Mickey Mouse Party

I love a party. I love all the prep for a party. I love getting together with so many friends. I love the not-so-healthy food at a party. I love all the craziness it brings (sorry to my husband who has to deal with me being a little crazy.) This year we decided to combine the boys' birthdays into one party. Their birthdays are only a week and a half apart. Jack turns three and Will turns one. I still can't believe my boys are so big!!  Jack decided he wanted a Mickey Mouse birthday since Mickey Mouse Clubhouse is his absolute favorite show. We played the Clubhouse song as all the kids were coming into the party and had a big sign as they walked into the play area.

My birthday boys are all ready for their party! Their shirts were too cute, almost as cute as my sweet boys. This picture doesn't do them justice. My talented friend "Ms. Ronda" made their shirts. They each had their name, age and Mickey Mouse. They opened these before their party and Jack was so excited.

He is ready to party.

 Those reading this with young kids understand that we had to have "Hot Diggity Dogs." Mickey sings the Hot Dog Song during his show. It is Jack's favorite and Will dances when it plays too. We played the Hot Dog Song as the kids were coming in to eat.

I made these cake stands (I am going to blog about that in the next couple of days.) I also made the cupcake stickers. I found an extremely helpful blog that gave step-by-step instructions: http://homemadebyjill.blogspot.com/2010/07/how-to-make-printables-without-photos.html

Once I printed the top section, I took them to Signed Sealed and Delivered (a scrapbooking store in Rogers, AR). This store is amazing. They allow you to use all of their tools at no charge. They have tons of paper (and everything else you can imagine) to purchase. I used their circle punches to make the rest of the stickers (not really a sticker at all but really a label.) I taped it all together and onto the sticks with double-stick tape. Double-stick tape became my favorite tool as I was prepping for this party - where has it been all my life?  A sweet lady named Billie at the store basically held my hand as we made tons of decorations for the party. I made the birthday banner, Clubhouse sign, cupcake stickers and parts of the centerpiece there!

Yummy cookies.

It's hard to read but it says: Oh Toddles...we're thirty! Another silly part of the show.

I used the circle punches and die cut machine at Signed Sealed and Delivered. I spray painted cheap metal buckets from Target, painted thin wooden sticks from Hobby Lobby, stuck it in floral foam, a little confetti paper, tied a bow and voila - Mickey Centerpiece. I had 4 of them around the room.

More centerpieces made from Jack and my niece's vintage Mickey lunch boxes. They were too cute to not find a way to use at the party!

I also used picnik.com (the above blog gives great instructions on how to use it) to make the invitations and taped them onto fun paper. 

We had our party at Boingo Bounce in Fayetteville, AR. It was a blast. It was so fun for the kids and the workers there were so nice and helpful. I fully admit to being the crazy mom that showed up too early with way too much stuff. As they were trying to get our room cleaned and ready (there was another party right before ours), I was already moving in box after box. My sweet hubby, father-in-law and step-mother-in-law helped set up. They were so patient with me - I can get a little out of control on party days.  Boingo Bounce is an inflatables arena with several party rooms. There are inflatable slides, bounce houses and a smaller inflatable for the little ones all in one huge room. It is a kid's dream.

Will and I are playing on one of the inflatables.

Daddy and Will sliding. He wasn't sure what to think about that.

Jack ran from one inflatable to another. He didn't stop smiling the entire hour we played in this room. He got pretty sweaty too.

The grandparents came to help celebrate.

 

Grandadddy and K.K. with one of the birthday boys.

D'Bob and Nana with that same birthday boy. (Jack was way too busy running around to pose with grandparents.)

My precious family - sorry it's a blurry picture. Jack is bright red with soaking wet hair, we made him stop to take a picture with us.

After we bounced for an hour, we went into our party room for food, drinks and desserts.

All the kids were so well behaved and sat together so nicely to eat. When did our kids get so big?

Such sweet friends.

I couldn't help but take a picture of Jack surrounded by all his girls. What a lucky boy!

Will loved his cupcake!

It was such a great party - mostly because all the kids had so much fun. It is one I will not forget.

Happy Birthday Will

Happy Birthday to My Sweet Baby Will!!

Dear Lord,

I praise your name for my baby William George. His smile fills up my heart. I pray that Will grows up to be a Man of God.  I ask that love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control will be developed in his character. Joy is already rooted so deeply inside him. I ask that he will always give his love and joy as generously as he does now. I pray Will's determination to let me know what he wants will be burned into his heart and grow into a determination to stand for what his right. Thank you Lord for this child - he has ingrained in me (along with his brother) a love I could not have imagine before.

My Blessings.

Valentine's Fun

It felt like Valentine's Festivities went on and on over the past couple weeks. It was too fun with Jack being almost 3 this year. He loves to do crafts (as long as it doesn't take too long.) We had some extra cardboard boxes so we cut hearts out of them. Jack, with a little help, painted them red and then glued glittered on them. We wired them onto my red and white wreaths...voila - Valentine's Day Wreaths.

We ran out of glitter and it ended up looking a little homemade but Jack was so proud of them. He asked everyone that came over if they saw them and that he made them. Sweet boy.

Will played on the floor while Jack worked on the hearts. He is usually so sweet to entertain himself when Mama and Big Bro are busy. Jack wanted his picture taken too. He told me he was being "tricky" while turning around on his motorcycle.

Another day we worked on Jack's Valentines for his friends. I saw this idea on Pinterest. We took  toilet paper rolls, creased them to look like hearts then dipped them in paint to be stamps. Jack loved it! It ended up looking like graffiti paper, which I thought was so cute. I used picnik.com to make the top part of the Valentine. I put Jack's current memory verse on each Valentine, which was so appropriate for Vday. Then we taped on a sucker - the part Jack decided was the most important.

Will took a good nap while Jack stamped away.

We went to a party at my good friend Candice's house. She had all the kids over which made it so crazy and so fun. We fed the kids lunch, did crafts, decorated cupcakes and played hard (good naps that afternoon.) My boys had to sport their pink shirts for the special occasion.

So many sweet kids. We have all been friends since before there were any. If you noticed that the last 2 pictures were much better quality than the rest, our friend Lindsey is our group's photographer! She took the family pics at the top of my blog and has her own blog: http://www.adollopofmylife.com/

After tons of fun and excitement on the days leading up to Valentine's Day, on the actual holiday we had to make a special Valentine for Daddy. Jack decided he wanted to use his scissors. So we cut up pink and red paper and glued it in the shape of a heart. I saw another cute idea on Pinterest with hand and footprints. After I did it with Will, Jack decided he wanted to do it too. So both boys had the same Valentines. Daddy was so excited that they are now on display on his desk at work.

Although all the fun with my 2 boys is always so lovely, my highlight of Valentine's Day was my date with my honey. Since we were dating we have gone to Copeland's every year - 9 times now. We always spilt Jambalaya Pasta and Banana Fosters. So yummy! After dinner we went to see The Vow - it was really good. Family time is sweet but I am so thankful that J.J. and I still love to hang out alone. Another reason I love Copelands is that it takes 30 minutes to get there. This gives us an extra hour of talk and laugh time! I tried to take a picture of the two of us by holding out my camera at the restaurant. It was so awful that it wan't blog appropriate.

My dad (D'Bob) babysat Jack and Will. They had a blast. He said his highlight, besides all the fun they had playing, was laughing about the vegetable incident.  As he was laying out their dinners, Jack told him that the peas and carrots were for Will. Will refused to eat them. As my dad was explaining this when I got home, I died laughing. Jack is pretty tricky - the peas and carrots were for him.