Hello Kitty Party Details

My 6 year old loves Hello Kitty.  When she asked for a Hello Kitty party I kinda cringed.

I don't like character parties.

I don't like how easy it is to "buy the matching plates".

I like a good challenge.

I like an original party!

So I got to work dreaming up a "Hello Kitty Party" of my own.  It was a ton of fun and Maddie loved every minute of it and it was over way too fast.  Please enjoy these photos and if you have questions, please ask!

The Decor

{Left to right}

-Simple balloons tied to curling ribbon

-Cute bouquets lined the table

-A fun felt Kitty welcomed the guests at the front door

-My birthday girl made the name tags herself.  CUTE!

-The kids adored the Hello Kitty balloons!

-I covered tin cans with cute card stock and filled them with silk flowers and button flowers for the kitty balloons.

The Crafts

{Left to right...}

-"Pin the bow on the Kitty

-"Pass the package"

-Home made coloring books

-Place mats the kids glued in place and we covered with contact paper

-Coloring pages are better printed on card stock!

-Every time the music stops, someone gets to unwrap one layer!

-Packing tape on the back of felt "bows"

-Kitty looks pretty!

-The girl who unwraps the last layer of paper gets to keep the prize inside.

The Main Event

Hello Kitty Store!

My daughter Maddie told me she wanted a "Hello Kitty Store" (like the adorable Sanrio store in San Francisco and other fun cities).  One night I woke up with the idea to display the goody bag items in our cute dollhouse and let the girls buy their treasures with play money.  This activity was so much fun.  The girls were completely into it and my older daughters loved running the store!

The Outfit

 I found the gorgeous pettiskirt in bubblegum pink on Etsy .  The seller was so great to work with and the quality of the skirt is top notch at a fantastic price!

Maddie put the skirt on Friday night and wore it to bed!  When she woke up she was ready to party.  

I bought a $4 plain white shirt and ordered this fantastic iron-on rhinestone from Bling Bling Transfer on Etsy.

I love Etsy in a big way!

The shirt turned out so adorable.

I made the bow. 

The kitty is on a bobby pin and can slide off the bow and be worn alone.

Did you know I sell bows?

Want some?

GO HERE!!

  

Thanks for visiting and taking a minute to check out this fun party!

If you are inspired to use any of these ideas, I would LOVE for you to send me a photo or a link so I can see what you come up with!!

See cake HERE.

Kitty Favors

 

Here are some fantastically cute kitties.

And here are those same kitties happily perched on their new homes.

Party favors...

Check!

We're Rolling!

Things are in motion around here!  The Hello Kitty party invitations have been handed out and the details are coming together.  Here's a little sneak peek.

 

 Rows of bows made out of felt and outlined with puff paint.

Button Bouquets!

Little Felt invitation holders:)

More to come...lots more to come!

Calm Before The Storm

Around here my brain is bursting right now with ideas and plans.  I have made so many lists I can not keep track of them.  Three of my kids have spring birthdays.  One of those is a FIRST BIRTHDAY!!  

I love first birthdays.

I mean really really love them!

I can not wait for Cait's big day!

 

Before I get to do my baby's pink and brown giraffe party, I will be throwing a Hello Kitty party for my 6 year old.  This should be easy, right?  

Buy some plates.

buy some balloons,

make a cake

bada- bing, bada- boom,

party is over...

Ya not in my world.

For some reason I feel complelled to re-invent the Hello Kitty party.  No themed plates, my brain wants to come up with something new and fresh.  This banner above is not mine, I wish it was, I wish I had come up with this cuteness! I saw it on Etsy. I heart Etsy... but we will leave that conversation for another day...

...Because I have a Hello Kitty party to plan!

Yikes!  Wish me luck!  If you have any inspirations, send them my way!  The Hello kitty party is March 6

right.

around.

the corner!

Double yikes!

Oh!  I forgot to mention, the first birthday, the one I have been dreaming about for 9 months, is on a Saturday in May and my son's party will be the next day.

Yes, you read that right.

THE NEXT DAY!

Which leads me to my 3rd party that needs to be planned...

My almost 4 year old wants a "park party".

What's a park party you ask?

We have a park across the street from our house.

He wants his party to match the park...

....and be at the park.

And that, my friends, is me, as real as it gets... lamenting about the toils and trials of having so many of my kids' birthdays in such a short space along with my God-given desire to make every detail perfect because doing parties, I swear, is the 6th Love Language!  Thanks for listening and thanks in advance for any ideas or words of encouragement!!

I Was Featured!!!

I am so excited!  Remember my daughter Mailee's Shopping Party?  Well it is being featured today over at The Creative Party Place!   I love this site.  They have compiled 100's of fantastic parties into one place.  I can get lost for hours pouring over all the great ideas.  Oh!  Best part?  They are always looking for fresh, new, fabulous parties.  Do you have one?  You should enter it!!

Wanna see for yourself?

You totally should!

You'll thank me:)

Oh wait- before you go check out the Party Place, take a second to look at my sidebar.  I added a whole bunch of my parties.  All you have to do is click on the picture and it will take you directly to the post on that party!  Cool, hey?

Pretty Ribbons

I've been working on organizing my "crafts" so they all have a place in hopes that they will stop trying to take over our house. 

I moved a shelf into the dining room and got a few boxes to start.  My biggest struggle was trying to figure out how to handle the 100's of ribbons that I have.  Then I came across a fantastic idea HERE.

I wasted no time getting my ribbons wound up and into their pretty jars!

This is not all of the ribbon, I have three shoe boxes full of ribbons waiting.

I had to order more clothes pegs from the store!

So far the pinks and oranges are pretty...

...the blues and browns are pretty...

...and half of the reds and purples are looking good as well.  I will have to update you when the whole collection is done.  I think I'll need to pick up two more of those candy jars as well.

 Does this make you as happy as it makes me?  Do you have a creative space that you love?  Tell me about it!  Share your photos and ideas!

Winter Wonderland Party

My daughter's Winter Wonderland Crafts 10th birthday was a huge success!  Here are a few of my favorite details....

I let my children cut out tons of snowflakes to create an entire wall of "snowing flakes".  The wall is dark gray so the flakes looked really great against it.

I wrapped plain canvases with silver ribbon.  Easy peasy!  I'd like to do this everyday, it was great to have the TV hiding!!!  I saw this idea online a while ago and cannot remember where?

I made stockings for each girl out of felt.  One of the crafts was decorating the stockings.  I supplied the girls with 100's of rhinestones, plenty of silvery ribbons and pearls and puff paint.  The stockings turned out beautiful and they served as the "goody bags"  to hold all their treats at the end of the party.  The stockings were easy: cut out stocking shape, sew around edge, add ribbon...wa-la!

I try not to over-do the sugar.  One of my solutions is no juice.  Instead, I make their water bottles appealing!  I used all sorts of textured papers in silver and white.  Then I puff painted the initials in the middle.  So pretty!

I love doing this to my dining room light every Christmas!  This year I took it further and used the same concept at Thanksgiving with fall leaves.  Too fun!

Craft parties are so fun once the kids are old enough to handle most of the steps themselves.  We did 6 crafts and it went really smoothly.  The girls enjoyed themselves immensely and I was glad to not be throwing ANOTHER bowling party or swimming party!!

I asked my younger sister to come over and give the girls sparkly silvery make overs.  They loved this!

Kinda reminds me of the mask Drew Barrymore wore in Ever After! Beautiful!  In the invitation we had asked the girls to come dressed in white.  For the most part, everyone did.  Look how cute they are as a group!

One of the crafts was making knotty yarn scarves.  I bumped into one of the girls' moms at the mall last weekend and the MOM was wearing the scarf!  A true sign of a super cute and successful project!!

Here is my birthday girl blinging her picture frame.  We kept the frames after the party and added photos to them and wrapped them.  We handed them out at school the next week so the girls could give them to their moms for Christmas.  What picture did we use?  Glad you asked! 

Each girl had a little angel photo shoot:)  This was my daughter's idea.  She's a clever girl, that one!

The girls' eyes got really big when they saw the craft supplies!  See those silvery cylinders?  I save my hot chocolate canisters and all other cylindrical(sounds pretty smart, hey?  I had to look this word up!) cardboard containers and cover them with pretty paper or fabric to coordinate with the party theme.  They always come in handy!

The ladies "trimming the tree".  This is my favorite photo from the party.  I love to force a few cute posed pictures to have on hand for future graduation or wedding slide shows:)