Morning News Brunch

Have you heard the news...? You're invited to view the "Morning News Brunch" that I styled recently for Bird's Party Spring/Summer Magazine! Click the link to view the magazine, which includes many other amazing parties from your favorite party stylists and bloggers to inspire you for all your Spring and Summer celebrations.

The theme for this brunch was inspired by the yellow and grey party printables from Bird's Party. The use of newspaper fruit, fans and napkin wraps added a touch of whimsy and fun to the otherwise elegant tabletop. Vases filled with lemons created colorful and inexpensive centerpieces.

In keeping with the yellow/grey brunch theme, the menu included lemon poppy seed muffins, banana pudding parfait, pineapple with gorgonzola cheese, deviled eggs with hash browns and bacon, mini waffles with maple syrup, lemon bars, champagne and lemonade. I kept the servings small to create a tasting buffet of the brunch items.

Here are more photos from the styled shoot.

Spidey's Superhero Academy Certificate

I've had so many requests for and questions about the Spidey Superhero Academy certificates from my son's birthday, I decided it was about time I posted about them. 

I did not buy these certificates from any source, online or otherwise, and they are not part of Bird's party printable collection (Bird's collection does not include any licensed images--I just mixed and matched the printables in with store-bought licensed merchandise). I made these certificates myself for my own use at the party, but since they include some licensed images, I'm afraid I don't feel comfortable sharing them with readers, even without any charge (my blog is a forum for sharing ideas and inspiration only, I have no associated shop). Sorry!!

What I can do is share with you the text of the certificates: 

Spidey's

Superhero Academy 

To all to whom these presents shall come, Greetings!

Be it known that

____________________________

having honorably fulfilling all the requirements of web-slinging, wall-crawling, 

web-spinning and web-jumping and having amazing spider sense and upon 

the recommendation of the spider faculty, is hereby conferred with a 

Bachelor of Spider Science

With MARVEL-ous honors and all rights and privileges to that degree appertaining.

The certificate is then signed by Spiderman, Dean of Web Affairs.

The seal says "with great power, comes great responsibility" around the edges. 

I hope that helps those of you who have been asking about it. 

Ahoy Mateys!

I have literally been meaning to post this for MONTHS!!

Remember this cardboard boat from my "cardboard craze" post?

Well, it had been sitting in my garage for ages waiting for me to find a use for it. Last October, I finally found a use for it! Here's what it looked like once I was done with "repurposing" it as a pirate ship float for my son's school parade....

Here's the captain and his first mate....

One very satisfied pirate....!

Valentine's Day, Home-Made Marshmallow Hearts Tutorial

Hi folks! Sorry for being MIA. I've been really busy, so I have a whole backlog of posts coming out really soon!!! Here's a few photos of some of the Valentine's Day treats for the Valentine's Day party.

Vanilla cupcakes with strawberry cream cheese icing:

I even made the heart-shaped fondant toppers!! Fondant toppers have terrified me for the longest time, but they are shockingly easy to make--tutorial coming soon!

Heart-shaped sugar cookies with royal icing:

These are from my favorite local cookie boutique--Lily's Cookies. 

Home-made marshmallow pops:

I decided to make marshmallows from scratch! They taste amazing!! I'm never using store-bought marshmallows again!! The recipe and a quick tutorial is below. 

My little helper was having trouble waiting until the party!!

Home-made marshmallow pops (tutorial):

To make these heart-shaped marshmallow pops, you'll need:

• 1/2 cup cold water
• 3 packets of unflavored gelatin
• 1/2 cup cold water
• 12 oz regular sugar
• 1 cup light corn syrup
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• Red food coloring
• 1/4 cup powdered sugar
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• Nonstick spray
• Heart-shaped cookie cutter
• Lollipop sticks
• Red/pink sugar sprinkles

Here's how:

1. Place the gelatin into the bowl of a stand mixer (with the whisk attachment) along with 1/2 cup of the water. Let sit.
2. Meanwhile, combine 1/2 cup water,  sugar, corn syrup and salt in a medium pot, with a candy thermometer clipped to the side.  Place over medium high heat and cook until the mixture reaches 240 degrees F, approximately 7 to 8 minutes.
3. Turn the mixer on (low speed ) and slowly pour all of the sugar syrup into the gelatin mixture. Increase the speed to high. Whip on high speed until the mixture becomes very thick, approximately 12 to 15 minutes. The mixutre will still be lukewarm. Add the vanilla and food coloring during the last minute of whipping.
   
   

   

   
   
   
4. While the mixture is whipping, combine the powdered sugar and cornstarch in a small bowl. Lightly spray a 13x19 inch metal baking pan with nonstick cooking spray. Add the sugar and cornstarch powder and move around to completely coat the bottom and sides of the pan. Return the remaining powder to the bowl for later use.
   
   

   

   
   
5. Pour the whipped mixture into the prepared pan and smooth with a lightly oiled spatula. Dust the top with the sugar/cornstarch powder to lightly cover. Reserve the rest for later. Allow the pan to sit uncovered for at least 4 hours and up to overnight.
   
   

   

   
   
6. Turn the marshmallows out onto a cutting board, dust cookie cutter with remaining sugar/corn starch mixture ans use it to cut the hearts. Once cut, lightly dust all sides of each heart with the remaining powder, using additional if necessary.
   
   

   

   
   
7. Insert lollipop sticks into the marshmallow hearts. Dip the tops in a solution of one part water and one part corn syrup, shake off exceed liquid and dip in sugar sprinkles.
8. Store in an airtight container for up to 3 weeks.

Enjoy!!

Here are photos from the party, using Bird's party printables!

Rudolph-themed Christmas Party

My co-room mom and I selected a "Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer" theme for our classroom's holiday party this year. I enlisted my dear friend Bird, of Bird's Party, to design a set of reindeer printables for me. She came up with a cute, modern design featuring a white reindeer--how adorable!!

Check out the invitations from the printables collection. I backed the invitations on scrapbook paper, also from the printables collection.

Since we were on a tight budget ($125 total budget for snacks, drinks, activities and favors for 22 children!), there was a lot of DIY and repurposing that went into this party. 

The party kicked off with a visit from Santa. The children were then divided into three groups for the activities. We made jingle bell necklaces using red, green and white ribbon and small bells to assign children to each group. The groups then rotated between three stations: (i) Crafts--making reindeer antlers and red noses to wear at the party, (ii) Story Time--the story of Rudolph, the red-nosed reindeer (of course!), and (iii) Games--Pin the Nose on the Reindeer (which consisted of pinning "red noses" on a reindeer pinata) and a Magic Reindeer Food station (details below). 

To drink, we served hot chocolate with marshmallows and bottled water. The reindeer paper cups were an easy DIY. The water bottles were embellished with bottle wraps from the printables collection. 

Red gable boxes (left over from the Spiderman party) embellished with cupcake toppers from the printables collection and inexpensive baubles ($1 for a tube of 12 from Target), housed Rudolph bath sponges ($1 from Jo-Ann Fabrics & Crafts) and decorated sugar cookies to take home.

The Rudolph cupcakes are chocolate cupcakes, embellished with Nilla wafers, pretzels and M&Ms. 

The Rudolph candy canes were an easy DIY. To make, simply twist a pipe cleaner around the top of the candy cane, bend into "antlers", add googly eyes and a red pom pom nose. Easy! 

Since we didn't really have a budget for decorations, we reused the red lanterns from the Spiderman party and some red stockings that my co-room mom had from an event she'd previously hosted. 

We used bulletin board paper to line the tables, instead of buying table cloths. The gable boxes, reindeer cups, water bottles, reindeer candy canes and red napkins wrapped around peppermints rounded out the tablescape. 

For one of our activities, we set up a Magic Reindeer Food station--bowls of oatmeal, sugar sprinkles, marshmallows and crushed peppermint. The children had a great time filling reindeer paper bags with scoops of each item, to take home to scatter on the lawn on Christmas Eve for Rudolph and his friends! A lot of the recipes for Magic Reindeer Food that we saw online contained glitter, but we decided to skip the glitter since it's not biodegradable and could hurt animals if ingested--we used sugar sprinkles instead. 

The reindeer paper bags for the Magic Reindeer Food was also an easy DIY, using paper bags, construction paper for antlers, googly eyes and red pom poms.