Mama's Beautiful Life

Trick or Treat!
Smell My Feet!
Deciding what type of wreath/door hanging to go with was such a hard decision! I love to include my kids so I did that just with things I had around the house. I took plaque that was 'made but never paid' for and painted the surface black with the side trim white and green. (You can cut these yourself if you're familiar with it or you can get them at any craft store)
After the paints have dried I painted my kids feet and did there prints. I filled in some of the 'feet spaces' with a little more paint, but I tried to keep the little foot print indentions in tact.
I added the, bowtie, faces, hat, hair, boots, brooms after each previous had dried.
After ALL the paint has dried, seal the paint with a glaze or modge podge.
Place outside in the sun for it to dry more quickly.
Luckily, in the south, it is still in the 70/80s in late September.

Once everything is completely dry, you are ready for the next part.
You'll be added thin tulle with a staple gun.
(If you don't want the tulle, skip that part and just add your ribbon for hanging)

But 1st, you will need to prepare you tulle.
I cut my cereal boxes & cracker boxes to wrap fabric around for storing, so it looks like mini bolts of fabric on a shelf.
I took a cheez-it box and wrapped my tulle around it. The amount you will need depends on the size of your plaque. Start with maybe 10 pieces and estimate it was you go.

Cut the tulle at the top of the box and then at the bottom.
Be sure to hold the fabric tight.

Here are the squares.

To shape the tulle, pinch it in the middle a few times.
Easy Peasy.

Now you are ready to attach the tulle 'pinches' to the back of the board.
I used a staple gun which is easiest. However, you should make sure your staples are not too deep for the plaque as you don't want them to come through the front!
I pinned two colors side by side at a time.
Black - Black, Glitter Orange-Orange, Black-Black, Glitter Green-Green, Black-Black
I also stapled two colors at a time to use less staples.

Once you have tulle all the way around, you're ready to add the hanger.
Cut your ribbon or string to the length you like best.
Pinch together and flip around & place by the tulle in the middle of the top portion of the plaque.
Staple.

Now, to seal and hold down the tulle so it sticks out better in the front.
Felt is best for this. Cut a piece the size of the back. Place over the tulle.
Hold back the tulle and start to staple.

Then, flip over and WA-:LA!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

There's so many options for a 2nd Birthday Party and I wanted to go with something a little different. I 'googled' around and decided on Veggie Tales as it is my son's favorite. His face lights up when he sees Bob and Larry so I went with it.
Everything happened so fast, I blinked my eyes and it was over. All the kids had a great time and it was a success. I didn't get everything done that I planned, but what I actually had was plenty so it all worked out!

First, I made a list which I scratched out and added as I planned. Here's what it came down to.

Goody Bags
Watering Cans
Turtle & Seahorse Water Squirters
A few packets of seeds
Veggie Fries
Veggietale Book Marks
Veggietale Coloring Books-home printed & tied with embroidery string. :)
Food
Veggie Tale Cake
Banana Sundae Bites
Large Chocolate Covered Marshmellows
Veggie Tray
Games
Explore the Garden
Pin the Nose on Bob
Bob the Spinkler
Bob & Larry Pinata
Play Time
Invitations
Home made!

These can be found on the baby isle. They were new in May and so great for the theme!

I started with brown paper bags for the goody bag. I found a Veggie Tale Image and customized it with each kids name, cut it out and glued it on a bag.
The watering cans I found at the Dollar Tree! That was a great find! Also, they had seeds 4/$1.00. At 25 cents a packet, you really can't get much better than that!
The squirters came from Hobby Lobby.

For the coloring/fun pages I found some vegetable themed pages and Veggie Tale printables. I re-sized them then printed on card stock paper. My nifty paper cutter made it super easy to cut. We put the booklets together then tied them with embroidery ribbon.
The Veggie Tale book marks and pages were printed from http://www.VeggieTales.com
They have lots of printables and games to play.

I arranged everything to make sure each bag had equal amounts.

I thought the bags turned out nice!

For the Invitations, I played around on the computer! I resized an image of Bob & Larry, added a pic of my son and added the invite wording.
"Peas come and Lettuce
CELEBRATE
Justin's 2nd
BIRTHDAY!
Sat. June 9th
Turnip Time 11AM
AT
Justin's Garden"
I sized the invite and printed them out at Walmart as a regular 4x6; very inexpensive! I also printed some at home for decoration.

It was so cute to see all the kids running in with excitement!

I painted Bob on a foam poster board. Actually, I painted the circle and glued the face that was printed from Veggietales.Com!
This was a last minute thing that turned out too cute. It served as PIN THE NOSE ON BOB as well as a great decoration too.

I couldn't find a Veggie Tale shirt or an embroidery design anywhere, so I ordered one from Veggietales.com. They really had some great deals! This shirt came in a water bottle which was really fun.

The kids loved playing in the sand & water table.

The biggest hit was the Bob Spinkler! This was another great find from VeggieTales.Com!
I'm not sure why we don't have a picture of the face. Like I had mentioned, everything happened so fast!

We toted our coffee table outside for the gift table.

I can't remember what kind of sandwiches, but there were at least two kinds. Maybe turkey and chicken salad??
There was a veggie tray, multicolored goldfish, chips and a fruit salad.

Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Pops! These are the campfire marshmallows, which are the largest I have seen. They were dipped in milk chocolate or white chocolate then dipped in glittered green sprinkles, then frozen.

I meant to have Madame Blueberry Lemonade but I forgot so we had regular lemonade!

They seemed to enjoy it!

My husband made these kid tables! We put several out and they were just perfect for the event!!

For Larry, I baked a rectangle and cut into a Larry shape and Bob of course was from a round pan. I used food coloring for the green and red and used a shimmery black for eyes, nose and mouths. It wasn't perfect but everyone loved it and it tasted really good too!! It's hard to make everything perfect when you have 2 little ones and are nursing one of them, but everything seems to fit together. :)

I wish I would have taken a better picture of these! They are Banana split bites! I put the bananas in the fridge for a little bit. Then cut them in 3rds, with the peeling still on. I took a small 1/8th teaspoon and scooped out some of the banana, dipped the bottoms in chocolate, then dipped some ice cream in the top. These went into the freezer until it was time to serve. I added a little whipped cream on top before bringing them out. These were gobbled up in delight!

The Birthday Boy was very excited over the Bob and Larry Cake!!

Cake and Banana Split Bites! Perfect!

This was the thing that took my nerves away! I almost thought this would not happen but it turned out perfect, thanks to my niece who helped!! I found a tutorial (click here) that was totally great!
The only thing that was a little different was the balloons. My oblong balloons were much too tiny so I tapped 4 together then added the same to the bottom to make a Larry shape. The outcome made it look more like a cucumber with there textured shape. I would do this a week in advance though and not just a day like I did!

The Marshmellow Pops were so good, some had to have 2nds and 3rds!

Opening his Larry Mobile! Thanks to Veggietales.com!
You can't tell it here, but we put down a blanket for the kids to sit on during present time.

Larry Boy! His favorite!

Now the big moment! The Birthday Boy and his cousin took a swing at the cool pinata!

Six months old and she wants a turn too!

The kids took several turns and this thing was made better than we thought it was!! She really had to bang at it to get it to burst.
There was candy, fruit snacks and ring pops inside.

See all the loot in their bags!?

The flowers are on the left. To the right are the peas from the dollar store seeds. These were planted a week prior. We let Justin decorate his garden with the frog, wind spinners and the duck & rabbit that my husband made.