Alphabet Handprint Book

I wanted to make a special keepsake present this year for the young nephews and my girls.  I have seen many posts on handprint crafts during the past year and knew I wanted to incorporate that idea.  I figured that tracing the girls' handprints and then retracing them onto different pieces of construction paper would be a whole lot cleaner and easier to accomplish - I did most of the project after the girls were in bed.

After the pages were all put together, I decided to laminate the pages before binding them in hope that they would last a little longer after being held by little fingers.

Aa is for Alien

Bb is for Butterfly

Cc is for Crocodile

Dd is for Dinosaur

Ee is for Elephant

Ff is for Flamingo

Gg is for Giraffe

Hh is for Hippopotamus

Ii is for Impala

Jj is for Jellyfish

Kk is for Kingfisher

Ll is for Ladybug

Mm is for Monkey

Nn is for Narwhal

Oo is for Owl

Pp is for Penguin

Qq is for Quail

Rr is for Rabbit

Ss is for Strawberry

Tt is for Tiger

Uu is for Umbrella

Vv is for Vulture

Ww is for Whale

Xx is for X-Ray Fish

Yy is for Yak

Zz is for Zebra

Baby Shower

We had a baby shower this past weekend to top off our busy December.  I haven't got to host a baby shower for quite a while, and am definitely not into the habit of planning for a little boy, so I found this endeavor to be quite fun.

Since the shower was a few days after Christmas, we still had all of our decorations up, but I did decorate the cake table area with baby boy decor.

I kept the games pretty low-key.  I'm not really big on the embarrassing shower games and didn't want to inflict that on my new sister-in-law:).  When the guests arrived they each were given 3 clothespins (which I had already painted for an wedding shower earlier in the year).  This was part of the Never Say Baby game. Each time you caught someone else saying the word "Baby" then you got to take one of their clothes pins.  Our winner ended up with over 20 clothespins!

We also had the guests sign into a notebook and write in their birthdays and anniversaries.  This served a dual purpose. It gave the guest of honor a list of family dates as well as provided another game.  The winner of this game was the one whose birthday or anniversary was closest to the baby's due date.

We wrote up a quiz about the new mom and dad for the next game.  Since they are newlyweds and expecting a baby, not all of the shower guests knew very much about the guest of honor.  The quiz consisted of questions about the expected mom and dads as babies and as adults. It was a good way to get to know them better.

In place of another game, the final activity was a gift for the new baby.  We had each of the guests color a page with a letter from the alphabet.  They colored the page and drew pictures of items that started with the particular letter.  We will now laminate and bind the pages together to form an alphabet book that he can keep.

The prizes for the games were more of the sugar scrub that I had made for Strawberry Shortcake party earlier in the month.

We made a guest book page that they can keep for the new baby's room.  Each of the guests signed a 1 1/2 inch diameter circle that I will make into a balloon bouquet.

Strawberry Shortcake Party

So, Hannah wants a Strawberry Shortcake party this year, and I have had a lot of fun finding ideas for it.  Pinterest is way too addictive!

I've gotten the treat bags all ready for the party and a few decorations up.  I'll update when I get the cake done and the rest of the decorations finished.

 We'll be having almost 20 girls here so I kept the bags pretty simple.  I used simple paper lunch bags and the name tags from here:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/60572947/Sweet-Berrylicious-Free-PDF-Pack-by-Sweetly-Sweet

There are a lot of other cute things in that printable pack, including pinwheels, invitations, and thank you cards!

I made lip gloss for each of the girls with this really easy recipe from Meet the Dubiens

http://www.meetthedubiens.com/2011/01/make-your-own-lip-gloss.html

She even includes these really cute labels that I mod-podged onto these pots. I didn't find any lip gloss pots right away so I used mini paint pots that I found at Hobby Lobby.

 I couldn't resist these cute little origami strawberries to add to the bag.  My husband actually helped with this project and was definitely done after making 20 of them! :) But they are really quite simple.

http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/gallery/photo/999319?&cat=500&ppuser=121081

    My youngest was having

 a lot of fun helping me 

put the gift bags together!

 When McDonalds had their Strawberry Shortcake happy meal toys a while ago, I hate to say that we ended up with most of them.  However, they did include a really cute strawberry cookie cutter.  I used the baking soda and cornstarch recipe like this one here

http://www.funroom.com/recipesforfun/playclay.mgi

I added red food coloring before I rolled it out.  I also used a polyacrylic coating to make it smooth.

 I loved the strawberry sugar scrub idea.  My girls are always wanting to use mine, so I thought it would be a wonderful gift for a group of little girls (and their moms).  I found the recipe along with this adorable tag at Seven Clown Circus

http://sevenclowncircus.com/2012/08/strawberry-sugar-scrub-recipe.html

I picked up these sweet little jars at Hobby Lobby at 50% off!

  Since we will be having so many little girls, I am planning on setting up tables of four to be a little more like a cafe setting.

These are the invitations that we sent out.  I found a template for strawberries on Google and traced them out onto many sheets of pink cardstock:)

 UPDATE TO THE PARTY

I would say that the party was a huge success.  We had a full house of exuberant girls (plus 1 boy) who seemed to have a lot of fun.

 I was given this awesome Wilson cake pan from a friend right before the party.  It worked out perfectly and I actually had enough done ahead of the party that I didn't feel rushed when decorating it.

A couple of views of the cake table.  I have a stash of spray-painted jars that I like to fill with my silk flowers for many party occasions.  I  also like to add the poms as little decorations.  The artwork on the cork board above the table were pictures that Hannah's friends made for her before the party.

 Since we had too many little girls to sit at one big table, I had many smaller tables set up cafe-style.