birthday – mamasbrush

Panda Party on a Budget

When I found out that pandas were going to be my theme for this family party, I was super excited. There is so much cute stuff out there for pandas. This is my take on it.

We had the pleasure to throw a family birthday party for a girl we consider part of our family. She’s one of ours and her mom’s okay with that. They always join us Sunday evenings for our family movie night, but tonight, we added in a surprise birthday party for this newly 13 year old.

Now, for those of you who have been around a while, or who have looked through some of my other parties, you know that we do parties a little differently. I have 6 kids, with my mom and sister joining us, already, we are 10 people! So we don’t do guest lists and I try to keep things pretty simple in the way of activities. We do food, decorations, presents and cake (or pie or whatever the birthday person requests). We also don’t do expensive. I do 6-8 parties a year. I can’t do that times $100+. I just can’t! All I bought for this party was some Pirouette Wafer cookies and paper plates and cups. Everything else was done with what I already had or free printables.

So… pandas. I found some really cute ideas on Pinterest (see my Panda party board here!)

Panda Party on a Budget | mamasbrush #panda #party #birthday #bamboo # China #decor #decorations #black #white

Crafty Pammy has this really great free printable panda craft that I cut out and did with my older boys. Mine is on the bottom. They came up with the idea of actually having the pandas eating bamboo. In another party setting, this would have been a fun craft to let your little guests do, but since my birthday girl was 13, I just used them for decorations.

My pinspiration for the bamboo came from Super Festa Infantil where they have all sorts of panda party ideas. It looks like theirs is pre-printed or something, but I just cut green construction paper into 3 inch strips and then trimmed them up to have the little details at the ends of the segments. Then I taped them to the wall (with special wall tape my father-in-law picked up for me) on top of each other and added stems and leaves. The stems are actually scraps from cutting those out. Then tuck in the pandas and we were all set.

And of course my chalkboard made an appearance. I was just going to do the bamboo since I was running out of time, but at the last minute I fit in a little panda. I just love him!

Cupcakes - Panda Party on a Budget | mamasbrush #panda #party #birthday #bamboo # China #cupcakes #black #white

The cupcakes were inspired by this adorable cake.

Cups - Panda Party on a Budget | mamasbrush #panda #party #birthday #bamboo # China #cups #black #white

And I got the cup idea here. Those are for sale, but a sharpie and white party cups got the job done for me. 🙂

Done miss the other ideas I didn’t use over at my Pinterest Board! And don’t forget to…

Panda Party on a Budget | mamasbrush #panda #party #birthday #bamboo # China #chalkboard #black #white

Gathering here.

Fall Harvest Birthday Party My {Young} Children Gave Me

For months my children (ages 4-12) have been dreaming up their birthday plans for me. I always make a big deal of their birthdays (in inexpensive and homemade ways) and they are getting old enough to want to do what I do… for me. It’s pretty cool.

They have help. My mom helps with brainstorming and shopping and any crafting. The day of, they kick me out of the house (I go down to my mom’s house [converted from a detached garage] and take a shower… ahhhh… happy birthday to me!) so they can decorate.

Pumpkin Cake - Fall Harvest Birthday Party My Children Gave Me | mamasbrush | #birthday #party #harvest #fall #cake #sweets #pumpkins

This year they baked a cake. Due to a flop the previous day, I helped the little kids make the cake that morning and the big kids decorated it with my mom in the afternoon when she was home from work. It turned out really cute!

Fall Harvest Birthday Party My Children Gave Me | mamasbrush | #birthday #party #harvest #fall #centerpiece #scarecrow #pumpkins #gourds #floralarrangement #decorations #decor

They colored pictures for the walls and put together a centerpiece according to the theme.

Fall Harvest Birthday Party My Children Gave Me | mamasbrush | #birthday #party #harvest #fall #chalkboard #kidart #pumpkins #handlettering

This year they even put my chalkboard to use! Isn’t it adorable! They all helped in some way. Keep in mind that the oldest is 12 and the youngest had just turned 4.

Thank you babies for a wonderful birthday!

[Most of this post was finished back at the end of September, but life got busy and the blog (as necessity demands) is the first thing to go. (I haven’t been painting either!) I just popped in to work on some new posts when I discovered that this one had never been finished. So here it is. Hopefully there will be another this week, and they we’ll see how life settles in. I miss sharing… and having things to share!]

Blessings,
Babychaser

A Turtle Themed Birthday on a Budget

Turtle Birthday Theme on a Budget #partyplanning #party #birthday #turtles #diy #cake #chalkboard #breakfast

My baby turned 4 last week. Four! It’s hard to believe. But he loves turtles. Has for a while now. We were supposed to do a turtle theme last year, but it was the week my husband had off to work on the house (and make me shelves), so the kitchen was out of commission. We hung streamers and blew up balloons at my mom’s house instead.

This year was the year of the turtles. I started with my chalkboard (I love my chalkboard!)

Breakfast was waffle turtles (Pinspired here, other ideas on my board) and pond water (apple cider). The kids thought the pond water was a mixture of funny and gross. It was perfect. That means they approved!

The cake was inspired by one from Cake Adventures. I wasn’t bold enough on my colors and it’s a little messy, but the kids loved it and it wasn’t hard. I didn’t even have to bake the cake in a bowl. I used an 8 inch and a 9 inch cake pan, layered them with ganache in the middle and carved it into shape with a knife.

I rounded out the decor with green streamers, green balloons and green plates. It was the perfect family party (we even had friends over this time). Maybe $10 tops (beyond food/ingredients we already have on hand) for the whole thing and a memory they will cherish for years to come. That’s the important part!

Turtles Birthday Theme on a budget #partyplanning #party #birthday #turtles #diy #cake #chalkboard #breakfast

Gathering here.

Simple (and cheap) Chocolate Theme Birthday Party

It’s a chocolate themed birthday party! Super inexpensive, simple and fun. The kids loved it and so did my mom (the birthday girl).

Mole Chicken - Chocolate Theme Birthday Party

So, a couple weeks ago we celebrated my mom’s birthday with a chocolate theme. We often go out for dinner on her birthday, but there is chocolate in Mole sauce and she LOVES her Mole. No question… I would be cooking. (We got our all-you-can-eat sushi a few days later!)

I kept the decorations pretty simple. I spent August trying to recover and catch up from the unexpected 10 days we spent in the hospital with my daughter in July. Only now am I starting to feel we’re back to normal.

I made the Hershey Kisses by wrapping foil over upside down bowls of various sizes. The paper is just printer paper I cut into strips and put messages on. Are they perfect? No. But they were well received and did their job. The little ones in the next picture (on my shelves) can also use the top of a water bottle instead of a little bowl, but I forgot to keep the ones we had. If you do that, you can fill them with candy and give them as party favors too. Since it’s always just us at these parties, we didn’t need the candy or the favors. 🙂

The Chocolate Tuffles and Cupcake cards could have been framed, but I didn’t get to the store for the frames, so they were cute on their own. My mom has since framed them and hung them in her chocolate themed bathroom. They doubled as gifts.

The chalkboard frame is just a cheap white frame (my go to frame for all my artwork because of it’s simplicity) from Walmart with a black sheet of paper in it. I used a white water based paint pen to do the illustration of a mug and hand lettered “just add chocolate and cream please” on the side. I love that frame! Silly that it took me so long to pull it together!

Chalkboard - Chocolate Theme Birthday Party

As you know if you’ve been around for a while, I decorate my large (husband made) chalkboard for birthdays and events too. Everyone has come to look forward to it and uses it to help determine the theme for the day when I keep it a secret. This one says “birthday wishes and chocolate kisses.”

Brownie Cake - Chocolate Theme Birthday Party

This brownie cake on the back of a Ghirardelli Brownie box mix was the inspiration for the theme. This past spring, my mom saw the picture of that Ombre Brownie Cake on the box and declared that she wanted to try that. I decided that day that we would do it for her birthday.

I’ve never made ganache before and as you can see, my cake doesn’t look exactly like the picture. It was a good first run though, and I hope to do it again because it was yummy!

Note: Not all (or any) of your plans have to work out just right. The person or people you are celebrating will still feel loved that you tried to make their day a big deal! Don’t let fear of failure (or failure itself in my case so often) keep you from going all out!

Gathering here.

Easy Chocolate Truffle Artwork – You can do this!

Remember that chocolate themed birthday party I threw for my mom? The one I painted the Chocolate Frosted Cupcake for? Yes, the one I haven’t shown you yet. That’s the one! Good memory!

Well, I painted these cute little truffles for that party too. (Pinspiration here.) Again, part gift-part decoration! She actually hung them up already on the wall in her bathroom in little white frames! Yes… it’s adorable!

I painted them with watercolor and added the white with Sharpie Paint Pens. Then I added a touch of black with my Faber Castel thin pen to add shadow and make the white pop. It really helped! Super easy!

You could do this with markers too! Just color in the chocolate with brown marker and then use the white paint pen (a couple coats would help!) and add the black lines at the end. (Keep the black on the same side of the white on all the lines so it has a realistic “shadow” look.) I think they would make adorable greeting cards! Let me know if you try!

Looking at them now (I always notice details like this when I look at the picture of whatever I painted, not before) I think I would put the swirl one in the middle to make it seem more balanced, but that’s because I have issues with symmetry. What do you think? Would you switch them out to put the swirl in the middle? Or do you like them as is? Let me know in the comments!

Gathering here.

Take a Hike – How I Made a Sloped Birthday Cake

Turns out I had to come up with my own plan for this hiking theme cake. I searched and searched for ideas. I have some on my Hiking Party Board, but nothing was going to work with the time available and I didn’t need 30 people worth of cake. In addition to that, I made a camping theme cake several years ago for the same kid, so I wanted it to be different. (aka no tents)

Hiking Trail Cake -- Easy Hiking Theme Birthday on a Budget

As I mentioned earlier this week, the end of July we spent with our oldest daughter in the hospital, leaving very little time for preparing for this birthday. I made the cake (from a box mix) the night before, but I set the temperature wrong and it turned out dry. This set me behind. Usually I freeze the cakes before assembling and frosting them, but after our birthday breakfast we made a new cake (thankfully we had a back up box of cake mix!) and set it to cool on the counter.

First of all, I baked the cake with these even-bake strips from Wilton. They help the cake to rise more evenly. After lunch I was ready to begin frosting the cake. I leveled my cake layers like this (a great video about leveling and frosting cake layers.) I set the tops off to the side to be used later (I had to guard them well as there were several children floating around looking for scraps. )

Frosting the layers was little trickier since they weren’t frozen, but it worked. I did something different for me this time and used a piping bag to pipe the frosting between the layers. (Here is another great video about frosting cakes.) Piping it on helped greatly since the cake wasn’t frozen and was apt to fall apart as I spread. I’m still not great at all the techniques of cake decorating, but I’m having fun learning with each new birthday. 🙂

The Layers

[Ack! There are no pictures of the process. Time was short and I was working as fast as I could to get done in time for an early dinner and celebration. But I’ve drawn pictures for you… I hope they help!]

One of the cakes was falling apart on one side (whether this happened coming out of the pan or with the help of one of my smaller children is undecided). It worked out though, because I used that spot, after the second layer was on, to cut and shape a slope out of that layer down to toward the first layer(see diagram… these are not to scale!!).

Then I frosted only part of the top in a semi-circular way. Then I placed one of the cake tops (saved from before) on top of the frosting and trimmed away the cake that went over the side.

I then added frosting to that layer and repeated with the second cake top saved from before, but I offset it even further (see diagram… still not to scale!!). Then I trimmed away the rest of the cake top and handed out scraps to the hovering children.

This is what it looked like from the side when all the layers were ready.

I then applied the crumb coat and stuck it in the freezer for 20-30 minutes to harden so that I could finish the decorations (and make more frosting.)

I frosted the whole thing with a light green buttercream frosting I made from scratch.

the Creek

On top of that I used blue cookie frosting we already had on hand. I don’t recommend this particular icing, though, because it took a long time to set and ended up sagging down the slope after the pictures were taken. I can already tell in this photo that it had begun. I picked a random place on the cake for the creek and worked a line across the cake and down to the cake plate. Then I just did that several more times to make it thicker . The lines of it melded together nicely.

The Path

I mixed in some white buttercream with chocolate frosting I had in the freezer, left over from another birthday, and it made for a nice “path” color. I piped that onto the cake, making sure to cross the creek, and ended it in a larger area at the top. The kids decided that the picnic tables would go there (the imaginary ones). 🙂 My oldest son figured out how to cut a pretzel so that we could use it for the bridge. Good luck with that, mine kept breaking! 🙂

How I made a Sloped Cake for a Hiking Themed Birthday

The trees

For the trees on the cake I used left over Cupcake Icing we had from another birthday and used the star tip that came with it. I don’t know what color it was because I used the last of it and threw it away, but it was super handy for a quick decorating job. You could do the same thing, though, by making your own frosting and using a star tip. It worked a lot like “spray cheese.” I made both the trees on top of the cake and the ones on the tall side of the cake. Then I put “bushes” around the cake on both sides of the creek until I ran out. The trunks on the back trees are the chocolate frosting I had kept back before adding the buttercream to make the lighter brown for the path.

A few hints on tree placement:

1. I put several “trees/bushes” close together at the start of the creek to give the illusion that it started there in a hidden spring under the trees.
2. I put a tree in the crook of the path to give a reason for the sharp bend in the path.
3. I put several trees at the top around the “eating area” of “path” frosting to mimic a shady picnic area.

Do you have an event coming up that could use a sloped mountain or hiking cake?? Pin it for later. 🙂

Gathering here.

Easy Hiking Theme Birthday on a Budget

I wasn’t sure how I was going to make this “Hiking” themed birthday different from the “Camping” theme we did a few years ago, and let me tell you, inspiration was not coming. I had only general ideas going into the evening before the big day, but hopefully that is just proof of how easy and budget friendly this whole theme was.

Birthdays are a big deal around here, and if you’ve been around a while, then you know that there is always a theme. I was really struggling with what the theme would be this time around since the interests of my now nine year old haven’t changed much over the last few years. I’ve done all the themes already. What he really wanted was a hiking theme, but I kept fighting against it since we just did a camping theme a few years ago.

Added into all that, my husband and I spent 10 days during July in the hospital with our oldest daughter and, while she is in full health now, the week we got home was full of recovery and catching up from being away from home and the rest of the kids for so long. That left only a few days to figure out what I was going to do for this birthday.

Finally I gave in. Hiking theme it was… but I had no idea what I would do. Pinterest is always a huge help, but most of the “hiking” searches brought up tons of great “camping” themed party ideas. Or “national park” themes. Still not exactly what I was looking for. (See my Pinterest board for more ideas!)

One thing I did find was cute hiking signs I could print… but my printer wasn’t working at the last minute, so we didn’t have those.

So what’s a girl to do with no balloons, no streamers, and no idea what to start with? I headed upstairs to to the attic for the Christmas/winter decorations. Yes I did! You may recognize some of these from the Cozy Mountain Lodge Women’s Retreat I decorated for earlier this year too.

I put some of these decorations on my much loved shelves.

Adventure Awaits Hand Painted Card -- Easy Hiking Theme Birthday on a Budget

And I try to paint/illustrate a little card for each of the kids on their birthday. It’s become something that is really special to them. This time I thought it fit nicely in the decoration. You could totally do this painting. I painted the green part of the tree loosely, leaving gaps here and there in a light green. After that dried, I did it again with the same paint, but not going all the way to the edges. Then a third time after it dried again. Once it was all dry the fourth time, I added the brown trunk. Sometimes I simply use a tall triangle for a pine tree. It works great!

The mountains I put on a pedestal in the middle of the breakfast table. (Excuse the wrinkled tablecloth… the epitome of last minute.)

Birthday breakfast was cinnamon roll mountains. Super easy! Two cans of cinnamon rolls from the refrigerated section of the grocery store (though you can make your own if you have the time and inclination). I just unrolled each one and re-rolled it in the slightest cone shape. A little tip: don’t go too high with your cone or it will topple over… but I just made that one mine. 🙂 No big deal.

I made little flags out of scrapbook paper and glued “take a hike” circles on to them. The stick is a skewer I cut into three parts. I hand wrote the “take a hike” but you could use something printed off the computer or even stickers if you can find something you like.

Life's An Adventure... Go Hiking! Chalkboard -- Easy Hiking Theme Birthday on a Budget

The chalkboard was really easy to do. Honestly, the hardest part was the lettering. Again, you could even use a simple tall triangle for the tree if the scribbled lines are too much. I found that the orange chalk gave enough of a brown feel over the black of the chalkboard that it worked perfectly.

The cake was the most last minute of all. I baked the cake the night before… but I used too high of a temperature and it was dry. So my daughter and I remade it that morning. That afternoon I was assembling my cake unfrozen (freezing them first makes it super easy to assemble and frost!!) and with no real idea of what I wanted to do. None of the 2-3 pins I found were what I wanted/had time for, so I was on my own. The cake has it’s own post! Click over to find out how I made it! 🙂

And that’s how we did our easy hiking theme birthday on a budget! To top it off, we recommended some hiking themed birthday presents to family who were looking for ideas, so the back pack, nature journal and compass really added to the excitement! 🙂

Gathering here.

Simple Wine or Vinyard Theme Birthday Party or Event

Chalkboard art - Wine Theme Birthday Party for Daddy

We plan parties in our family. Events. Each of the children gets a detailed theme for their birthday each year and each year is special, though some are simpler than others. Even my mom and my sister get a full theme for their days. Daddy, however, rarely gets a full thematic party. Frankly, he doesn’t care, so often I let the busyness of the impending Women’s Retreat (check out our Cozy Mountain Lodge and Sweet Life Cafe Retreats) and two approaching kid birthdays take my energy away from him. This year, however, we had a Wine Theme Birthday for Daddy.

It was simple. Super simple! But the important thing was that the kids and I set aside some time to honor Daddy by making him a party.

I decorated the chalkboard. Note the spelling of “Whinery”. A detail not lost on Daddy, I assure you. We should probably rename our property from Claystone Family Farm to “Whiney Vinyards” or something. But I digress.

I served one of his favorite dinners and the kids drank juice out of stemmed glasses.

The touches were so simple and took very little extra time, but it was fun to dress up Daddy’s birthday a little.

Gathering here.

Ladybug Birthday Party Theme

My youngest daughter loves ladybugs (she’s 7). I am glad for her sake that they always seem to be in the house. She get so excited, carries them around, and then, begrudgingly, lets them go free when it is time.

It wasn’t hard to pick a theme for her birthday. A ladybug birthday for my little ladybug!

Tea Party Lunch - Ladybug Birthday Party Theme

She wanted a tea party like her sister (and her brother for that matter), so we made lunch into a tea party complete with flower shaped pb&j. We had pink juice int he tea cups.

The children loved getting to make the paper flower and ladybugs on the table. (pinspiration here) It may not be as cute to us moms as the pin, but the kids had so much fun and the birthday girl loved that they made them for her.

Ladybug Apples - Ladybug Birthday Party Theme

Ladybug finger foods - Ladybug Birthday Party Theme

Other foods were ladybug apples, ladybug bruschetta, and ladybug cheese and crackers.

Red Dots inside the cake - Ladybug Cake - Ladybug Birthday Party Theme

Ladybug Cake - Ladybug Birthday Party Theme

I made the cake with red “dots” inside as a surprise. There are several ways to do them. I just made mini-muffin cupcakes and shaped them with a knife. They also make sphere pans for making them, but we couldn’t find one last minute.

I followed this tutorial for making the little frosting ladybugs. I did it all with frosting instead of edible pen, but it worked too.

Ladybugs on grass Hand lettered Psalm 150:6

And I made this for her also. (I told you in that post that I’d share this party, but never did. Sorry you had to wait so long! (UPDATED: a revised version of this painting is available in my Etsy shop!)

I try to illustrate and or paint something for the kids birthdays when I have the time and inspiration. She loves this one and put it in her school binder to see everyday. Makes my mama heart smile.

Gathering here.

Kitty Cat Birthday Party Theme on a Budget

The other day I shared a how to on making a Kitty Cat Cake, but today I want to share the rest of the party. When I say “party”, please know that it’s nothing big. It’s just us (we are 10 people when my mom and sister join us, so we are a party already!) And the budget isn’t big either. This whole thing took a shopping trip and an afternoon to put together. Not too bad. And with more help, it could have been even faster. (My sweet husband did blow up all the balloons for me… that was a huge time saver!

**UPDATE: You can find my new
Kitty Cat Party Pack
on my Etsy shop here!**

I’ll be linking to my Pinspirations throughout the post, but you can find a bunch of Kitty Cat themed ideas (ones I used and ones I didn’t) on my Kitty Cat Party Board. I would have done more if the week weren’t so crazy already.

Kitty Cat Chalkboard - Kitty Cat Birthday Party Theme on a Budget — Pink and grey balloon “ears” on top are a good example of how things don’t always work out but kids like it anyway. 🙂

I didn’t have a lot of time for the chalkboard this time, but she thought it was the best board ever because it had a kitty face on it. (Another perfect example of how things don’t have to be purrr-fect for them to love it.)

Kitty Cat Nose and Whiskers on Balloons and Tableware - Kitty Cat Birthday Party Theme on a Budget

I found the idea for the Kitty Balloons at Best Friends for Frosting. Looking at them just now, I realized I forgot the ears, but they were still really cute and no one missed them. Hers may have been cuter, but no one here noticed. 🙂 The cups were Martha Stewart inspired, and again, not exactly the way I did it. Hers had eyes. The plates were inspired by a cat party from Writing about the Journey. Jump on over there to see more of their ideas!

Kitty Cat Pizza - Kitty Cat Birthday Party Theme on a Budget

When she told me she wanted “Mama Made Pizza” for her birthday dinner, I was very excited. Full sized kitty pizzas jumped into my brain. I did some “research” and found Pinspiration in a Cat party by My Paper Crane. (Her cake was a litter box cake… you have to see it!) But I think the mini Kitty Cat Pizzas I pinned were just as cute.

Easy Kitty Cat Cake from a Box Mix and Standard Pans

And then there is my Kitty Cat Cake (Don’t miss the how to I posted earlier this week!)

Tag: birthday

Panda Party on a Budget

Fall Harvest Birthday Party My {Young} Children Gave Me

A Turtle Themed Birthday on a Budget

Recommended Reading:

Simple (and cheap) Chocolate Theme Birthday Party

Recommended Reading:

Easy Chocolate Truffle Artwork – You can do this!

Recommended Reading:

Take a Hike – How I Made a Sloped Birthday Cake

The Layers

the Creek

The Path

The trees

A few hints on tree placement:

Recommended Reading:

Easy Hiking Theme Birthday on a Budget

Recommended reading:

Simple Wine or Vinyard Theme Birthday Party or Event

Ladybug Birthday Party Theme

Kitty Cat Birthday Party Theme on a Budget