Partying Made Easy

I love throwing parties in general and have fun throwing birthday parties for my kids but a lot of times end up overdoing it and feel overwhelmed.  Thought I would pass on some things I did differently that made it easier this time:

1.  Freeze.  I made my triple layered cake, cookies, cupcakes, and homemade frosting all days before the party.  One night, I did all the cakes and had fun making cookies another day with the kids.  I wrapped up the cakes with aluminum foil to keep their shape, then wrapped them individually in plastic.  I put the frosting in a tuperwear and the cupcakes and cookies in freezer ziplocks.  

2.  Unfreeze.  I frosted the cake the day before the party and made fresh frosting for it that day too.  The cake was easier to frost because it was cold.  I put it right on the cake platter and kept it in the refrigerator over night to keep its shape.  I took the frosting, cookies, and cupcakes out of the freezer the morning of the party.

3.  Dollar Store.  I found powdered sugar, decorations, table covers, candy, punch bowls (that were plastic but looked like crystal), and candy trays.  After spending a ton on candy at Albertson's, I got smart and bought some extra candy at the dollar store. 
4.  Clean up.  I put all our left over candy in a freezer bag (and put in the freezer) to save for our Christmas gingerbread houses.  Everything can be frozen and frosted another day or given to neighbors.

Halloween party activities:

1.  Danced to Halloween music.  I made wands last year by spray painting dowel sticks and putting ribbon streamers on them-so the kids waved them as they danced.  We acted like monsters and witches.

2.  Read Halloween books.  Got some from the library to add to we had.

3.  Decorated cupcakes and cookies.  Bath and Body works has some great Halloween "hanitizers" that we had on the tables.

 

4.  Painted Faces.

 5.  Ate monster cake.  I got the idea from THIS blog.  I did mine a little different-I made my hair a little messier-more matted looking and used large marshmallows for the eyes (much easier!). 

We displayed some of the kids' projects on a string of yarn as part of our Halloween decorations.  We'll leave it up and do the same for Christmas.

Letter C.

This week I needed to prep Apollo's party, so making Cookies killed two birds with one stone.

Incredible sugar cookies (you can roll these out too, cut, and cook for about the same amount of time):

1 C (2 sticks) butter, softened

1 1/2 C granulated sugar

1 egg

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp almond extract

2 3/4 C all-purpose flour

1 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 350. Lightly spray pan cavities with vegetable pan spray.

In large bowl, beat butter and sugar with electric mixer at medium speed until well blended. Beat in egg and extract; mix well. Combine flour and salt; add to butter mixture. Beat until well blended.

Press dough into cavities, filling 2/3 full. Bake 9-10 min. or until light brown around the edges. Cool in pan 5 minutes. Turn pan over; lightly tap pan to remove cookies. Cool completely on cooling grid.

Makes about 1 dozen cookies

Love this pan!! Thank you Joanie! So easy for kids to mush the dough in, cook, and out come the cutest shapes.

Colors.

Cotton Balls.

Hungry Caterpillar. January made flannel board pictures to go with the book. Annie counted all the fruit.

I got a lot of my ideas again from here. They are easy to print. While Annie's working on something, I cut other things out for the next activity.

Upper and lower case word matching.

Match the colors and the word. She liked these puzzles.

Halloween fun for kids.

Why I love dollar stores for Halloween. I stock up on costumes and put them in the kids' dress-up bin to use all year, they have fun Halloween crafts for kids, accessories for our costumes, and Halloween decorations. I let the kids decorate their rooms this year with a few decorations and they loved it.

Halloween fun. Where do I get my ideas? The dollar bin at Michaels. Dollar Stores. Pinterest. The Family Fun Magazine.


Bloody waffles. Red food coloring in syrup.

Acrylic paint. I like it because it doesn't smear. I'm really not sure if it's the best for kids' faces but I grew up with my mom painting ours and never had a reaction. Suzana said each bottle is on sale right now at Michael's for only 50 cents.

Pumpkin faces. We got glass jars and made faces out of masking tape. The kids painted over the whole thing with orange acrylic paint. After it dried, we peeled off the tape.  You can put a candle in and the light will make them glow.

Glass stained ornaments. I bought these at Michael's and they have Christmas ones out right now for a buck each. They turn into beautiful stained glass. Just put them in the oven. Great for little kids or older ones. The older ones can use tweezers and really make them amazing.

Halloween scratchers. They're like 10 for 50 cents at Michael's right now. The kids use a little tool to scratch little faces into the Halloween ornaments. They come with colorful ribbons to hang them up. My preschoolers loved this project.

Melty Beads.  Apollo made this witch (turn your head sideways to see:) from a pattern.  Now we just need to put the wax paper on and iron.  We'll hang it up with other Halloween ornaments.  Another dollar treasure and great for Apollo to work on during quiet time.

Letter B. Letter b stands for...

Beads.

Beanbags. The kids each made their own.

Blood. We made fake blood of syrup and red food coloring for a Halloween decoration.

and Books. We got Halloween books from the library this week.

Click HERE to download free puzzles, number games, big B and little b matching games, and letter practices (and much more!). Annie loves playing school...I do to! These are all free so just click on the download buttons.

Letter of the week. Letter A.

My plan: To do a letter of the week using learning tools and activities. Through Pinterest and the internet, it is super easy to get ideas and to print any you want off. Annie and I are going to work on them for part of the time Apollo is at preschool and bring Apollo in for the fun too.. Annie LOVES LOVES "playing school". Being a busy mom, I want this activity to serve me and me not have to serve it or stress over it. So, we're keeping it simple. I hardly take any time to look, and print off the stuff I want. For example, this week we're doing the letter B and will go biking. Since I know what letters will be coming (ha ha), I'm going to keep track of ideas that come to me so I don't have to search too much when the letter comes. Here is where I got my letter A stuff. There are tons of ideas to pick and choose.

Keeping it Together: Walmart had the flat folders for 10 cents a piece and I bought some page protectors. I put Annie's art work, puzzles I cut out, activities etc. in there and will do so with all the letters. It's a great review and great activity book for road trips or church. Apollo enjoys doing the activities and they can be done again and again. I'm planning on keeping it around for baby #3.

I got this idea from my friend, Bonnie, as she's doing the letter of the week with her second child. He's just a little guy and knows all his letters. We were first year high school teachers (she was an English teacher) together and now it's fun to keep in touch via the blogging world. She told me she has more ideas and resources than time to do everything. I've found this to be true.

I cut out the puzzles and games while Annie did her projects, then we worked on them together.

Annie likes to show Apollo what we've been working on when he gets home. He likes to do the puzzles too.




Chalk. Fun way to learn. Apollo drew out the big letters while I did the lower case.

Fun twist on pb and j.

Welcome Back...me.  I took a long needed break after all my preschool posts.  I have still been working on tons of projects and taking pictures so I'll fill you in.

Perfect for lunch or a snack.     

Toast.  Pb.  Cut strawberries.  Drizzle agave nectar (I got mine cheaper at Costco) or maple syrup.  Yum