Under the Sea

I was going through some old pictures and came across Caroline's fifth birthday pictures.

She wanted an "under the sea" theme.
This cake was super easy to make (the "sand" was brown sugar)and I loved how it turned out.

Here are the stairs leading down to "the ocean" . . .

. . . and here is "the ocean".

I taped white Christmas lights all over the walls of the basement, then I covered them with blue plastic tablecloths (they came in a huge roll from the party supply store.)  The kids made fish to hang up everywhere.
I also hung streamers and balloons all over the ceiling to make the girls feel like they were under water.

(I obviously had way more time and energy then!!)

We played a few games.  The favorite was the "fishing booth" . . . Jake was hiding behind it and when the girl's line would come down, he would attach a prize (stuffed ocean animal) on it.

I think Caroline had fun. :)

I can't believe how much she has grown since these pictures . . .she is 8 now . . . time sure does fly.

I can't wait to start planning her ninth birthday party.

What will the theme be????

Our "Fancy" Valentine's Day Dinners

Every year on Valentine's Day, our family has a "fancy" dinner.
The kids help set the table.
Everything is heart-shaped.
I make love notes for everyone.
We go around the table and tell each other what we love about each other.
I love our sweet Valentine's dinners.

Last year, in addition to our little fancy dinner, we had a fancy lunch for my daughter and her friends.

We made favors. (my daughter even wrote everyone's names in cursive on them)

We had flowers.

We let the girls decorate their own cupcakes.

We had "tea" (raspberry lemonade) and little heart shaped cookies. (I found the cookies at Aldi .. . saw them there again this year)

We had Jell-o jigglers . . .heart-shaped, of course.

We had heart-shaped sandwiches. (peanut butter/jelly and ham/cheese)

We had red fruit . . . heart-shaped watermelon and strawberries.

Every girl brought their favorite doll . . . my daughter (and her doll) had a fabulous time.

I'm still trying to decide what our Valentine's Day will look like this year . . . I'm always looking for something new I can make "heart-shaped".

Any ideas??

I'm linking up with Debbiedoo's Newbie Linky Party . . .  http://debbie-debbiedoos.blogspot.com/2011/02/lets-get-it-started-again-lets-get-it.html

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Baby, Baby

I came across these pictures of a baby shower that I threw for my sister a few years ago and I wanted to share these ideas with you.  It was so much fun doing this!! 
We knew she was having a boy (our cutie little Caleb) so I knew what colors to use.  Diane is a very classy lady, so I decided to try to make the shower as "classy" as I could.

Here is the dessert table.  I put white Christmas lights under light blue tulle, then added height with various sized boxes wrapped in coordinating paper.

A little blurry, but here is the dessert table with all of the desserts on it. 

I decided to use the favors as a decoration.  I bought 30 identical vases at my favorite little shop and put light blue and white flowers in them.  (I had to order the flowers ahead of time since I wanted them to be blue)
Can you see the mantle in the background??

I had fun decorating the mantle.  I used the same theme as the dessert table.

The food table also had the same theme.  We ordered a ton of food from one of my sister's favorite restaurants and filled all the platters with it.  I labeled each platter so everyone could know what everything was.  (lots of different pastas)

(I don't have any pics of the yummy food since I was so busy during the party.)

I absolutely loved planning this shower!