As I promised long ago, I have the scoop on my friend Keri's birthday celebration for her son Kyan. She is really good at party planning and did a fabulous job once again. Where I know, I've tried to include the information as to how/what she used to make these party supplies. We're both hoping that you might find inspiration and copy where necessary any and all of these ideas.
Kyan, who turned 6 on the 12th of September. Kyan is a young 1st grader and he wanted a sports themed party. Keri found a local group here in Chandler who organizes and executed much of the game play,
Great Play.
Keri made these really great invitations using untextured black cardstock invitations. Her husband, Todd, hand wrote the plays on each invitation using a white chalkboard marker. The invitations included plays for football and basketball. They are actual plays! How cool?
Since Keri's host for the party was a commercial location, the party accoutrements were slightly pared down from her usual style. Great Play organizes multiple different play opportunities including soccer, dodge ball, basketball and baseball activities. Each child is announced on a "big screen" (wall projection) with the appropriate opportunity to cheer and scream for your favorite.
Here's Kyan practicing for this season's recreational baseball! The facility is a big open warehouse type look, but most importantly, they provide all the best sporting goods so each party goer can participate.
Keri mentioned just a couple of drawbacks- there isn't a lot of space for parents to hang out during the party time. This left a small group of adults huddling in the foyer. Also, she had a lovely spread for the party and although Great Play was o.k. with her bringing this stuff in with her, there wasn't a large enough space to really enjoy the eats. Plus, the kids loved playing the games. Her one suggestion would be to select a package that allows more time or skip the lovely foods.
However, who could skip these lovely treats? Not me. Plus, you all can learn from this endeavor and host at home or go home after for the feast. Here's where Keri's creative genius shines:
The "concessions" letters were cut from the Cricut using the Don Juan cart at 3.5 in. from red cardstock. The patterned paper is from Hobby Lobby's Little Sport paper pack. Keri covered purchased banner triangles with random strips of paper using cut outs from Cricut's Sports Mania cart. A few short pieces of fibers and ribbons on hand and the concessions banner was beautiful- I mean o.k. (no girly descriptions here!).
You'll notice the small piece of artificial turf used on the table. Neat- I mean totally radical, dude!
Keri found these
cute manly French fry bags to hold the chips. A little blue twine to
dress them up ensure proper eating orientation and they look just like they came from a very hip and
crafty sporty ballpark vendor!
Red stripped treat bags are transformed into a package for sugar cookies cut into French Fry shapes and served with a red frosting "ketchup" dip.
I, personally, think this is the best treat of all. White cupcakes are cut in half and layered inside is a circle cut brownie along with some green "pickle" frosting, yellow "mustard" frosting and red "ketchup" frosting. Those are real sesame seeds on the top. Polka dot cupcake holders were opened to provide the perfect take away packaging.
No treat table is complete without the chocolate covered strawberries dressed up as footballs, baseballs and basketballs. Yum!
Those cute food labels were simple to put together. The base is a foam disc about 3 inches around, one inch high. I cut the circles from Cricut's Accent Essentials cart- the ones with the center hole cut out. A glue dot holds the circle on the top of the foam disc and a 1 inch strip of coordinating paper is held to the side with two glue dots. A red polka dot straw is used as the pole and a red yarn fiber used to hold the pennant to the straw. The pennant was made using untextured black cardstock and the same white chalkboard pen as was used to make the invitations. They really set off the look on the table, don't you think? Hot dogs were also served (no pics though- things got real busy by then).
That cake turned out great didn't it? The same young lady who made the
Bubble Guppies cake made this cake too. I heard that the cake is as good as it looks.
The last craft was a simple label. The All Star frame was cut using Cricut's Sports Mania cart at 2 1/2 inches. The backing is a layered black and white cardstock. We used the Xyron 510 (which they now only have as a
Create-a-Sticker version). This is my go-to adhesive for those tough, challenging projects. Here the cut wanted to lift and not lay flat. Xyron adhesive (we used the permanent kind for this project) lays down in an even, strong coating that didn't allow for one pop off those drinks. The straws are tied using a bit of blue twine. The table was all decked out waiting for the kids to come back and eat. No party is complete without the proper balloon display and our Cardinals aren't doing too bad, yet... They needed their proper spot at the table.
I think they all had a fabulous time, don't you. At least it looks like it from these pictures. Keri spent a good deal of time planning all the special treats. However, you can see how neat things turn out and it really was fun to put all this together. I hope you are inspired for your next celebration. Jazz it up and watch the party goers have fun.
A special thank you to Keri for letting me completely abscond with the pictures from her party. I just couldn't let an opportunity go by without sharing her wonderful ideas. After all, we are all about being Contagiously Crafty around here.
Andie
