2012 Birthday Bash: Monster Style

We celebrated the boys' birthdays this weekend and it was such a great day! Since their birthday's are relatively close (Grayson March 15th and Connor April 10th), I decided to throw a joint party, easier for all, right? Ha, in theory, yes, but next year I VOW to start executing on all of the ideas more than 24 hours prior to the party. Someone shoot me an email or something next February and tell me to get started :)

So, here comes the photo overload!

The inspiration for the Party. Pear Tree Greetings' Monster Birthday Party Invitations. I can't believe I forgot to take a picture of the real invitations, but, I did, so you get that cute boy instead and text that doesn't make sense to our party. Promise the actual invites were cute, too :)

 

Just in case the guests weren't aware of the fun they were about to have :) 

(supplies/instructions: I taped a plastic table cloth to the door, cut out the shapes from construction paper and adhered with glue dots. Super simple and easy! So you couldn't open the door...details, details.)

This was definitely a last minute project and prompted my aunt and uncle to come down the night before (since I can't sew). Love how they turned out and gave the pink and purple ones to my nieces as their party favor (Krystal...you forgot these, ha).

(supplies/instructions: drew random shapes on fleece for the monster shapes, cut out eyes and mouths from felt sheets, ironed those onto the fleece with heat & bond, then sewed and stuffed. I take zero credit for the assembly of these, thank you Aunt Mary!)

This might be my favorite thing I did for the party. I got the idea from this Infarrantly Creative blog post while browsing Pinterest (where else?) and I will admit, the tutorial made it sound a little easier than it actually was, however I was a total rookie to mod podge. But, two prints of each photo later, I think it turned out pretty well :) I was/am not great of taking consistent monthly or yearly photos of the boys, so I only did four younger shots for each, but overall I'm really happy with how it turned out. Now, what to do with these massive prints? 

(supplies/instructions for the prints: Printed 36x24 prints at FedEx Office (Kinkos) for $4.50 each. They're printed on engineer/blueprint type paper so it's very thin, but again, $4.50! Purchased two 4x4 sheets of 1/4 sanded plywood from Menards, drew the shape, cut it out with a jigsaw, spray painted it, then here's where it got tricky. You're supposed to use spray adhesive to set the photo then use mod podge over top, when we applied the mod podge, the photo started buckling, raising, lifting, wrinkling. Eventually we just trashed our first round (thankfully the board survived), got new prints and just did spray adhesive. Someday I'll figure out the mod podge thing. Update: I reached out to the IC blog and asked for any tips, they said the lighter the coat of mod podge the better but that even without the mod podge the frame still looks great, which, I can agree with!)

The table. I had a table under each of the boys' photos, Connor's table got all the food, Grayson's all the treats. We used Pear Tree's Monster Bash Kids Gift Tags for napkin rings and again for the monster juice (see below). The personalized confetti in the bottom left and top right corners is a new product we're working on at Pear Tree! Fun fun!

We had a lot of fun with the food. I will admit, the visit from our Schwan's man on Wednesday before the party definitely helped set the menu :) 

Monster Brains: baked spaghetti

Monster Bones: baked asparagus

Monster Slime: chips + dip

Monster Toes: mozzarella bites

Monster Ears: potato skins

Monster Fingers: pigs in a blanket

Monster Juice! I ordered these 12 oz. sauce bottles from Specialty Bottle. Added some raspberry lemonade, gift tags and paper straws for the final touch :)

The treats. We definitely had an overload of treats, but would it be a birthday party without? Frosted made the monster cakes and cupcakes, which were as tasty as they were adorable, a co-worker made the absolutely amazing cookies (I think people were actually afraid to eat them they were so amazing), and my mom made the monster eyes. Yum!

Grayson's first cake smash! He never got REALLY into it, but absolutely LOVED the frosting. 

Love this boy!

The guests! This is the first time I've made a point to photograph everyone in attendance, definitely want to try and make this a tradition. Thank you to these wonderful people for making the boys' birthday party such a wonderful day!

After presents and cake we spent the rest of the party outside. I'm not sure we'll be able to do this ever again in March, so we absolutely made sure to take advantage of the 70+ degree weather!

I give Bryan credit for making sure we got a family photo (I know, I was shocked, too!). We love these boys beyond any level we'll ever understand. 

Happy Monster Birthday Connor & Grayson!