December 18, 2012

Toy Story Birthday Party

To Infinity and Beyond!!

My youngest is turning 3 on Friday, December 21 (I know...the end of the world).  But we had his birthday party last Saturday.  He asked for a Toy Story theme (or Buzz/Woody party) for his party, so I decided to go all out!  He dressed up in in his Woody costume and we had a Rootin', Tootin' Good Time!  Check out some of the details pictured below!

My Birthday Boy!

This is a free printable banner that you can find here on this blog.  There are a lot of other great Toy Story Printables that you might see in other photos. :)

I retouched the picture to blur his name...it didn't really look this messy. :)


I saw this Subway art on another blog and decided to make my own! So cute. This went on the gift table as you can tell by the previous picture.
 
 The Army men were joining the party via zip line. There were 3 different stations they were watching over. Gifts, Food and Kids.
 
The table where the tots ate food
 

M constantly is telling me how "Buzz holds Woody" in the last part of the movie, so I thought this would be a cute thing for him to see.  He was REALLY excited and again, kept telling me how "Buzz holds Woody!!"

I recreated the logo of the Toy Story 3 logo to incorporate M's name!  This logo was on the invitations and the thank you cards and a few other places.  I decided it would be cute to have Buzz hold a sign with the logo as well on the food table.  Kind of a "Man on Mars staking his territory."



Again, the army men...

I printed these pictures from Over the Big Moon.  You can print these for free here.
 
The food table.  Pre-food.

Oooooh, the CLAW!!

This backdrop (along will all of the backdrops) is just a Dollar Store Table cloth!  It covered over the kid's artwork and really transformed the space for the party!

The characters were cupcake toppers that I printed from the same website as above.  I made the space ships to match the movie's Pizza Planet and put their pictures on the ships.  I think it really added a great finishing touch to the backdrop.

 There are those Army men again. They were a big hit with everyone!
 
This was M's cake.  Dark Chocolate cake mix, Mint Chocolate Frosting (the new mix your own kind!), Mentos, Sour Straws, Green Gumdrops cut in half and some black food gel! They turned out great and M was so excited about them!

 
They were stationed under the CLAW of course! :)
 
The toy blocks spelled out a special birthday message.

We got these Buzz & Woody Potato Heads last year for Christmas.  There's Ham too!
 
I hope you enjoyed my little Toy Story Birthday Party!  Stay Tuned for some cute pictures of M and his friends at the party!  They all had a great time!
 
Now on to G's Mickey Mouse Themed Birthday!! :)

December 8, 2012

More Christmas Home Decor

The house is finally ready!  The air is getting colder!  The smell of firewood is in the air!  I even saw a few snowflakes in the sky!!  Christmas time is near!  I finally finished (at least for today) our interior and exterior home decorations.  I wanted to share a few with you. :)


This is SO easy to do.  It did take some time, but easy.  All you need are some Dollar Store ornaments, some floral wire or string or fishing line, garland and ribbon.  Just start hanging each ornament one by one in the center of your chandelier until the desired effect is complete.  I started with the lowest ornament first and just started filling in the gaps.  Smallest on bottom and largest on top.  You can do this with all the same color like I did, or with several different colors to match your decor.  I just wrapped the garland around the spokes of my chandelier and attached the ribbon to the shades with straight pins.  I tried tape first, but it didn't stick.
 
Here is is with our centerpiece.

I found this subway art on another blog and of course I can't remember which one.  I LOVE it because it really embraces the true reason of Christmas.  I also like that I placed it near our nativity scene. I find it fitting.

This snow village was a surprise find for me!  I purchased a box of outdoor garland/lights at a garage sale and when I went to unpack the box this season I found this in the bottom!!  I only spent $5 on the box of garland, so this was EXCELLENT!!




This was also a Dollar Tree decor choice!  I hung a wreath on the inside of our back door so that I could enjoy it! :)


This advent calendar is a family favorite! I found it a few years ago at Walgreen's and every year I restock the boxes with candy and activities and reuse it!  The kids LOVE this and look forward to it every morning!


This is our Family Christmas Tree.  This tree doesn't come out until after Thanksgiving when the whole family gathers round to decorate it. We put on Christmas Music and let the boys go to town.  Most of the ornaments are on the bottom 1/3 of the tree.  I love it though! 


No, that is not a fire wood holder.  It is a manger.  A good friend of ours made this for us and the boys so that we can teach our children about the meaning of Christmas.  We don't put presents under the tree until Christmas Eve when the boys go to sleep.  We really didn't want our children focusing on what they were getting as gifts the whole month.  Instead, we have this manger under the tree to represent the greatest gift we have ever received...Jesus in the form of a baby to save us from our sins.  On Christmas Day, when they wake up, baby Jesus is laying in the manger in swaddling clothes.  We then sing Happy Birthday to Jesus and open our gifts.  I cherish this tradition!


Up the stairs to the playroom/guest room. 


 This is our entry way looking from the family room.





I have also hung a wreath on almost every window in the house! 

On the windows with the Christmas tree, I hung candy canes from ribbon so that the tree lights could be seen from the street!
 
Here is our Formal Christmas Tree

Garland above the windows in the Formal Rooms


 
This is in the kitchen over our sink.

A little personal family Christmas card display from years past and present.

These are our kitchen cabinets where I am displaying all of our incoming Christmas cards from around the world! :) (We have friends in England, Estonia and Asia)

 

Here is what our outdoor Christmas lights look like!

That's the Formal Christmas Tree on the left.