Archive for the ‘make it a party’ Category

A birthday party starts with an invitation.  And for a 1930’s party, an invitation that looks like a handkerchief is just about perfect.

A quick internet search turned up the perfect template for my invitations….  found at Eat Drink Chic by Amy Moss.

Amy’s handkerchief templates were so lovely and perfect, I ended up using them not only for the invitations, but for the party too.

Here’s how I made my invitations:

It started with one of Amy’s handkerchief templates.  I modified the template slightly to remove some of the flowers, so I could cleanly fit my wording.

I used Illustrator to create the invitations because I was modifying the template, but you can easily use Word if you are leaving the template as is.  In fact, I used Word for the other hanky project for the party.  To use Word, simply copy and paste the image.  Then create a text box layered on top of the handkerchief image, center the alignment, choose the font and font color and type away.

The font I chose for the invitations looked very 1930’s to me.  It’s called Calamity Jane NF.  I colored the font blue to match the hanky.

I printed out the invitation on nice white printer paper, trimmed them down and mounted them on cardstock.  The finished invitation was 5 inches square.

But now I needed a square envelope…  which I had trouble finding at the store.  If you can’t find what you need, make it instead.

Here is how I made a simple square envelopes to fit my 5 inch invitations:

Cut your paper of choice in an 8-1/4 inch square.  I choose printed paper over cardstock since it’s much easier to fold and makes a very suitable envelope.

Make a mark in the center of the square (4-1/8 inch from all sides) with a pencil.

Fold in both sides about 1/4 past the the center mark so that they overlap like shown.  On the first envelope I folded, I checked my invitation to make sure it fit.  Then proceed.

Fold up the bottom so that the point comes neatly to center.

Then carefully glue or tape down the edges of the triangle.  I used a permanent glue called Create from Martha Stewart.  Take care not to let the glue spread into the inside of the envelope.

After the glue has dried, place your invitation in the envelope and fold down the top.

To address the envelopes I printed the girl’s names in a Word document in two columns spaced the names apart.  Again I used Calamity Jane NF and a colored font.  Once printed, I punched them out with my favorite 2″ Scalloped Paper Punch and glued them to the envelope.

I used a white circle dot sticker to seal the envelopes shut.

It was a bit of work for the invitations, but I LOVE doing a project like this.  It’s like being back in art class… and I loved art class.  It was also very Make it Do.  The cardstock and paper were purchased on a 30% off sale at Roberts Arts and Crafts.  And I simply used nice white printer paper for every thing else.  The whole project cost me only a few dollars, and much less than had I purchased invitations, and they looked EXACTLY like a wanted them to.

Be sure to check back this week for more 1930’s party fun….

***********************************************

On a side note:  Yes, I know I said this would be posted yesterday….  Achooo.

But I came down with something yesterday…. (sniffle, sniffle) so did my husband… and he NEVER gets sick.  In fact, LOTS of folks in Utah came down with something yesterday…  I know because I saw them in the lift line (I mean at the doctor’s office!)

OK, OK I am a terrible liar. It snowed 35 inches in the mountains here in the last few days.  AND THEN the sun was shining when we got up yesterday morning.  Holy Pow, Pow Bat Man.   We’re going skiing!   So we played hooky and hit the slopes.  Utah powder is so light and soft, it was amazing.  (Right up to the point that my husband had a little wreck and gave up a couple teeth for Lent.  Doh!)

We had quite a party at our house yesterday.  Ten little girls make for a very fun and lively time.

I loved the Woodland theme and it was difficult not to go really crazy.  But since I was on a budget, I needed to get creative, rather than buying a lot.

When the girls arrived, we started off with our craft.  Doing the craft first gave them time for the paint to dry.  Since we were painting with acrylic paints, I asked the girls to bring a paint shirt on the invitation.  Acrylic paint is nearly impossible to get out of clothing, and I didn’t want someone’s favorite outfit ruined.

I found these sweet little bird houses at Michaels for a $1 and I could hardly believe my luck.  They were the perfect craft for a Woodland party.

The finished products were so delightful.  I provided red, white, green and turquoise paint colors.  It’s always amazing to me how different all the houses turn out with the same few colors of paint.

Next it was off to games.  We played woodland charade.  I rolled up all the “characters” on slips of paper and placed them in a bucket.  The list included a rabbit, tree, owl, dragonfly and fairy, just to name a few.  This game was so fun, I wish I had a video.  The girls were quite creative in acting out their charades.

Next it was “Acorn, acorn,  whose got the acorn?”  All we needed for this game was a small acorn in place of the traditional button.  I was amazed that none of the kids had ever played this game before.  It seems like I played this game at almost every party in my childhood.  Just like charades, it’s an old-fashioned and simple game, but very fun…

We also played pin the fairy on the flower, which I had from another birthday party.

I wanted to play the game where you hold a plastic spoon in your mouth and have to race keeping an acorn or small pine cone on the spoon.  But we just didn’t have enough space to really make it challenging.  Those are the breaks with a winter birthday.

Next up was the Toadstool cupcakes.  The inspiration came from the fabulously talented Bakerella.  I used her tutorial for making Cupcake Pops to make these little toadstools.   I followed her instructions exactly, just changing the color of the chocolate to white for the bottom and red for the top.  I picked out the white confetti from our Christmas cookie decoration supplies for the white spots on top.

Angie from Bakerella makes everything she does look fabulous… and I would have given my eye teeth to have her help me make these.  They are very easy, right up until dipping the chocolate.  That part was a challenge!  If I were a perfectionist, I might have gone crazy.  But perfection is overrated and I settled into the idea that my best was going to have to be good enough.   So don’t look too close.  I used a cookie scoop to make the balls, which made the process fast, easy and consistent.  I looked everywhere for a plain round cookie cutter for the stem (see Bakerella’s tutorial) but ended up using a fluted cookie cutter similar to the one Bakerella uses.  It also helped to keep the cupcake balls really cold throughout the whole process.

The base cupcake was from a chocolate cake mix… because they were for kids.  I made buttercream frosting dyed green for the grass and used a #233 decorated tip on a pastry bag.

The girls LOVED the toadstools.  They all asked if I had more, and since Bakerella’s recipe makes almost 50 cupcake balls, I gave them all extras.

After unwrapping presents, it was time for the girls to head home… but not before getting their party favors.

In keeping with “Make it Do” I used brown paper lunch sacks.  They are inexpensive… but I loved how they turned out.  I used a little scrapbook paper and printed out the girls names using Little Days Font.

For the clothes pin at the top, I was inspired by a comment from a reader.  She recommended a wonderful site called Bake it Pretty.  There I saw the wonderful clothes pins made from wood.

I made mine out of paper using a 2″ circle punch.  I simply cut off part of the circle and rounded the bottom corners.  I used my hole paper punch to make the spots on the toadstools.   I cut out the stems free hand.

Inside the bags I placed the girls painted birdhouses, a small bag of chocolate eggs…

And these wonderful little pencils along with a small notebook.  I could not find the small natural pencils shown in the tutorial, so I ended up buying these red ones and cutting them with my husband’s chop saw.  I could have done that with natural pencils too, but I loved the red.  One friend suggested getting natural wood pencils from IKEA… which would have worked too.

At the end of the party, my girls looked like this….

And that was worth all the work.

If you liked this party you might be interested in how to make the invitations.