moonpie celebrates- part 2

the decorations


I love to look at pictures of elaborate children's parties.  I am on OhDeeDoh all of the time checking out the beautiful parties going on up in there.  However, when it comes time to throwing my own party, I prefer simplicity.  Just like I prefer it in every other area!

A few weeks ago when we were at the library, I noticed an entire set of 1950's Funk and Wagnalls Encyclopedias.  I grabbed a stack of them, setting them aside for party time.  

There is so much inspiration on the web for making things out of book pages.  Over on Dottie Angel I found heart streamers...perfect for our party and Valentines Day!  {{{I must pause to say...I am absolutely smitten with Dottie Angel.  I want to invite her to live in my little shed, however there is no moss to be found and she may not like it in the summers.}}}

These were very easy and fun to make!  We cut out hearts from the books and I just sewed 'em right up. I plan on leaving these up until March.  Or maybe forever.  I love them!

Next we set out to make a banner out of the pages.  Moonpie took over this job and wrote out S-E-V-E-N in glitter glue.  I stitched a length of binding across the top to make it hang.  I love for the children to be involved in all of the stages of the planning, and I think Moonpie did a lovely job on her banner!

Our bookworm cake was for sure the main feature!  The kids thought he was pretty cool!  I stacked him up on some of my old books and perched him next to our jars o' snacks.  The snacks were limited this year because we actually served lunch.  Moonpie dipped several pretzel rods into (fair trade) chocolate and Buddy helped roll them into sprinkles.  The rest of the snacks were basic- carrot sticks, clementines and plain pretezel rods.

For the goodie bags I simply ripped out a page of the book and glued it to a brown bag from Hobby Lobby.  Inside the goodie bags we placed a yummy earth sucker, a thrifted book and a secret treasure box with bookworm glasses attached!  These were the typical Groucho Marx glasses with the nose and eyebrows removed.  I attached  a little poem I came up with at the last minute and then almost burned the house down trying to make it look cool.  Moonpie was behind me the whole time saying "please be careful Mama."  "We really don't need to do this Mama!"  "Please don't burn yourself Mama!!!".

These little boxes were my most favorite element.  John worked 2 days on these getting them ready.  And I love the way they turned out!  Our children have already stuffed theirs with treasures, and I'm hoping Moonpie's buddies do the same.  John was pretty relieved that we only had 4 children over.  I can't imagine how long it would have taken if there would have been more!
Here's to having a husband that puts up with all of my over ambition!  I think he's my enabler because he always says "sure, we can do that".  That's right.  It's all his fault!!!

And that was it.  Very simple.  Very manageable.  Just the way I like it!  As in most things in my life, it is more important for me that my children be a part of the process than to have a perfect picture at the end.

***one last thing- before the book police come and hunt me down.  These books were going to be thrown out, living in a land fill.  I was more than happy to give them a second chance at life, sitting on the shelf of child concealing treasures of the heart.  And yes, turning some pages into hearts.  I know this isn't for everyone, it was actually rather hard for me to do.  But I feel like it was a worthy use of what essentially was going to be trash.***