Count down to the birthday party

After Thanksgiving most people are prematurely celebrating Christmas. But in this house we are all about the count down to the Rocket ship birthday party. This party theme is based entirely on the plates I bought a couple years ago at Target. Outer space decorations abound so it has been pretty simple to collect things we need over the last year. (Yes, I picked his 3rd birthday theme before I had his Sesame Street birthday last year.)

Michael's sells unfinished birdhouses shaped like rocket ships so I planed long ago to incorporate them into the centerpieces. In all my sleuthing online it seems like everyone else uses these little wooden rockets too. I've primed these and am beginning to paint them similarly to those on the plates.
 
My preliminary plan for invitations was stylized rocket ship stickers on stationery, basically what I always seem to do. But Our Little Helper is so artistic and loves to draw. He presented me with a drawing of a rocket ship in outer space which included an astronaut tethered to the ship. And he composed the drawing so wonderfully with a border with Saturn, Jupiter, Earth, and the moon. I fell in love with it and thought it would be the perfect artwork for the party invitations. Mr. W added the lettering.
 
With a December birthday we have to hold the party indoors so I try to make up for that with the decorations. I ordered paper lanterns in varying sizes here and we are going to add some paint and tissue paper to create some texture to make them look more planet-y.  I think my MIL sent this set of poster paints when Our Little Helper was 3 and I never really let him use it.  So today was a big event since they got to use ALL the paints!

 This one will be Saturn.

 This largest lantern will be Pluto.

 

So much paint!!

 

 

Accesorizing the crafting table

 Now that my little work table has been painted and placed in the bay window of my closet it is time to start unpacking into it and getting things set up so I can catch up with sewing projects and photo albums. I want a tray that I can keep desk thing on and then easily remove them when I need to set up my sewing machine. I wanted something with purple faux croc. At first I thought I would recover a tray I already have, but I couldn't find any purple croc paper online.
I was able to find a few ready made trays. This first one I saw on the P1 website so I went in to buy it. It isn't exactly the right shade of purple, but I do like that the large size would allow me to keep a stack of papers that need to be filed and remove it all from the desk when needed.  I also found this little chrome based, drum shade lamp on sale for $29! Perfect for what I was looking to do!
 
So here is the P1 tray:

And here is a tray I found at ZG while shopping with Ms. Mc. I prefer this shade of purple, and I think the round shape is a nice contrast to the rectangular shape of the desk. But now I like the idea of having a spot to keep papers.

Using the lampsade in the antique shop as inspiration, I realized I had a couple of little broach type things. When I was in grade school, I think, my grandma or someone else gave me these little metal pieces. The one on the right was from a pair of shoes, the black in the middle is a piece of the suede from the shoes. I can't remember what the other piece was from. Yes, I never throw anything away. I had two of each of these and have been hanging on to them all these years! I used one of each a few years ago when Ms. Mc had her Wine & Witches party and we all decorated witch hats. You never know when something could be reused!

 Here they both are against the lamp shade.

 I really wanted to get a pretty velvet ribbon to mount them, but they didn't have any at Joann's. I thought 2" wide ribbon would be too thick, so I went with the 1 1/2". Now I just need to decide which I like better. And if I like the one on the right better, do I want to keep the black part or remove it so you just see the purple of the ribbon?

Finishing the dragon pinata

The time had finally come to close up the pinata and attach a hanger.  This proved to be a bit more challenging than I anticipated. I learned that Mr. W had some zip ties lying around and that they would be nice and sturdy. Then he could connect that to whatever rope he's using to suspend the pinata. Using the exacto knife again I made two slots. I messed up the direction of the slot the first time, I want them to be parallel to the back of the dragon so they can go round the egg container spikes. Then I slide the first end of the zip tie in and instantly realized my problem.  Unlike sewing, I can't easily flip to the underside. How on earth would I get that tie back through the other slot?
After several attempts with long handled things, I decided I'd just cut the hole for adding the candy larger so I could fit my hand through.

MLH couldn't figure out what I was doing with my hand stuck inside his dragon pinata!
It worked though! I got the zip tie through both slots.
 
My plan here is that between the layers of paper mache, the cardboard of the wings, and then the egg carton, there will be enough support to keep the fastener in place to allow the children to have several go rounds of hitting the pinata.  That's been my biggest fear with this homemade pinata, that it won't be strong enough to hold up and the children will be disappointed.
Next I added the wings that MLH painted blue and green. I made a slit for the male end of the tie and then made two slits forming an X on the other side so that I could force the bulky female side through. Worked great.

Then I glued on the wings. I used Elmer's glue again and as soon as I did it I realized I ought to have gotten the hot glue gun out. I do not have time to stand around holding cardboard in place. I had MLH get a bag of brown rice out of the pantry to use as a flexible weight.  I repeated this technique with the first length of dragon spikes. 
Unfortunately the other one is missing. How many times did I say don't play with the wings and spikes for the pinata?  Too many to count, and yet here we are with parts missing.. Hopefully they will turn up before the party!

Update: The rest of the spikes turned up and we did one last set of painted egg carton to finish the ridge. The zip tie fit around the egg carton spikes.

 I did have a small problem with the zip tie, I put it in backward! Aagh! After all that work! But Mr. W simply twisted them so the closure would work properly.

 Then I added another zip tie for Mr. W to use to suspend the pinata from the rope.

 Here he is in his final state pre-dragon slaying.  That hind legs were glues on after Mr. W finally got him suspended.

  

Shield party favors

Another plan I had for all our left over moving boxes was to create cardboard shields for the children.  I figured this could be the craft for them to keep them occupied for part of the party. I used the sides of the medium sized moving boxes. Then I tried out a few different mock ups on paper to get the shape I wanted for the shields.  This is the template shape I settled upon.
 
Once I cut these out with a matte knife (remembering to change the blade before I started) they were ready to paint.
 
I used the same battleship grey paint as the castle.
After both sides were painted the cardboard magically became convex which I wasn't anticipating, but made them look even more shield like. Yay!
I used black webbing for the straps and fastened them with 15/32" Mini Anorak snaps, all of which I picked up at Joann's.

 I also bought some blue metallicy fabric to use as a table cloth for the medieval banquet.  It was 50% off $7.00 a yard so the price was right. I figure I can use this fabric in the future for costumes of some sort.
After all that effort though, Mr. W decided to use some more of Mr.McGroovey's rivets to put the staps on the shields. Mr. W poked a hole through both the fabric strap and the cardboard. I did 6" lengths and spaced the rivets 3" apart to allow for little boy arms to slide through. But after the test run of that it wasn't quite enough space. When I asked how long the straps ended up being Mr. W answered "the right amount" which isn't entirely helpful, but I'd guess it was more like 7-8" each.
Now we have assembled shields for the children to decorate! My Little Helper and I found bags of jewels for the children to glue on and they can also draw decorations on with markers. I considered making dragon silhouettes, but have run out of motivation for something so tedious.  I have an entire dragon cake I have to bake and assemble tomorrow!
I finished painting the castle yesterday afternoon. Can I just tell you how happy I am to have a garage in which to do all these projects?!  It is so nice to have!
  
"Take my picture inside the castle!"
 

Building the castle walls (and stuffing the dragon)

Mr. W had a very busy weekend preparing for Our Little Helper's dragon birthday party. After we moved we decided to save all our cardboard moving boxes to use as a castle for the children to play in at the birthday party.  I had heard somewhere that you can buy plastic rivets for assembling boxes.  My internet search turned up Mr. McGroovy. Not only does he sell rivets, but he also has floor plans. I didn't think I needed those, I was able to come up with a general idea based upon the photos of castles on his website. The little rivets snap together fairly easily, but they have to be lined up just so.

We didn't really have enough of the large wardrobe boxes and we weren't about to go out searching for more boxes in order to have the appliance boxes so we improvised with the large moving boxes. We went back and forth on the best arrangement for the boxes, this was our result.
I was expecting to pay a ton for spray paint cans, but Mr. W had the brilliant idea to purchase a paint sprayer. He figures there will be plenty of painting the exterior of this house in his future so it was a worthwhile investment to him. I thought it was a great idea.
 
He primed it first.

Then added a top coat of battleship grey.
 
Now I will have the task of painting all the mortar lines. Yesterday MLH and I ran a bunch of errands for his birthday (as well as someone else's upcoming birthday that I have to plan.) I purchased black poster paint and now just need the motivation to go outside and begin.  I'm thinking Baby Boy's nap time is the right time to do it.
We also went to the Scottish Country Shop to purchase little Welsh flags to decorate the 4 corner towers of the castle.  Both the Scottish and Welsh flag feature a dragon and I got the idea when we were at the Highland Games.  I thought the cost of $3 a flag was worth the time saved for me to go to the fabric store and sew my own flags and somehow get a dragon image on them.

The other thing MLH and I got on our errands was more prizes for the dragon shaped pinata.  We went to the Learning Palace which caters to school teachers.  I got another tub of these knight figures.  I think they are great because they go with our theme, but it occurred to me that they also will look like the dragon ate a bunch of knights.  Somehow I think the little boys may find that funny.

We also have a giant pile of saltwater taffy from our recent trip to the coast.
 
And we finally found some dragon stickers.
 
I think this is a good mix of treats and prizes.

 I poked a hole with an exacto knife into they back of the dragon.  It took a little while before I could hear the balloon inside snap and then deflate pulling itself free from the paper mache. Happily the pinata remained intact! I cut out a small rectangle big enough to get the knights inside.
 
MLH enjoyed filling up the pinata, he's so excited for his birthday! And it is finally right around the corner!

Fringey

My Little Helper and I made a lot of progress on the dragon pinata for his birthday. The site I used as a starting point for the pinata suggested priming over the paper mache so that not as much paint would be needed to cover up the newsprint.  I'm not sure if I actually needed this step since we would be doing a traditional tissue paper fringe, but I thought it couldn't hurt to do it since I had a tiny bit of spray primer left over from my desk project.  Since it was nearly 100 degrees out the primer dried really quickly.
Then we were able to move on to fringing it, or putting on it's skin according to MLH.  This was the part I was really dreading.  I knew it would be tedious and time consuming.  I bought several packets of the perfect shade of blue tissue paper at CPWM for $1.95 each and I only ended up using not even an entire packet. Awesome! I cut the tissue paper into 2"w strips and then fringed in about 1".  I started at the tip of the tail so my fringe strips would over lap each other
. I put the glue mostly on the pinata itself rather than on top of the previous layer of fringe because I didn't want it to get all gunked up.
Along the spine of the dragon I measured and marked out where the dragon's spikes would go so that I wasn't wasting my fringing and tissue papering efforts.  This is also the area where I anticipate we will make the opening for getting the candy and prizes inside as well as attaching the hanger.
Fringing was tedious, but I got really into it and kept going after bedtime and finished it up today.  I was thrilled that Mr. W was so happy with the way it was turning out.  He thinks it looks awesome too.  MLH is behaving so grateful and appreciative.  He kept coming into the kitchen to check on my work saying, "Wow!" or "Awesome!" or "This is SO cool!"  It certainly makes the effort worth it.  At one point before bed he came back down to give me an extra hug and a kiss and thanked me for his pinata.  What a sweet boy!
Today as I was finishing up with the tissue paper, I sent MLH and Mr. W upstairs to the playroom to paint the wings and spikes.

The wings I made out of a used mailing envelope and the spikes are the inside dividers from and egg carton. MLH was inspired to use an egg carton for the spikes based on a large paper mache dragon at his old preschool.  I love his imagination and memory! Originally MLH very specifically wanted green spikes, blue on the top of the wings and green on the bottom of the wings.  But at some point during the actual painting process he decided that some of the spikes should be blue too.  Not sure how all that will come together. This was the first time that I let him use this paint set that his Grammy W sent as a gift at least two years ago. At the time I was like, "What was she thinking?!" But at nearly 5 years old I think it is a great gift.  The paint pots have a little indentation to hold the paint brush.  Pretty nice!
I had considered filling the head cavity with candy too or opening up the head cavity to make a giant mouth from which the fire would cascade, but in the end decided it would be easier to just tissue paper over the whole thing and cover the last bit up with the metallic grass MLH picked out for the flames and one last piece of fringed tissue.
 As I type this I realize that he needs some sharp teeth too. MLH and I both agreed that our dragon pinata would need googly eyes.
So we're not done yet, but I'm feeling really good about how quickly this part came together. It is a lot of work, Mr. W asked me if I was sure we wanted to have the children bust it open at the party. I think that may be the funnest part, but yeah, each child will probably only get ONE homemade birthday pinata out of  Momma!

Dragon pinata

Before we even had the Green T-Rex birthday party for Our Little Helper's 4th birthday he began planning out his next birthday party theme: a blue dragon birthday! I couldn't help myself, I started planning out all the fun things we could do for a blue dragon party like slay a dragon shaped pinata with wooden swords, have a dragon shaped cake, a cardboard castle, etc. I bookmarked a bunch of website and with MLH's birthday about a month away I figure I better get a head start on all my good intentions before I run out of time.  Well, truthfully in addition to having nightmares about the first day of school, I also had a bad dream in which it was his birthday party and I hadn't even made the cake yet when the guests started arriving and hadn't made any crafts or favors to keep the children occupied.
So with those worried keeping me up at night I was finally motivated to go out and get some balloons so we could start assembling the pinata. I used this dragon pinata as a guide for how to create the dragon.  I decided that we needed a little more form than this so I also made the head out of another balloon.  I figure we could even put candy in this cavity as well. I also added legs.  I will want to add back legs to, but I'll add those later.  I'm worried it will be too hard to paper mache this thing if there are too many nooks and crannies. 
MLH is so excited about his dragon pinata!

 I followed this recipe for the paper mache too making sure to add in the recommended salt to prevent it molding. It's hot and I'm making this a few weeks early so the last thing I'm going to want is a moldy pinata to fill up with candy. As soon as I put my fingers in the paste I was transported back to my childhood making paper mache in public school.  Who knew pinata making was like riding a bike? MLH seemed to enjoy it too, but it was short lived.  About ten minutes in to our macheing he got bored/tired and said his feet hurt from standing. So I was left to finish it on my own.  I only do one layer at a time because it's time consuming with all the different joints. But so far after a few layers it is beginning to take shape.