Light Sabers and Fairy Wings

A full week and a half after the twins' birthday party and I am just now getting back to the blog.  Of course, I put off customer orders for 2 weeks leading up to the party, so I've been trying to dig my way out of that mountain of work, but no complaints!  In addition last weekend we were dealing with Chloe's patch testing (you can read about Cassidy going through this process here and Chloe's recent diagnosis that necessitated the testing here). I'll be talking about Chloe's allergy screening experience in an upcoming post.  For now, I wanted to share with all of you the little day of happiness that we squeezed in among the doctor's appointments and testing.

If you are a regular reader, you know that Chloe and her twin brother Quinn just celebrated their 5th birthday!  He picked a Star Wars theme and she chose woodland fairies.  We had the party at a local orchard, and I really think that a wonderful time was had by everyone.  It was chillier that it has been this spring, but it didn't rain, and since the kids were running around with wings and light sabers, they didn't seem to mind at all.  I posted earlier about making the food all allergy safe, including my favorite baker for ordering allergy safe food when I can't make it all myself.  I'll give an overview of what we served, as well as details of the goodie bags and the party itself.

For starters, we purchased print-at-home invitations packs on Etsy.



Quinn's were these, which you can find here,
  
This party package included tons of stuff, so much that we didn't even use it all!  It was great, and I highly recommend checking out the Etsy shop.

 Chloe's were these. Chloe just loved these, and the pack included favor tags and signage.








 Fairy and Jedi Food

The fairy side of the table held "Fairy Fruit" (pre-cut fruit tray), "Pixie Love Cookies" (allergy safe sugar cookies with pink and purple frosting) and "Twigs and Branches" (pretzel sticks and rods).

The Star Wars side had "Vader Veggies" (pre-cut veggie tray), "Wookie Cookies" (allergy safe star wars shaped sugar cookies) and "Death Star Doughnuts" (Allergy safe mini doughnuts with fun sprinkles)

For drinks, we had juice boxes as well as chocolate soy milk boxes (Cassidy is allergic to apples and therefore most juice boxes) and bottled water.

Each table also had cupcakes.  I bake them using my favorite allergy friendly chocolate cupcake recipe from the Food Allergy Mama cookbook; the fairy cupcakes were frosted grass green with little fairy pics on top, and the Star Wars cupcakes were frosted with vanilla, sprinkled with red or blue sugar and topped with light saber flags included in the party pack with the invitations.  Easy as it gets, as far as I am concerned.  With the exception of the cupcakes, all of the allergy safe baked goods were ordered from HippieCakes.  As I have mentioned before, her baked goods (pictured to the left) are fantastic, and her prices are very reasonable.  We are ALWAYS working on a budget (a normal budget, not a wedding budget.  My thoughts on that in this post!) 


We ended up having enough cupcakes left over for the snack at the preschool the following Monday, which was great since I didn't have to bake another batch on Sunday.

Since everything was basically finger foods, the kids (and parents) were welcome to graze when they wanted to, which was casual and in my opinion, just right for a children's birthday party.



Goodie Bags

The goodie bags were so much fun to put together, and they were probably a bit much.  But each twin had specific ideas, and just as I don't agree with making them share a theme just because they happen to be twins, and because their ideas were so heartfelt and generous for their guests, we decided to let them both contribute.  So we ended up with what were basically double goodie bags for the guests. Each bag contained the following:

From Quinn, Han Solo in carbonite or R2D2 shaped soap with a washcloth (the soap was  simple melt and pour stuff from the craft store, the washcloths I made from star print cotton and flannel) We packaged these in little light saber goodie boxes from the party pack! Also, Star Wars stickers and a push pop decorated to look like a light saber.  The boys also got a chinese yo yo, and everyone got a personalized jedi training pass (also part of the party pack!)

From Chloe, a crayon roll and sketch pad.  Wish I had a picture of these, they were so cute!  If I track down a picture, I'll post it.  Also, a ring pop and a jar of bubbles.  The girls also got a little fairy wand and a personalized hair clip.

The washcloths, crayon rolls and hair clips would have been budget breakers to purchase, but since I sew and machine embroider for a living, they only cost me supplies (I don't charge for time when it comes to my kids' party budgets).  My advice in party planning is to capitalize on whatever craft or talent you have to help keep costs down.



Other Fun Stuff

 As I mentioned in a prior post, the orchard lets the party guests feed the farm animals (the kids especially loved the baby goats!) and takes them all on a hayride. We also made fairy wings and tiny crowns for all of the girls, and everyone (boys, girls and some grown ups!) had foam light sabers made from pool noodles and duct tape.  Many thanks to my friend Becky, for her amazing photography!

Chloe, in her extra special birthday wings, enjoys the hay ride with friends.

Mark (aka Daddy) handing out light sabers before one of many big battles.  Not sure which age group had more fun...the kids or the adults!

Chloe, the birthday girl, enjoying herself.

Fairy wings and a light saber!

Helping my little man, Quinn, (in the red jacket) open his gifts.

Big sister Cassidy, little sister River and a fairy friend.

River and her buddy charging into a Jedi battle!

Fairy size crowns for the girls.  We made these from empty toilet paper tubes.  It was super easy.  Look for that tutorial next week!

Jedi Quinn fending off a rebel attack!

A group of fairies heading over to feed the farm animals.

Quinn, Daddy and crew on the hayride.

Birthday boy Quinn, running and playing.









The day was wonderful, and for my kids as well as some of their food allergic friends, being able to enjoy the party and all of the food  and treats without worry was priceless.  It is really something that you tend to take for granted until you are forced to worry about it first hand!  In addition, we stayed within a low budget and the party was proof that the kids were thrilled to just be kids, and that the over-done bells and whistles are not necessary.  Everyone wins!  Now that's my kind of (kid's birthday) party!