Butterfly Birthday Party

My 5 year old had her first 'friend' birthday party last month. She decided she wanted a butterfly theme. So, I made a chocolate cake with frosting flowers and white chocolate butterflies. We colored butterfly (and dragonfly) pictures while waiting for everyone to arrive. Then we made butterflies out of coffee filters, played pin the butterfly on the flower, danced around to pretty classical music, and played duck duck goose. The party was in the middle of the day, so there was butterfly themed lunch food. We had butterfly shaped sandwiches, butterfly shaped crackers and pretzels (pepperidge farm), and lots of yummy fruit. Then we opened presents and played until parents arrived to pick up their kids. It was lots of fun. But, I'm glad birthdays are done in our house until spring.

Bollywood Birthday

We had a Bollywood Birthday Party for my 10 year old daughter. It was a lot of fun. I made the invitations myself, and glued them on to some sparkly scrapbook paper.
Every one came dressed in colorful and sparkly clothes. We ate the traditional Indian sweets gulab jamun (the round ones) and jalebi (the spiral ones).

We also had cinnamon vanilla cake, to go with our 'sugar and spice' theme. And an ice cream sundae bar, with homemade ice cream (so it was egg-free for one of our guests). We had pink punch too.

We gave them their goody bags at the beginning. In it we put some bangles, a fancy bindi, a pink candy stick, and a sari fabric scarf (pink, orange and gold of course).

They put on the bindis and bangles, tied on the scarves, and then we started the party. We had some fake henna temporary tattoos for them to put on too. We did some Bollywood dancing once they were all dressed up. I found some clips on youtube to learn a basic dance. And I put together some song/dance numbers from various films we have. We had the movie clips playing on the tv during much of the party and the girls went back and forth watching and dancing periodically.

Here is our play list (I felt all these dance numbers were child appropriate):

Ainvayi Ainvayi from Band Baaja Baaraat

Kajrare from Bunty Aur Babli

Baawre from Luck By Chance

Desi Girl from Dostana

Zoobi Doobi from 3 Idiots

Marjaani from Billu

Dola Re Dola from Devdas

Bole Chudiyan from Khabi Kushi Khabi Ghum

Shava shava from Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Ghum

Yeh Ladka Hai Allah from Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Ghum

Saajanji Ghar Aaye from Kuch Kuch Hota Hai

Kangna Re from Paheli

Minnat Kare from Paheli

Nimbooda Nimbooda song from Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam

Dholi Taro Dhol Baaje from Hum dil de chuke sanam

Tumse Milke Dil Ka Jo Haal from Main Hoon Na

Deewangi Deewangi from Om Shanti Om

Aaja Soniye from Mujhse Shaadi Karogi

Lal Dupatta from  Mujhse Shaadi Karogi

Tenu Leke from Salaam E Ishq

Salaam E Ishq from Salaam E Ishq

Radha Kaise Na Jale from Lagaan

Jai ho from Slumdog Millionare

 

Even though we never got around to making the barefoot sandals I don't think they missed it much. We ate, danced, and generally had fun.

Cinnamon Vanilla Cake

My daughter's birthday party was a 'sugar and spice' theme. So I made her a cinnamon vanilla cake,  per her request. It was delicious and all the girls loved it. I made it pink and put a henna-style peacock on it, but the sparkly gold decorators gel spread a little more than I thought it would, so it didn't look as great as I'd meant it to. Nobody minded.

Pinterest Challenge?

Someone mentioned that they were doing a 30 day pinterest challenge. They will be doing one craft, recipe, or reading an article, each day for 30 days. Well, I certainly have a bunch of crafts and articles pinned on my own pin boards that I want to do/read but haven't made the time. I think I'll join in the challenge. From now until Halloween, I'll be trying out pins.

First up, a birthday cake. I saw this cool construction cake on Pinterest and knew my son would love it. How convenient of him to have a birthday just in time for this challenge. It turned out amazing. I admit I used boxed cake mix and canned frosting instead of making it from scratch (I did add black food coloring to the chocolate cake to make it darker). It still turned out great.

So anyone want to join me for a pinterest challenge?

Birthday Time

So my kids both had their birthdays recently. I enjoy baking and decorating cakes, so I did just that for each of their birthdays. Here are the pictures:


This is for my 1 year-old. His nursery is all in a frog theme, so was the baby shower he got when I was pregnant.




My now 5 year-old wanted a Halloween birthday party. We did a spider theme with the colors purple and black. This is the haunted house cake she wanted (for some reason she refused to have a spider cake).