penny carnival

The Sleeping Beauty Goes Camping birthday party

We celebrated Bo's fifth birthday last night, following her desire for a Sleeping Beauty Goes Camping theme. 

I'm going to let these photos tell the story, and then you can hop over to my kids' parties site where there are more pictures and all the juicy details.

Thanks for cheering me on here and over on Facebook as I prepped for the party as the kids camped with J over the weekend. I had planned a totally darling setup, with all the bunny favors sitting at place settings at the table under the trees before the party began, but we had this crazy dust/wind storm here yesterday, so I had to scrap that idea. It would have been charming, but as J put it, "you could have thrown cow pies on the lawn and those kids would have had a good time."

See why I need you fellow craft addicts in my life?

Party favors (thanks, again, to the great tutorial from Wee Wonderfuls):

 

Princess ice cream, before Bo decorated it:

 

Princess ice cream, after Bo decorated:

Anyone else laughing at my old tirades against princesses and Barbie dolls? A lot of it still bothers me (like the fact that my daughter tells me she likes "skinny dolls, not puffy ones"), but we keep it to a minimum and it's generally not worth the fight. I've learned to pick my battles. There are plenty from which to choose.

A few of the girls eating dinner (gotta love the compost bin in the background--that's charming):

Dinner:

Playing pin the crown on Sleeping Beauty:

Cake and wardrobe change No. 2 for Bo (one of her friends gave her a matching outfit for her birthday):

Chocolate-frosted cupcakes with roasted marshmallows on top to fit the camping half of the theme:

Blurry. Sorry.

Many more pictures and a description of the whole party here.

T minus 3 months to Magpie's third birthday. Better start planning. 

  

Plan B

Tell the truth. Were you all snickering behind my back when I said I was going to make nine of those dolls to give as favors at Bo's birthday party? Holy moly. I didn't realize how long each one was going to take.

This is the ONE I've been able to make so far:

OK, I realize she has a slight jaw issue and her embroidered eyes and mouth are a little funky, but I still love her. 

This is definitely a pattern I'll use again (using matching thread next time, ahem), but I'm scrapping the plan to make nine of these, unless I can get Bo to agree to push her birthday party to December.

Plan B: Instead of making nine princesses for the "Sleeping Beauty Goes Camping" party, I'm going to focus on Briar Rose's little forest friends.

Mr. Bunny here took a fraction of the time to make:

 
Thank you, Hillary Lang, for your sweet and simple tutorial.

I'm either going to make nine bunnies or do a mix of owls and bunnies. Wish me luck. I have about 30 hours until J returns with the girls after camping.

 

One birthday project down ...

... many, many more to go.

Bo had the great idea to play pin the crown on Sleeping Beauty, so that's what this is for. I had a spare piece of plywood in the garage and used the girls' poster paint. I'm not sure if she earns the name "beauty," but she was free. 

More to come.

 

Hay bale seating

I've been meaning to do this for a long time, and Bo's birthday party is as good an excuse as any.

Hay bale seating.

There will be a food table between the bales by Monday.

I can't remember whether it was my friend Emily who first brought the idea to my attention or a picture from Country Living's website in my bookmarks. You can find more hay bale goodness at these links (warning: looking at these pictures might make you wish you could do your wedding all over again.):

From Ruffled

From Eventualities

From Sparkle & Hay

From Fiore Fresco, a slightly different take on it

We bought four hay bales tonight for $5 each from a delightful man named Sergey we found on Craigslist. For a moment, I thought J had found his new bestie.  

Advice: you need the quilts or some sort of cover on the hay. Unless you enjoy the hokey pokey.

These lovely quilts happen to be very special to me. The blue one was made for my dad by his grandmother, so it's about 70 years old. The holes are courtesy of my childhood dog Rocky, who had a thing for blankets, Barbie dolls and hippity hops. 

The red one was something I spied at the Farm Chicks Show his year. I must have visited it 10 times, and then, at the end of day 2, I came around the corner and saw my dear friend Nis holding it.

"Here," she said, thrusting it at me. "You have to have it."

I truly think of her every time I look at it. Thanks again for the wonderful gift, Nis.

Bo's reaction when she saw the hay bales tonight: "What does hay have to do with Sleeping Beauty Goes Camping?!!" (which is her birthday theme, if you're just tuning in).

Don't be silly, I replied. Don't you remember the horse the prince rides in the Sleeping Beauty movie? Well ... horses eat hay! 

Oh, yeahhhhhhhh. 

Good, good. Glad we're all on board. Now if poor J would just stop sneezing.

Doll shop

Just wanted to take a sec to say thanks to everyone who has "liked" Penny Carnival over on Facebook. I see lots of familiar faces and lots of folks I didn't even know were out there. Some of you I've never met, but I know from old comments that you've been reading this blog for a long time. Seeing your names feels like home.  

I also added a way for you to subscribe to new posts ... over there ...  ---->

... in case that's more your style. 

I'm gearing up to redouble my efforts--more toots (tee hee hee), more posts, more links to great things around the web and maybe one day a fancier look for the blog (but don't hold your breath). 

Thanks for following along. Without you, my husband would be forced to listen to me talk about crafts, parenting and (striving toward) simple living more than he already does. He thanks you, and I thank you.

On the agenda this week, making nine of these dolls to give as favors at Bo's birthday party Monday. 

Pattern by Bit of Whimsy and image courtesy of her, too.

I'm going to make them with the eyes closed, though, to fit the "Sleeping Beauty Goes Camping" theme. The dolls' eyes will be closed. Not mine.

We're sticking to a budget of $150 for the party (including presents--thank you, Craigslist). Helping in that effort is the decision to make this a little girl's party (as it probably should be) rather than a get together for our friends (who drink beer and require more sustenance than tea sandwiches) with a scoop of birthday on the side. 

I was discussing this with the nice woman cutting my fabric at Jo-Ann's today (9 party favors total cost: $26, thanks in large part to healthy supply of fabric scraps in my craft room). While I was there, I couldn't resist a little purchase for myself. McCalls patterns are on sale for 99 cents today, and I think this hat pattern will come in handy come fall.

It's the brown one, center top, that I want to make, minus the braid. And for 99 cents, I think I will. Some of the others would be perfect if I decide to go as Mrs. Roper on Halloween this year, don't ya think? 

P.S. It's J and my anniversary today, so I couldn't resist posting a picture from our wedding in 2002.

This summer also marks the point when we've known each other as long as we haven't. 18 years without him, 18 years with him (give or take a few years when we were didn't want anything to do with each other). I know quoting the Dave Matthews Band is tragically unhip these days, but "you come to me like wine comes to this mouth so tired of water all the time. You quench my heart, and you quench my mind."

Cheeeeeesy. I know. Sorry. He's just so dang great.

Here he is patiently getting "help" from the girls while fixing the sprinkler system:

And here is the result of letting your daughters think that they're being useful:

  

 

Cake, camping and crafting

I have nothing profound to say. I'm only here to report that I love summer.

Who doesn't, right? I love it so much I want to make out with it in the back seat of a car. I want to tattoo the word "summer" on my right bicep (the left bicep is reserved for the imaginary tattoo I have designed in my head but will never get). I want it to last for-ev-uh.

Here are some reasons why:

1. The new bakery at Chaps called Cake, and eating lunch with my girls in the grassy outdoor seating area. 

I believe we were there for almost three hours the other day. That place is heaven on earth for a mom because the kids can just play in the sandbox while I read the paper and drink delicious coffee (Bumper Crop, of Coeur d'Alene).

Inside Cake, you can see how owner Celeste Shaw found amazing new uses for old objects. Can you tell what this round blue thing is?

Yep, an old display case from a hardware store that formerly held nails and screws. She has two of them in the space, and if I remember right the plan is to load them with to-go bread.

Celeste's creativity never ceases to amaze me. Here's some eye candy (or should I say "eye cake"?):

My pictures don't do it justice. You must see it in person. Perfect opportunity: The Latah Summer Market, organized by Celeste and happening July 10 and 11 in the parking lot in front of Chaps and Cake. Artisans, antiques, produce, baked goods, flowers, more. 4241 S. Cheney-Spokane Road off Highway 195.

By the way, Cake pastry chef Gina Garcia made my birthday cake this year. Lemon chiffon. Delish. 

2. Backyard camping.

You know we're getting ready to go camping bananas around here. Well, J and his close friends decided to celebrate the Great American Backyard Campout with a night of practice camping with the kids. (OK, they had no idea there was a national effort to promote backyard camping yesterday, but we were pretty impressed by their good timing.)

Hot dogs, s'mores, an outdoor movie and nine kids with their dads in tents. Does it get any cuter? 

Apparently the picture below was taken during a hilarious game of hide and seek. Our friend H was "hiding" behind a tree, and it took Bo forever and a day to find him. It's not even an old oak tree or anything. It's more like a cluster of thin branches with a big dude behind them.

Is she rocking the pajama bottoms + 2T T-shirt or what?

For breakfast, they grilled French toast kebabs.

 

So much fun I almost wish I'd been there instead of out to dinner/drinks with the wives and then on a long run in the morning with one of them. Darn. Maybe next year. (But probably not.)

3. Nature crafts.

I'm working on those eco kid crafts I mentioned the other day (prepping for the make-and-take craft booth at the county fair).

Here's our take on Maya Made's nature crown:

Bo opted to draw pictures of nature objects instead of taping them to the crown, (although I was not aware that Sleeping Beauty counted as an object of nature):

I also made a bird mobile from newspapers, inspired by projects from the Queen of Tarte, Kayte Terry and myself a couple years ago:

 

Do they look more like rubber duckies than birds? Oh, dear.

 

A bit of advice if you're doing newspaper crafts with kids. Do your best to use articles with nice words. This little bird snuck in somehow:

Damn media. (Wink, wink.)

Sleeping Beauty toasts a marshmallow

First of all, the Facebook thing is a hoot. How fun to see all of you there! I really appreciate you "liking" penny carnival. If you're not into Facebook, no worries. You won't miss a beat just by following along here like normal. I appreciate and am humbled by that, too.

With Bo's fifth birthday party coming up in a few weeks, I figured I'd better send the invitations. 

Just to refresh your memory (and mine, since the kid changed her mind so many times), the birthday theme is: Sleeping Beauty Goes Camping. I'm doing my best to marry the two ideas. A few weeks ago, I showed you the dress I sewed her for the party. And before that, I listed some ideas for the bash, although I think that was back when it was Barbie Goes Camping, not Sleeping Beauty. 

The original plan for the invites was to set up a scene with Barbie holding a fishing pole and a can of beer soda near a miniature tent, take a picture and use that as the card. With the change to Sleeping Beauty, that would have required me buying Barbie Doll No. 2 (one with a Sleeping Beauty dress), and I'm just not ready for that yet. 

Anyhow, I went with tents instead:

I wanted it to have a Cath Kidston feel to it. I love her camping stuff.

The print isn't from Cath Kidston, though. I took a scrap of fabric from my stash--just a flannel from Jo-Ann's I used around Valentine's Day--scanned it into my computer and printed it out at Kinko's. 

I did the same thing to make the envelopes, but using the kitschy camping fabric ("Happy Campers" by American Jane for Moda) I had from the party dress I sewed.

I'm planning on posting a template for making custom envelopes on my About.com kids' parties site soon, but in a nutshell--just dissect an envelope you already have, lay it flat and trace its shape on any paper you like (even old magazine or book pages) and then fold and glue it into place).

And here's Aurora herself, toasting a marshmallow (I took the liberty of adding that to a coloring book image): 

Sorry for smudging out some of the details. I dislike creeps showing up at my house.

I created a place on the kids' parties site where readers can submit pictures of party invitations they've made, so head on over there, if you like, and show off your stuff.

And while I'm on the topic of paper projects, I never posted the Father's Day gift we gave J this year. He doesn't like to get anything fancy, so we made him a camping cookbook of outdoor recipes that we printed off the web and, ahem, illustrated:

 

(Yes, a cannoli. You mean you camp without cannoli? OK, we've never brought cannoli on a camping trip, but Bo insisted on including it in the book.)

(Not together, I hope.)

I would be happy to give my husband "real" gifts on his birthday and Father's Day, but the fact that he'd prefer things like this makes me love him even more.  

In defense of Shrek 4 ... and mama sews a birthday dress

What's with all the bad reviews of Shrek 4? The Shrek movies were the first films our girls fell in love with. J and I liked that we could laugh along and that the girls were getting a strong princess role model in Fiona. The girls liked the music, the characters and the tooting.

So we'd all be looking forward to Shrek 4 ... until I read some of the reviews this week. Critics are either saying it's mediocre or just plain awful. I knew we'd still go see it, but I wasn't jumping for joy to spend two hours in a movie theater after my expectations had been so greatly slashed.

We went yesterday, and the movie was GREAT. Funny, clever and Fiona was as strong and independent as ever. The plot is a little over Bo and Magpie's heads, but they still found plenty to laugh about. As did J and I. If you've seen it, I have two lines for you:

"I love you, Daddy."

and

"... Then my donkey fell in your waffle hole."

We laughed about those scenes all the way home.

I just had to throw that out there into the world. I know sometimes I get on my soapbox here about various lofty things like the First Amendment and simplicity and religion and such. Today it's Shrek 4. There. I've said my peace.

Moving on.  

The other day, when I wrote about Bo's upcoming "Barbie Goes Camping and Eats Ice Cream" birthday party, I forgot to mention one project I'd planned: sewing a camping-themed dress for her to wear. 

Done! Here it is:

 

I used a pattern for the basic shape (I'll update this later with the number), but then added the straps for the tie in the back. The fabric is "Happy Campers" by American Jane for Moda. The only problem is that the birthday girl thinks she's supposed to wear this when she goes camping since, she now tells me, this is going to be a Sleeping Beauty Goes Camping birthday party and therefore now needs a Sleeping Beauty dress to wear.

Cheese and crackers, kid. Where's Fiona when you need her?