Sunday, July 3, 2011

Woo Week 2!

Okay, I guess today I will review my daughter's 4th birthday party.  Belle turned 4 on April 25th and decided she wanted to have a Tangled party.  With that I went out to research the net and found a variety of sites, including the Disney Family site, to pull ideas from.

There were a few things I knew I wanted to do.  Instantly, I decided the cake MUST be the tower.  I knew I wanted to incorporate the glowing flower and I knew I wanted a few games and activities for the kids to do.  Belle also insisted on a Pinata.

I found a wonderful website Super Mom Moments that was a great starting point.  I used their file for the pennant flag decor, the Flynn game (altered slightly), and used their recommendation for the floating lanterns.

I also found frying pans for favors.  Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of the favor baskets...I got behind that morning and totally forgot to catch a shot of those...oops...I guess I can't remember everything sometimes!

I guess the best way to do this would be to take you through the day.  I'll start with the decorations.

Near the top you can see one of two strings of pennants I made for decor.  Also in the picture is a "boat" I made, because my daughter decided she needed a boat to sit in to "see the lanterns."


I also thought it would be a cute addition, and photo opportunity. I think it turned out well enough...for a last minute addition.
Close up of the Pennants.  The PDF from the Super Mom site converted and cut from MTC very well.  These pennants were modeled from the pennants seen in the village on Tangled.
This turned into decoration as well as our game.  Flynn's wanted poster.
 This next section is about the games and activities we did.  I have pictures of the kids participating in each game/activity, but thought it best to only show my daughter in pictures.  I decided on the following activities: Can you get Flynn's nose right?, decorating flower pots (which included planting seeds and then having a "magic flower" "grow" while cake and presents were done.), coloring 3D Pascals, and the Pinata.

Coloring the 3D Pascals didn't go as well as I had thought.  I only had a few kids color the two pieces and none of those got assembled before they left...these came from the Disney Family site.  I guess the best laid plans...I did make one with Belle prior to the party just to see how hard they were to do.  She loved it!

All the kids really seemed to love decorating the flower pots.  I bought some plastic pots from the Dollar Tree, 20 for $2 isn't half bad.  I cut some floral foam into small cubes and hot glued them to the bottom of the pot and spray painted all the pots white. 

Then I had to figure out the easiest way to decorate these pots with 4 year olds.  I was at a complete loss until I took Belle to a make and take thing at Michaels where they let her use the foam sticker things to decorate a easter egg hunt bucket. After seeing how easy this was for her to do, all the coloring/painting ideas went out the window and I bought 3 different shape styles of foam stickers.  I ended up with a letter set--so the kids could put their name on them (letter search and spelling practice!)--small shapes and larger shapes.

After the kids finished decorating the pots, I took them over to another area of my carport where we added dirt and they got to pick which type of flower to plant.  After topping the pot off with dirt, they took it to another parent that watered each pot and put them on a table for "safe" keeping.

The fun part, for me, came when I ran outside with a hand full of fake yellow flowers.  They were painted with gold glitter and glow in the dark spray paint.  While the kids were distracted with cake, I placed one flower in each pot--the Magic Flower grew!!!  I had one 5/6 year old kid fuss because the flower was fake.  LOL He thought the seed wasn't real!  After we explained it to him, he was skeptical, but believed that, if taken care of, the seed would grow.

I know the planting of flowers doesn't go with the theme too well, but I wanted to incorporate the glowing flower...the kids liked it, though. :)

Belle's completed pot with flower.
The next activity was "Can you get Flynn's Nose Right?"  This was, I think, clever and very entertaining to watch.  I do have to say, I wish I had put a solid piece of wood behind the Flynn poster.  Things would have worked better.  Anyway, I let each kid select their favorite color of play-doh, which they got to keep.  I then instructed them to mold a nose out of the play-doh, and when they were finished, they took turns seeing who could put their nose closest to where Flynn's nose should be.  They thought this was hilarious.  I think they could have played this for hours!  It was fun to see where each kid put the nose, and their interpretation of what a nose was.

Here is my daughter trying to "get the nose right."
The last activity we were able to do was the pinata.  How do you get a Mexican tradition to fit into a Tangled party??? You make a sun!  I originally wanted to make a Flynn head and have all the kids bang on it with the toy frying pans from their favor basked, but decided that would probably teach them it was okay to hit people on the heads with frying pans. Now maybe that's okay for a wife to do to her husband every now...I kid, I kid...but not for kids to do, for sure!  My next idea came from watching the movie for about the 20th time.  The sun  medallion that appears on the mobile and the military armor.

I researched how to make a pinata on several sites, and pretty much came up with the same instructions.  This is what I did.

I used a mylar (spelling is evil) from the Dollar Tree and used a mixture of flour and water to adhere my strips of newspaper.
Once dry, I removed the balloon, and used newspaper shaped like cones to make the rays. I bent these slightly to get the shape I wanted and taped them to the circle.

Then came another coat or 3 of newspaper to cover the cones and give more shape to the sun.

Here it is dry, just before painting.
Ta-Dah! We now have a golden sun. Thank You Krylon Spray paint!
Of course, Belle got the first swing, but isn't it beautiful???
I hung it with fishing line...I should have thought that out a little more, but it made it 3 rounds before a boy swung downward and broke it off the string.  I was afraid it wouldn't make it 1 round of hits before breaking.  I think we had 8 to 10 kids at the party.

I hate that I didn't get a picture of the favor baskets, but I can at least tell you what was in them.  I bought  plastic baskets at the Dollar Tree (Can you tell I love that store?).  I would show you an image of those, but they no longer have them up online. Inside each basket I put an empty Tangled treat bag for their pinata candy, a small slinky, a bouncy ball, a glow braclet, an 8 1/2 X 11 inch laminated Flynn wanted poster and playdoh (so they can play the game at home), and two plastic frying pans, since that thing was all over that movie.

So Adorable!!! I painted these with some Krylon texture paint.  Krylon states that their paint is non-toxic once dry.

I went ahead and gave them both since I got the two piece set for $1 at Michaels.
After the party was over, and it got dark, we released floating lanterns. These were absolutely beautiful.  We tied them down with fishing line, but one got away.  It was okay though. When the string broke, it was out of any danger of hitting trees or power lines.  It was fun to watch it disappear, and fun to watch the others float and slowly fall to the ground.


I shopped Belle's granddad out of this picture, but I just had to!  Isn't it just wonderful to see her watching her lanterns?  I just wish I could have gotten all 4 we launched in the shot...since she turned for...I guess I could shop another lantern in...


Last but not least, is the cake.  I promise I saved the best for last!  I know this has been a heavy post, and I promise, if I am still doing this next year, Belle's next party will be spread out over several posts! 

I am still in love with this cake.  I knew I wanted to make a tower, a big tower!  So I decided on a 3 to 4 FOOT tall tower.  I made most of it ahead of time and with PVC pipe and Styrofoam because it was a lot of work and I knew I wouldn't need that much cake.  The only thing that was cake was the area that could be considered the living quarters.  The only thing I hate about this cake is the bottom.  I wish I had had the time to finished it off a little better, but I was literally piping leaves on the vines 2 hours before her party started!  I also would have wished to add some flowers to the vines, but I guess this is what happens when you let time get the best of you!  On to the pictures!!!

First, I glued the PVC pipe to the table and covered it with fondant...I bought lots of new toys for this one!

Here is the basic structure before fondant, and I have a dummy cake in place of a real cake for now.

Here is after I added the detail "wood work."  If you look real close, you can see a little Jasmine doll I was using for sizing things out...I ended up putting one of the little Rapunzel dolls in the final cake.


Initial covered roof.

After adding the "gables" (I think that's what they are called).  You can also see that I've added some dusting to the stones.

I just love this picture of the details.


Another detail shot.

The roof now has shingles and the bottom has RKT for the "ground."

I absolutely love the roof...yes, each shingle was placed on individually by hand!

It was a very long night...

Here is the completed cake.

The blue window is styrofoam covered in fondant.

"When will my life begin?"

I think it turned out great!

Thanks for bearing with me!  More to come later this week or next Sunday for sure!

11 comments:

  1. WOW WOW WOW!!! That castle is AMAZING!!!!! I came by to THANK YOU so much for your sweet comment you left on my blog and look what I get to see...this is BEAUTIFUL!!!!!

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  2. Mrs. Penny, you just gave me chills. :D

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  3. Wow unbelievable, that cake is just totally awesome, what a fantastic job you did!!

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  4. Gorgeous cake. Now I have to start making Penny's flowers out of fondant too.

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  5. Absolutely STUNNING!!!!!! What a beautiful job you have done on this, I hope Miss Belle had a fantastic birthday, wow I wish I could make a cake like that!!!!

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  6. LOL It was kinda a rush job. I used some left over bead board, another thin board, duct tape, flour/water/newspaper, and spray paint. I more or less hand drew a design on the back of the bead board and cut it with a jigsaw, traced and cut the other, I think. Then I taped those together on the ends, stood inside to trace the shape I wanted it to be on the other thin board, cut that with the jigsaw, and placed it inside the "boat" to keep it open in a boat shape and as a bottom. I used the flour/water/newspaper to create the curved shapes on the ends and to smooth the tape somewhat. After that it was just a quick paint job, and we had a boat. Unfortunately, we had a tornado a few days after the party and the boat was covered with fallen trees and limbs and the clean up crew carted it off with the debris...I wish I still had the boat, but at least I have pictures. (We're all fine and our house is back together--that's the important thing.)

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  7. You did an amazing job with the cake and the whole party. Would you mind me asking where in Michaels (hope I read that right) you got the pans? I am throwing a Tangled party for my daughter in less than a month and would love to have something like that. Thanks, Megan

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  8. Megan, unfortunately, I don't think they have them anymore. I called several Michaels in my area and had to drive 3 hours to get the ones I found, and that was a year ago. :( If they do still have them, they would be in the dollar section...the one that has items for 1 to 5 dollars. Good luck! I'll comment again if I happen to see them again. I haven't seen them the last few times I shopped.

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  9. Thanks Brandi. I finally was able to get someone at Michales to help me and they said that they are discontinued which is a total bummer. I will have to find a different alternative since I am not willing/able to pay $5 for a real skillet/cast iron pan.

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