Little House on the Prairie 6th Birthday Party

Levi had his SIXTH birthday party!  

His favorite book series is the "Little House" books, so he chose that as the theme for his party.   

I found some fun party examples, like this, and this and this, and this amazing party that would be wonderful if you had an unlimited budget.    I saw that every one of these parties was designed with a little girl in mind, so I had to use some of my own ideas to make it a little more boy friendly.   

First is the location.   I immediately thought of "Sam's House" which is a historical site.  Same time period, and a log cabin!  I emailed and found out that they did indeed to parties (I found out later that we were actually their very first party!).    They had a "Little Pioneers" party package that included a tour of the cabin, 3 games and use of the covered porch and grassy area beside it.   They made it very easy for me, and it was perfect for the party theme.   

Next was the invite, I found the file ready to edit from the blog The Decorologist.  A few edits and I had a cute invite which I rolled up and tied with twine.  

In preparation for the party, I ordered straw hats and bandanas for the boys (from Oriental Trading), and sewed bonnets for the girls using a very easy pattern from Pick Up Some Creativity.   At Sam's House, one of the activities was a clothes line relay, but to start out the party I used it to display the hats and bonnets. 

The kids picked out their bonnets/hats/bandanas as they arrived at the party.  Taylor wore hers the entire party, super cute!

Nai Nai helping one of the guests get her costume on.

First, the ladies from Sam's House took the kids to the cabin, where they told them all about what life was like for a pioneer kid. 

They had some costumes of their own to try on!

Next they had some fun games!  The first one was a "harvest" game where the kids had to gather scattered eggs, veggies and fruit one at a time and then sort them into baskets.   They had tones of stuff to gather and the kids had a good time running around.  

On the left side is the covered porch, and the cabin is behind the big white house. 

Next was the clothes line relay.  Having been cleared of hats and bonnets, it was left empty so the kids could take turns hanging clothes using old fashioned clothes pegs.  First they had to "scrub" the item on the washboard and then hang it up, a great challenge for little fingers.

It was supposed to be "relay style" but a lot of the kids went more than once because they liked hanging things up!  They then had to reverse the process and take things down and put the pegs away. 

The last game was one the boys in particular really liked - spear fishing!   Not exactly Little House on the Prairie, but in Florida, I guess people in that time period ate fish.     It was just a simple wooden frame with a fish hanging from it.  Spears were sticks with foam on the end.  

In this pic, you can also see the cornhole game that my dad and I built for Halloween last year. 

The kids also had plenty of time just to play in the grass and with the various activities. 

After the games, it was time for food! 

For snacks, I got an assortment of baskets and lined each with a gingham napkin.  Inside was a piece of cornbread wrapped in parchment paper and tied with string, an apple in a little tin pail, and a mason jar full of lemonade.  
We also had a little popcorn bar (in the book Farmer Boy, Almanzo really enjoys popcorn as a special treat).   This was just a big basket of popcorn with various toppings to put on them and paper bags to "fill and shake" 

The cake was very simple as Levi requested because "they didn't have fancy cakes in the olden days".   It was just a vanilla cake with vanilla/almond frosting.  I made a little bunting with 6 flags on it for the top, and 6 purple candles!     I also made gluten free cornbread and cupcakes for our gluten free guests.  

After the food, each kid re-used their tin pails for the penny store.  They got 10 pennies each to "spend".   

 In the store I had:
- marbles
- pebbles (from the story in Little House in the Big Woods where Laura filled her pocket with them)
- candied orange peel (made in the food dehydrator I got Levi as a gift)
- honey candy (boil the heck out of honey to hard ball stage, pour out, crack up)
- calico fabric remnants
- remnants of velvet ribbon, lace, and trim (all from the thrift store)
- beads (from a story in Little House on the Prairie)
- peppermint candy
- old clothes pegs
-buttons
- little metal shapes, no idea what these were but they were various cowboy themes
-small balls of yarn
- some other small things I can't remember! 


The kids LOVED this activity - it was a big crazy mob of kids surrounding the "store" with Levi, Nai Nai and one of the moms helping take pennies as the kids made their purchases.  

At the end of the party, each kid took home their hat/bonnet bandana, a basket, mason jar, and a tin pail filled with goodies from the shop.    

I think everyone had a good time, it was a nice mix of organized activities and free time, and plenty of things to do and a perfect location for the occasion!  

This is the banner I made for the Mercantile area, it was very quick and easy to do.  I cut scrapbook paper into small squares, and then used my sewing machine to just sew right through each one.   This could be done in any shape, pennants or circles would be cute too, and you could even cut some into letters to make a banner that way.   

They had a big wasp nest hanging up too - Levi and Zach are studying insects for our summer unit study, so we checked this out after the party as well.

The kids in front of the cabin:

And the family + Zach and Taylor.   Grandpa Jack drove all the way over just for the party, it was great to have him there to join the fun! 

And here is a better look at Levi's outfit!  I modified the Ottobre "Poor Little Oliver" pants pattern to make knickerbockers with suspenders, and made a linen shirt to go with it, the shirt has purple and grey stripes.   He also wore his "fancy shoes" and got a different straw hat than the other boys.  

One of his friends is learning to crochet, and he gave Levi this necklace he made all by himself.  

And last of all is a carseat picture - Levi is still rearfacing in his carseat, he has room to grow so rearfacing he will stay! 

Happy 6th Birthday Levi!

Happy 5th Birthday Levi!

When Levi went to bed last night, I said goodnight to my 4yr old for the last time:

When he woke up, he was 5!

Here is his 5yr interview, I just asked him a bunch of random questions to see what he would say!

In the morning, we went on a homeschool field trip (yep, he has school even on his birthday!), BUT it was a trip to Ben and Jerry's, to see how ice cream is made and the back area of the shop.  And of course that involved eating ice cream!   More on ice cream tomorrow, we are going to spend the day learning more about it, I'll post the field trip pics then.  

Afterwards, we had a pool playdate in our neighborhoods pool.  It was a small group of friends and neighbors who came to enjoy the beautiful, hot day for Levi's bday.  The kids had a lot of fun swimming, I think Levi stayed in the water the entire time except when he got cupcakes.   

And as my version of keeping it simple, I did a easy snack of a watermelon shark, and made some gluten free vegan cupcakes with a melty chocolate center.  Yum!!!     

 

For the cupcakes, I cut shark fins out of cardstock and stuck them in, nice and easy, but cute!

 

The candle wouldn't stay lit because of the tiny little breeze that happened to blow by right at that time.

Rolling his eyes because we made him blow anyways!

Our neighbors have a butterfly garden in their yard with all kinds of butterflies.  They surprised Levi by bringing over 5 of them for him to release, one for each year of his life.  It was unexpected and a very cool thing for him.

It was wonderful having Levi's friends to play with today!


Later, we went home and cleaned up, and then had dinner at Levi's favorite place, Da Kine Diego's.  He gets beans and rice every time, and everyone there knows him, which makes it fun.  He'd rather eat that pose for a picture, but I tried.  You can see how tired he was too!

We also went to Mimi's crafts, which is a paint your own pottery place.  Levi painted a tile with his handprint on it, an annual tradition.  This year, he helped write his name on it and wrote his 5 all by himself - its tricky to do with the mini squeeze bottles they have b/c he tends to squeeze a little too hard.  But it should come out cute as usual, I can't wait to see it fired up!

And before bed, he got to open the rest of his presents.  From me, lots of books, a game, books on CD, and some other little things.  I also got him tickets to a local play thats going on in a few days.  His great grandparents contributed to his Music Together Class, which is great!  

"Levi's Girls" (the girls that live next-door) got him a harmonica, which he thinks is great  - he has been interested in music lately and he loves that this is a real instrument, not plastic.

Last thing before I put him in bed, I remembered that I forgot to take a carseat pic!  He is 40" tall, 30lbs and still rides rearfacing in his carseat.  He has a lot of room left still in this carseat and he is comfy in it, so he will still ride rearfacing for now.  Its MUCH safer than forward facing, in particular for kids under age 2, but the longer, the better (for a kid that is below the height and weight limit of their carseat of course)

Overall a wonderful day - Levi told me that I'm the best mommy in the whole world and that he had a great day, so that says it all right there.

Happy Birthday Little Guy!!! 

Guinness Book of World Records 5th Bday Party!

Levi turns 5 in a couple weeks, but we decided to have his party early this year, so his grandparents could go.  Levi decided to have Mr. Science do his party again (we had a great time last year!).   Mr Science has a big indoor lab thats great for parties - lots of fun stuff the kids can play with, plenty of room, out of the heat, and best of all, we are allowed to make a mess!
Levi also wants a Guinness Book of World Records theme.  A little challenging for me to come up with ideas for that one, but I think we pulled it off.   The kids had such a great time!

FOOD:

Here is the table:

 

We just kept it simple because it was a morning party, not really  prime eating time.  A bowl of organic apples and an apple cutter, a big bowl of fruit, gluten free pretzels and a veggie tray.  We also put a stack of world record books with a "custom" one with Levi on it!

Apples:

Carrots and Hummus (I actually forgot the hummus!!)

Pretzels

Water bottles:  On these I printed labels on sticker paper depicting all different water themed world records, like a dog who balanced a glass of water on his head and walked down stairs! 

Cake:

On the pic of the food table you can see the award we got from the Guinness book of World Records for Brevard County's longest birthday cake.   (well, actually it was made by me on the computer, but Levi was impressed!  And I'm pretty sure it is the longest cake in Brevard!)   The cake was 10 feet long!!

We put it in the middle of the science lab on low wooden boxes.  I took pics before the kids arrived, worried they'd all have their fingers in it, but surprisingly, I didn't see any evidence of frosting testers.  Later on though, around 8 feet of cake was eaten!

There were a couple kinds of icing, made from the same base of Earth's Balance (which is dairy free).  Some were chocolate, and some were vanilla,  I made the vanilla into the closest I could get to purple without using food coloring - by adding some blueberry juice from our fresh picked blueberries (that we froze plenty of!)

To keep the decorations simple, I printed decorations, backed them with card-stock and taped colored popsicle sticks to the back.  Stuck those in the cake for quick and easy decorations (and these could be designed for any theme you want!)

The wooden letters have been on the wall in our bedroom for a long time now, I brought them out to decorate the table.  They were made by PhoenixFire Designs for a Craftster swap.

There were several flavors of cake:
- Chocolate
- Chocolate coconut (the chocolate cake above, with coconut extract instead of vanilla, and some unsweetened organic coconut thrown in  - not sure how much I added, until it looked good!)
- yellow
- Maple Agave (sugar free and vegan)  I added cinnamon to this one.
- gluten free chocolate (cheated on this one and used a box mix!)

I'm usually behind the camera instead of in the pictures, but I got convinced to be in the pics for Levi's cake cutting. 

He has a lot of hot air!

Me clapping like a goofball and Levi looking proud!

Me and my soon-to-be-5 year old!

With Nai Nai and Buddy too! Levi is looking away as he often does, ready to get started with the eating part!

The Guinness Book of Records Challenges:

These I made just for fun to go with the party theme.

See how fast you can get into a suitcase:

or play a game of jenga.

How many spoons can you attach to your face?  (it wasn't long ago that Levi was calling these "poons").  

I included a roll of tape, for those who wanted to cheat!

How fast can you dress a barbie?

How many spins can you hula?

Or jumps can you do?

Or bean bag tosses?

Photo spot:

I set this up for taking pics of some funny props I made that related to some of Levi's favorite world records.  The banner is from Levi's 2nd birthday party (which was beach ball themed).

Levi and his "girl friend" with the worlds longest dog ears (these are actual size!)

 Levi with the worlds longest ear hair (gross!).    I knew that weird grey fuzzy yarn would come in handy eventually!   One of his little friends wore this for a good portion of the party.

The props had signs with actual photos and info about the records. 

Worlds biggest sunglasses (found these big purple ones at the dollar store), and worlds longest tongue - how does she fit it in her mouth?    Giant green eraser is there too, just because.

On a dog with regular ears, those giant ones look kinda silly.  Poor Berkshire put up with Levi testing them out on her when we got home later. 

Party time!! 

Here is another view of the lab:

 Lined up and listening to Mr. Science.

Mr. Science had the kids make hand kits and try to beat his record of walking the length of the lab 7 times.

Its not easy!

The rocket launch! 

Mr. Science built a real rocket for Levi during the party - made from cups, cardboard, tape, and some other stuff!  It even has a parachute that pops out.  

 Getting it ready

All set!

 Waiting for lift off

Heading back to earth.  

We got two launches!  But on its second flight, it landed on the post office roof next door!

And last is the goody bags:

They contained a mini-book of World Records and things to go with them.
- a mini sand castle, with the record for the most sand castles made in an hour
- some rubber bands, and a pic of the biggest rubberband ball
- a toy car, and the land-speed record
- some stickers
- some fun pencils





And here is Levi's outfit.  This one he helped make!   First, I hand dyed the fabric purple and cut out the pattern pieces.   I cut a stencil of a big number 5 out of freezer paper, got out my collection of fabric paints and let Levi have at it!   It entertained him while I baked cakes for the party.   When it was dry, I peeled off the paper and finished sewing up the shirt.   Added the text to the back, and it was done!

A big thank you to all of our wonderful friends!!!!

 

The cool science dudes at the end of a successful party! 

Thank you Mr. Science!!! 

Bonus pics