely dry, make a loop of painter’s tape. Insert stem through loop vertically and stick onto the wall.

Party!

12 Monday Mar 2012

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Decorations on the fan.  The vintage lanterns are from flea markets and the large pink one is from Pearl River Mart store in Manhattan, (much better than the site).  We make the pom poms from Nashville Wraps tissue.The spread.  I scored the beautiful Jadeite pieces on Craigslist the day before the party.  They remind me of my Great Gram and they are the most perfect color to mix with hot pink and reds.  The chocolate cake is my favorite recipe.  It is a staple at our parties and inspired me to be brave about homemade cakes.  They are so worth it!  Polka dot fruit cups and stripey straws are from Shop Sweet Lulu.  She has lovely, edited, special party supplies.  Special drink.  We like to do a signature drink for our parties.  Josie’s was a sparkling berry soda.  We added a kick to the adult version.  You will need:

*2 oz.Sparkling berry drink. We used Lorina French Berry.

*1.5 oz. St. Germaine

*1.5 oz. Champagne

*Raspberry for garnish

1.Measure, mix and stir gently.  Pour into fancy glass over ice.  (Drinking champagne through a good straw makes it even more fun!)  I found the perfect vintage ‘B’ glasses for Chris at a church sale years before we had kids.  I would have gotten them even without the correct last initial and $5 price tag.  Josie-bean Ice Cream.  I love our vintage ice cream maker and any excuse to whip up a batch makes me happy.  The We are going to do custom flavors for the girls’ birthdays from now on.  For Josie-bean (Ada’s nickname for Josephine) you will need:

*3 Cups Heavy Cream.  Good quality cream is essential.  We use Ronnybrook Farm’s from our farmer’s market.

*2/3 Cups Unrefined Sugar.  I think this tastes better than white sugar.

*2 Teaspoons Vanilla Extract

*Seeds from 2 Vanilla Beans

*2 Cups Fresh Raspberries

1.Scrape seeds from vanilla beans and add to cream, sugar and vanilla in small saucepan.  Drop empty pods into cream and heat on low heat until all sugar dissolves.

2.Remove vanilla bean pods and pour cream mixture into bowl.  Chill in fridge for an hour.

3.Pour cooled mixture into ice cream maker, add fresh raspberries and follow directions for your maker.

4.Serve immediately or store in freezer.  Allow to soften slightly before serving.

Happy Birthday Josie!

Rainbow Fruit Cake

07 Wednesday Mar 2012

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I like to give kids their own little cake to eat on their first birthday.  The rest of the party may be lost on a one-year-old, but they generally like making a mess with food.  This recipe is simple and has way less sugar than the cake that the rest of us ate.  Josie loved the fruit and ate most of it before getting to the cake.  We used a mini springform pan that we got at A Cook’s Companion in Brooklyn.  You can also find one here.

Here is the recipe:

*2 Cups Flour

*1 1/2 Teaspoons Baking Powder

*1/2 Teaspoon Baking Soda

*2 Large Eggs

*1/2 Cup Baby Food (We used one large pouch of organic strawberry/banana)

*1 Cup Soy Milk

*1/4 Canola Oil

*1 Tablespoon Vanilla Sugar (See my Vanilla Sugar post for directions).

*1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract

*Sour Cream or Thick Greek Yogurt (For frosting)

*Variety of Cut Fruit for Rainbow

1.Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2.Grease Pan.

3.Mix dry ingredients.

4.Wisk eggs and mix with wet ingredients.

5.Pour wet into dry and mix until smooth and pour into pan.

6.Bake 20-30 minutes, or until a fork comes out clean.

7.Release from pan after 15 minutes.

8.Frost with sour cream or yogurt when cool.

9.Arrange fruit on frosting just before serving.

Balloons

06 Tuesday Mar 2012

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Bringing home the giant balloons for Josie’s party.  Her favorite part of the day may have been the stroller walk with balloons above her head.  I found these 36″ giants at Bargain Balloons for cheap and then Party City filled them for $2 each!  This is exciting because everyone else in my area was quoting me $20 per balloon to fill.  (Sorry for all the prior bad-mouthing Party City).  We did have to walk a mile with the double stroller, but Ada helped look out for pointy gates and low hanging branches.  Josie got a lot of smiles and birthday wishes on the way.

Invitation

02 Friday Mar 2012

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Josephine is almost one already!  I am not sure how the year passed so quickly, so we are celebrating for more than one day.  I’ll share some of the birthday ideas in more posts.  Here is the invitation:

We used photo corners to attach her picture and a custom stamp for the inside.  The stamp shipping is cheap if you buy a few, so we have a stockpile for upcoming birthday years.  The square envelopes are from here.

Happy Birthday Josie-bean!

Stamps

16 Thursday Feb 2012

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I love a beautiful stamp.  It completes an invitation or thank you note and stamps are little works of art. I am still amazed that a letter can get all the way across the country in a matter of days for such a small price.  Unfortunately, my over-worked post office staff seems less enthusiastic with the quest for stamp beauty.  (The boring American flag sheets do not count as interesting in my book).

I discovered you can buy stamps online directly from the USPS site (duh).  There are a ton of stamp options that have never seen the inside of a Brooklyn PO and they deliver them for free!  You can even coordinate custom stamps to match your events.  Aah, the beauty of technology and old-school together on an envelope.

Hearts and Stars

14 Tuesday Feb 2012

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We originally got these tiny 1 1/2 inch cookie cutters at a baking shop for Ada’s playdough.  (There are some super inexpensive ones here). They are also perfect (after a good washing), to cut watermelon into Valentine party snacks.  PB&J, cheese and cucumbers may also be shaped in order to trick a toddler into eating something healthy.

Washi Tape Wrap

06 Monday Feb 2012

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My latest favorite way to wrap gifts is with Japanese Washi Tape and brown craft paper.  We used the tape here to label the card as well.  Happy Birthday Asher!

There are so many beautiful tape options…I could spend days looking.  Here are some great Washi tape choices from Etsy.  (Oh Etsy, how I love you!)

Heart Felt Valentine

02 Thursday Feb 2012

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These wool felt hearts are really reversible magnets for the fridge.  They are flat enough to put through the mail and make perfect valentines or invitations to a Valentine’s Day party.  You will need:

*Felt.  We used two colors of wool felt from Woolfeltcentral.com

*Embroidery Floss in contrasting color

*Stuffing

*Two small, strong Magnets.  (You only need one if you don’t want the heart to be reversible).  We used Tiny Mighties

*Glue

*Cardstock, or paper to make the pattern

1. Fold cardstock in half, draw half a heart along the fold. Unfold and you will have an even pattern.  Trace onto felt and cut.

2. Glue magnets on inside top of each heart cutout.  You don’t need much glue because the magnets will end up safely inside of the heart and won’t fall off.

3. Place a little stuffing on one side of the heart.  You can adjust stuffing position as you sew, and the stuffing will help prevent the strong magnets from sticking to each other.

4. Blanket stitch the hearts together.  Stuffing and magnets will be inside.  Push any stray stuffing inside as you sew.

5. Allow glue to dry.  If you are putting the heart through the mail you may want to fold it inside a note before putting it in the envelope.  We used vellum envelopes from Envelopemall.com

XOXOX!