Happy Birthday, Allie!

On Wednesday, Allie came home from school to her new sandbox for her birthday. Yes, we bought her some sand. It's actually way more exciting than it sounds. (But surprisingly, NOT exciting to clean out of hair every night.)

Cupcakes to school and a cake for her party on Saturday, meant that for her birthday candles on Wednesday, we didn't want cake. So, Allie got to blow out the candles on her birthday cookies and color a picture of what her cake for her party should look like. She already told me that it should be purple, with a pink flower in the center and hearts around it. So, imagine my surprise when she drew up an elaborate multi-layer thing, bigger bottom layers, smaller top layers, just like in the cartoons. The top layer had flowers on the side, the next layer down had dinosaurs (for the boys), then ballerinas, then dogs, and the bottom layers are still not finished.

The Invitations: A Garden PartyWe folded the petals in to form a circular invitation.They open to become the full flower and reveal the party details. Allie and I drew up a couple different versions before deciding on this one.
This is the petals all folded in. We wrote the "invitee's" name on the outside petal.

On the back of the "center" we wrote a celebration version of the "Roses are Red" poem
Roses are red
Violets are blue
Allie is turning six
And wants to celebrate with you!

Party details are in the center. "Join Me In The Garden" We were going to write it right onto the pink flower center, but the 'roses are red' poem bled through just enough that we didn't want to fuss with it. We used some paper that looks like hand pressed flowers to create a new center.

The Food: Simple and Fresh

PB&J sandwiches were shaped as butterflies; PB&H sandwiches were tulips.

The Cake

Allie actually directed all aspects of the design.

The Games

1. Painting the Pots

Since they had to dry, we decided to paint them first and let them dry while we partied. Some of the girls used the stencils, but mostly, they freehanded their beautiful creations.

2. Food, cake, and presents.
Allie and Aimee made most of these tissue paper flowers earlier in the week for the centerpiece.

3. Stick-The-Bug-On-The-Flower: The game Allie actually wanted play BEFORE the food. The garden party version of "Pin-The-Tail-On-The-Donkey." I drew the flowers on poster board and printed off the bugs. (The children really did a much better job of clustering the bugs around the flower; I moved them all, except the lizard, for picture purposes. The lizard was actually Allie's piece. It was positioned first and this is exactly where she placed it. I thought it looked great!)

4. Garden Bingo

5. Planting the Flowers.

6. Jumping This was actually what Allie wanted to be a long jump game. But, I forgot about this game in the preparation, so she improvised and used sand tools for the lily pads that she had wanted. Then, it evolved into jumping through the hoop.

The Friends

Thank you for celebrating with us. Sarah, Paris, Grace, Jenna, Allie, Aimee, Maria, Jett, Alex, Aidan (looking totally "safe" with a balloon on his face.) (Tiana is not in this end-of-party pic because she had to leave early. We're happy that she came for a while!)