Little Man Mustache Baby Shower

When my sister-in-law got pregnant with her second little boy, we were so excited and threw her a "little man" baby shower! Specifically, we went with a diaper shower, since it is her second baby and her second boy baby shower. 
We invited a few close family and friends and had a little party to celebrate this special baby boy's arrival in style!  

Boy Baby Shower Plans

Keep reading for lots of little man baby shower ideas!  These could also be used for a fun gender reveal or boy's birthday parties.

DIY Pennant Banner (Paper Triangle Bunting) Tutorial

This simple tutorial will show you how to make a pennant banner out of paper- perfect for parties, seasonal decor, or just adding a touch of charm to any space. When I shared the paper triangle bunting I made for Talia's Teddy Bear Picnic Birthday Party it became a popular post. The tutorial I linked to is no longer available, so I've received a lot of comments from people requesting a tutorial.

Here it is!

Pennant Banner Supplies:

Polka Dot Rainbow Cake

Here are some helpful tips and tricks for constructing a polka dot rainbow cake, decorated on the outside with the petal cake style.  
In this post, I'll focus on tips & tricks for execution rather than sharing a full recipe. Since you can find recipes for both of these types of cakes online already, I've linked to some recipes at the end of this post. 
For Talia's 8th birthday party, she wanted a polka dot birthday party. I knew that I wanted to make a cake surprise for her with a rainbow polka dot cake. I wasn't sure how I would decorate it on the outside until I came across what is called a petal cake which is the technique I used to frost the exterior- I love the effect!

Rainbow Polka Dot Cake

How to Make a Polka Dot Cake

I used store bought cream cheese frosting for between the layers and a crumb coat (because I was worried that I would run out of the homemade cream cheese frosting that I used for the rainbow part). 

Snowman Snowball Toss Game

Here's a simple Snowman Snowball Toss Game that we played at Katrina's Frozen birthday party one year. I'll tell you how to play, what you need, and where to buy fake snowballs if you want to use them!

This snowball game was a definite hit with the party guests- what could be better than indoor snowball games, without the cold?

Apple Shaped Oreo Cheesecake Truffles

With Fall around the corner, it felt like the right time to share these Apple Shaped Oreo Cheesecake Truffles! I have a recipe for you, but don't feel you have to make them look like apples- they're good with any coloured coating, fancy-looking or not!

It's been nearly 10 years since I threw my sister a School Themed bridal shower, and made these Oreo cheesecake truffles, dressed up to look like apples! They were so cute and it's time to revisit that recipe!

My mom & I worked together on these with a recipe from a friend of ours that is so simple & so delicious! Want to try them? I thought so! ;)

Get-To-Know-You Jenga Game

As a fun ice breaker, I made this D.I.Y. "Get-To-Know-You" Jenga game for our first activity with the girls (ages 8-11) at church! I've included the list of prompts or questions that I used, to help you get started if you'd like to make your own- it makes a great party game!

Get-To-Know-You Jenga

How to Make Your Get-to-Know-You Jenga Game:

How to Make Your Own Rimming Sugar

I've always thought it would be fun to make our own rimming sugar when we want to have a special drink. When the girls decided they wanted to have Disney Frozen themed birthday parties I thought it would be fun to have a blue drink and rim the glasses with sugar for an icy look. Around that same time we were putting together a gift for my mother-in-law who loves Piña Coladas and Strawberry Daiquiris, so we set out to figure out how to make our own coloured and flavoured rimming sugar as well!

Rimming Sugar Recipe

What kind of sugar do you use to rim a glass?

To Make Regular White Rimming Sugar, all you really need is white sugar and a citrus fruit!

To Make Flavoured, Coloured Rimming Sugar, here's what you'll need:

Rolling Stamp Wrapping Paper

When I saw these little foam shapes in a package at the store, I had the idea to use my rolling pin to create this rolling stamp wrapping paper. It turned out to be a really fun project with really cute results!
If you know us, you'll recognize that these are photos from an old project- we did this TEN years ago!

Here are the supplies needed and my tips for how to do this project:

A Tween Birthday Party at Glama Gal Spa

To celebrate Talia's 12th birthday, we went to Glama Gal Tween Spa for a very special tween spa birthday party, complete with manicures, pedicures, and facials! As I mentioned in a previous post, it was wonderful to sit back and watch as the Glama Gals led the party. The fact that I didn't have to run the party meant that I had plenty of time to document it all with photos, so I can show and tell you all about it!

Our "Be You Tween" Birthday Party at Glama Gal Spa

Our party started with spa sandals, robes (including a special pink robe for the birthday girl), and a "let's get this party started" cheer. As if the beautiful, fancy pink decor weren't enough to get them excited, this had them energized and ready for fun!

Manners & Courtesy Tea Party/Hot Chocolate Bar

For one of our recent girls activity days, we had a hot chocolate tea party for the purpose of helping our girls to learn about manners and courtesy in a fun way. Some of the ideas we used could be used for any party, so I thought it would be a good one to share with you here!

We invited the girls to come dressed in princess costumes or fancy church dresses. We had a bunch of cute little sandwiches and treats and a fun hot chocolate bar, preceded by a hands-on table setting lesson. It was so much fun!

Raise the Fun by Adding Challenges to Classic Games

We've been having a lot of fun with games at our house lately! We've been playing with a couple of Hasbro's newer games (that I had in my Families Gift Guide here on the blog and that you may have seen us playing over in my Instagram stories), but we've also been putting new twists on some of the old classics! Hasbro is encouraging everyone to find new ways to enjoy their classic games by making them fun to play and to watch and we've been giving them a try. Keep reading to get some fun ideas to put a twist on some of your favourite games!

Would You Rather Web

Here's how to play a fun Would You Rather Web Game. I've included everything you need, including a would you rather list of ideas!

I'm helping to run the "Activity Days" program for the girls (aged 8-11) in our congregation at church. We run activity nights twice a month. Our first activity was full of get-to-know you games. They would make fun ice-breakers or party games for tween girls at any event!

Today's game is a creative twist on "Would You Rather" that shows how we're all connected. I saw a game like this online (I wish I had a link to share with you, but I've lost it) and thought it would be a fun one to re-create.

Here's how you play and what you need to create this game at  home:

End of Summer & PhD Party!

To celebrate Ken's successful PhD defense, my fabulous sister-in-law and mother-in-law put together an "End of Summer/PhD Party" and got a bunch of our friends and family together to play games, enjoy food, and celebrate!

My sister-in-law was in charge of the games and she came up with some really fun ideas! With the help of my brother-in-law who brought this awesome rope, she planned for a game of tug-of-war.

She also created this giant Twister game with spray paint! We used an app to "spin" and then had fun watching everyone get twisted up!

DIY Emoji Birthday Party

When Talia turned 11, she knew she wanted an Emoji themed birthday party, so we embraced it and came up with several DIY party activities and decorations to create a fabulous tween emoji party! Here's what we did:

Thankfully, Emojis are pretty simple to recreate, artistically! I made a round cake and covered it in homemade buttercream frosting, dyed yellow. I set aside some of the frosting to dye red and some to add cocoa to (to make chocolate flavoured accents).  We went with a kiss face emoji cake and I love the way it turned out!

It's always fun to party plan with the birthday girl involved. Here we are, right before the party started, happy with all of the things we came up with together!

Digital Sketch Charades

While we were on our Florida vacation, we had a couple of "down time" days in our rental home. We had been walking Disney for days, so lounging around and resting our feet was an important part of our time there! Ken had his tablet with him and we had already found one really fun way to use the stylus at Disney World, so we were excited to try Ken's next creative idea: his version of digital Pictionary!

We figured out how to get the sketches up onto the T.V. and it was so fun to watch them appear! Here's how we did it:

A Surprise Birthday Party!

For months I have been planning a surprise party for my mom's birthday. With the help of my dad and siblings, we arranged to fly my sister, Hilary, home from Utah and gather some of my mom's close friends and family to surprise her almost a month before her actual birthday. It was so much fun to do this for her!

Mermaid Birthday Party Ideas!

We usually choose a theme to plan birthday parties around and for her 7th birthday, Katrina was set on a mermaid party!  She is a big fan of a movie called Barbie in a Mermaid Tale, so we started planning with an underwater theme! :)

First we set out to transform our living room to feel like we were underwater!  We twisted streamers and taped them to the wall with painter's tape to look like seaweed.  Ken found an aquarium YouTube video to play on our TV to add to the underwater feel.

Mini Piñatas (Snowball Piñatas for a Frozen Party)

Talia really wanted a Piñata at her birthday party. We've made our own piñatas a couple of times for parties in the past, but this time we weren't keen on adding all of the extra candy to the party, and honestly, we just didn't feel up to making one.  It seemed to be really important to her though, so we did some thinking and came up with a really fun mini version of piñatas!  It was perfect for our "Frozen" themed party!

Here's how to make  your own mini piñatas:

What You'll Need:

How to Make an Olaf Cake for a Frozen Birthday Party

Disney came out with a new movie just over a year go that you may have heard of called Frozen... ;)  My daughters both wanted to have Frozen-themed birthday parties this time around, so I have several Frozen birthday party idea posts coming up for you.  Today we'll start with an Olaf cake tutorial.  I know that "drawing" something onto a cake with icing can be a bit daunting, so I thought I'd take step-by-step photos of how I created this one for you so that it will be easier for you to attempt if you want to recreate it. :)

I started with a white cake mix (made with egg whites- no yolk).  I made one purple round cake and one blue round cake.  I also made a basic buttercream frosting recipe. I guessed on the amounts that I would need for frosting the cake and decorating the cake.

To Assemble the Cake:

Donovan's Backyard Birthday Party

Last week we went to my nephew's 4th birthday party.  It was just our family, his family, and Gummy & Poppy (the grandparents), and it was so much fun!  My sister-in-law, Betsy, had their backyard all set up with a pool complete with water and plastic balls, sun umbrellas and lawn chairs, their fun play structure, balloons and delicious snacks.  The kids had a blast and it was so much fun to watch it all!

Here's the cute little 4 year old himself: