Gold & Pink Party Inspiration

Usually this time of year is full of Birthday planning. But being in a smaller place and we weren't sure if we would be here or in the middle of moving etc. We decided to do things super simple this year. We are having a joint party for our oldest 2, their birthdays are 1 day apart. We rented the local swimming pool and I am getting a Costco cake. It's really whats best for us this year but makes me a little sad. I wanted to do a pink and gold party. I don't like gold that much but I love it on party supplies!! Just sharing some ideas I had floating around and some great sources for cute stuff!

I have a feeling I won't be so eager to do Gold and Pink next year. 

I always start with decorations, stuff like a banner or picture.

This DIY one is nice and basic

This one is more my style. I prefer less straight lines and more whimsy

But THIS is my favvvvvorite!

And outfits, ahh soo many!

Everything from over the top to super casual and super adorable

Supplies, things like silverware, napkins, think of everything you can do with some gold glitter!
And SO many cute treats and cakes!

Sad that we probably won't get to make this one happen, but if your little girl loves gold or pink and glitter, check out my Pinterest board  HERE for all of these links and more :)

Can't wait to see where we are for next years birthday parties! I feel like I am running out of themed parties for these big kids, they are growing so fast!

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Starbucks Birthday Party

Today is our little Finnley's 4th Birthday but we celebrated yesterday!

 

First I want to say Starbucks had nothing to do with Finn's party, but our local store was nice enough to donate some supplies.

 

Second.. pictures are totally lame. We had a slight disposal issue 20 minutes before party time... so I didn't really take much for pictures. Real life, what can ya do?

 

Many months ago Finnley started saying he wanted a Starbucks birthday with a pink cake. I was thinking... okaaaaay tiny nutter. But he never wavered, even when we talked about a farm party, baseball.. nope he wouldn't have anything to do with it. So Starbucks it was.  I know WHY he loves it. Tuesday used to be our in town day, we would always go to Target and Starbucks. Boy loves his banana bread and white hot chocolate, every Tuesday. I got him hooked on Target Tuesday so I have no one to blame but myself. What kind of  4 year old kid wants a coffee birthday party? A super cute one, so charming, it's hard to say no to him.

 

I didn't know HOW I was going to make this happen. Not like I could get a bunch of tots all caffeinated up to send home. So while I did some coffee themed stuff. I mostly went for colors.

 

First I found these little color your own coffee cups at Hobby Lobby

I just printed off little names instead of the inserts they came with.

These cups were the first thing that made me feel like I could make this thing happen.

 

Focusing on greens and browns. I made a banner and used the hot sleeves as the spacers between Happy and Birthday.

 

 

I emailed Starbucks but they don't sell party kits or anything, they said just to ask and the store could hook us up with some supplies. And they did!

 

Sticking with the theme, I tried to plan some green and brown food ideas.

 

Green Jello, in sample cups of course,

Green grapes

Banana Bread.. Finn's very favorite from Starbucks

And some cupcakes

 

 

Brown Coffee Filter Poms.. no way was I spending $4 on a small but not tiny Styrofoam ball. I used a Styrofoam apple from dollar tree instead. Still lightweight and round. Good enough!

Finding green snacks is hard!

We made a snack mix of

yogurt pretzels

green sundrops

pb chips

chocolate almonds

and some green animal cookies

 

 

Some little tea lights in coffee beans, vanilla meringues and some mocha wafers rounded out the over load of sugar.

 

ohh and cake

 

Had a little malfunction with the cake topper.. but he was still happy so it works!

 

Getting a little help blowing out some candles

 

And a PINK cake.. might be light pink but it counts!

 

 

 

Drinks

 

 

Also not pictured.

 

Pin the logo on the latte cup. No outrageous drawing skills here but the kids all got plenty dizzy and gave it a try.

 

My favoring part is probably the favors

 

The little cups, a little bag of cookies to go, just some F's and 4's in the Starbucks logo bags with a cd.

I got the pack of recycled cd cases to match the colors, cutesy'd them up with some washi tape and made a mix cd of Finn's 12 favorite songs. You know, cause Starbucks always has their little cd selection by the register, and Finn has good taste in music. He gets it from me ;) Put this all together in a Starbucks bag, we used the hot sleeve as a tag.



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Sparkle Party Inspiration!

I have the Party Planning bug and no plans for a party until September. I have no idea what we will be doing for our little guys birthday either. He isn't like most 3/4 year olds. We don't watch TV so he really isn't in to any characters, scared of garbage trucks and dump trucks. All those traditional 4 year old themes just are not him. Soo while I try to decide what to do for my Starbucks and Target loving boy I am checking out the party world for his little buddy. I think all 4 year old girls like glitter and sparkle.. right? Like it enough to make a party theme "Sparkly". Sure!

 

 

So when I pick a theme that isn't common,  that's not going to have a bunch of printables, or character plates and stuff. Like our little guys Lumberjack Party I like to make a list of all the basic requirements.

Cups, plates, napkins, banner, balloons and all those and think or look at ideas to make them fit my theme. There are some cute glitter ideas out there!

Just like when I clean I like to start from the top and work my way down.

Banners and Puffs/Poms/Lanterns

I can't share the banner yet but there are SO many banner ideas, and glitter can be added to anything. I am personally loving the letter style like I did for our Back to School Party

 

Could easily be made with glitter!

And pennant banners are always cute and easy to glitter. Just the glittered letters are easy to make, or find and match to most parties.

 

The tissue poms! Pretty sure there is glittered tissue paper

oh there is

 

Or if the lanterns are more your thing this is clever!

 

 

We almost always do basic, solid color plates/cups and sometimes pretty them up to work better for us. These cups with some added Washi Tape is SO smart, and cute and they make glittery tape!

 

And I personally wouldn't be putting glitter on any plates, no one wants to eat that kind of glitter.

But these are precious and just the right amount of sparkle without being expensive or hard to do!

  or

 

Super easy! Those stick on rhinestones are often in the $1 bin at our craft store in a ton of colors!

 

They do make glittery plastic silverware but it's expensive. If you like the wooden utensils I think you could glitter those lightly without them dumping too much glitter later on into your food.

 

Oh, balloons. I saw this and thought it was a cute idea! And also inexpensive

And you could probably add the bigger chunky glitter confetti too, or certain shapes if that matches your party better. I think I would use clear balloons and colored glitter for most of them though.

 

And once you have the decorations done, the food part is fun! Especially if you have a main color.

I LOVE these cake pops! Edible Glitter can make any regular treat party worthy!

 

And if the kids are old enough they can handle hard candies these I saw on etsy would be SOO cute!

 

And I was thinking you could probably add the edible glitter to your punch but went on a hunt to see if someone had tried it yet. She didn't use it in punch but jam! And it is SO pretty!

That ^ has me convinced that there needs to be a little glitter in everything!

 

I think I would use the washi tape again

And make some fruit kabobs but make some little flags for the end of the skewers with the tape.

and maybe glitter some beads ahead of time, this is a cute idea!

 

 I am sure there are a million other cute ideas out there. But now that I have distracted myself from a party I REALLY need to plan for a few days I better start looking for boy stuff again!

 

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Back to School (repeats)

Some of my favorites from years before are still on my MUST DO list this year!

This for sure makes our mornings and snack time run SO much smoother!

Snacks for the week

Check out the whole post HERE

Breakfast Planning so we don't get in the cereal rut!

Check out our weekly breakfast plan HERE

And one of my very fave new traditions is the "Back to School Fairy"

Last year was our first year and our kids STILL talk about it almost a year later!

Now is a great time to snag little trinkets in the dollar spots, or Target toy clearance!

This year I will try to take more pictures of our message boards and goodies!

I am going to try some new stuff this year too! All the details HERE

I haven't got the decorations out yet! We probably will do that August 1st if we aren't busy that day, but for sure not before then!

 I don't have any new ones for this year but I am hunting Pinterest for some ideas!

I do love how simple a big jar of crayons is though!

Check out last years HERE

And 2010 HERE

I'm sad that so many of my favorite styles for boys are too young for our oldest.. only a few years before the little one will go to school! Time to start prepping him for a bow tie ;)

My other favorite boy stuff is here

And girl here

Some of those outfits are still in rotation here for the first day of K!

We were dressing up and checking size and fit! 

Girl loves those fake glasses!

A post FULL of goodies HERE

These might be my fave!

especially since you can change things up for your family and what they like!

For sure going to have this at our Back to School Party!

Back to School Snack Mix

it is SO good and just reminds me of school, PBnJ's and it's easy to make, the kids love helping!

One thing I do already have out is my re-done desk!

Check out the before here.. it was BAD!

Hoping to put together some kind of photo op for our party with this!

And I am sure by the time party cleanup is done one of these will sounds amazing haha!

It's a PBnJ Martini ; )

Find the recipe HERE

Those are some of my favorites from the previous years! Hope I can find some new favorites this year! Back to School season is my 2nd favorite "holiday"?! I don't even know what to call it, but I love it!

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Baseball Party!

Day 2 of Birthday Weekend was for our big 7 year old!

He hasn't figured out that he can request Birthday themes so I still get full control (woooohooooo!!!)  

We were doing a much smaller party, only about 8 guests and it was SO nice outside! Feb in Oregon is usually horrible! The boys all played great, no one got hurt and they didn't leave too many leftovers! It was perfect, couldn't have asked for anything better, well other than my battery on the camera to last a little longer!

Drinks

Table

Baseball Hat Cups for their small goodies, gumballs, sixlets, seeds and peanuts!

Popcorn Marshmallow Pops

Fruits and Veggies

Licorice

No pictures of the Pinata, I filled it with peanuts, tattoos, packs of Wrigley's gum, little baseball bouncy balls, and baseball cards! Didn't get pictures of the pennants the boys decorated. But I did snag some of the favors

chapstick in gum flavors!

And of my big 7 year old!

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