Simon's two now, and I just love this age. He is so adorable (says his unbiased mother) and learning so many new things everyday. One of Simon's favorite things is watching big construction trucks. He's always mesmerized by them. So, I settled on a construction party for Simon, and our theme was, I dig being 2.
I made the banner by using a few sheets of 12x12 paper. I cut the paper in half (6x12) and then cut it into thirds. I used my cricut to cut out the happy birthday letters.
The cake was my favorite part! Seriously, this was the easiest cake to make too. I used Martha Stewart's
chocolate cake recipe, and my own butter frosting recipe. I frosted the bottom layer of the cake. Then, I used a fork to start digging away to make the hole in the top layer. I put all of the extra cake bits in a bowl. Then, I just put the cake together and finished frosting the whole cake. I frosted the cake the night before the party, and waited until the morning of the party to put it all together. I placed the backhoe on the cake, and 2 of the pylon candles. I made a few signs for the cake. It's hard to read them in the picture, but one says I DIG BEING 2, and the other one says YIELD FOR CAKE. I crumbled the cake that I had set aside. I mixed in a little frosting with it so that I would be able make a little mound of dirt. I put the dirt mound on the back of the cake and covered it with a few more cake crumbs. That's it. 15 minutes from start to finish.
It was an afternoon party, so I didn't go crazy on the food table. There were grapes and apple carrot muffins. I had water, juice, and a punch for the party goers to drink.
I've seen construction parties where people load up their dump trucks with brownies to look like dirt. I loved that idea, but since my party was for two year olds, I decided to make muffins instead. I used my sister's cake pop make to make apple carrot muffins in balls so that they would look like boulders.
I made a little label for the water, using a free clip art graphic.
This is the aforementioned punch I made for everyone to drink. (Recipe to follow in another post.)
Using my cricut I cut out the letters to make these signs on 12x12 paper. (If you don't have a cricut or similar machine, check out your local scrapbooking store. Most of these stores will offer their tools for their customers to use. Or you could just pick up a few packs of stickers.)
Derek, my husband, made this car track on the floor for the kids to play with. He used masking tape to create all of the pathways.
One of the best party activities was this giant colouring sheet that I made. I used a sheet of bristol board, and traced some shapes that I printed from my cricut. (I'm terrible at drawing, so I'm many of you could do this freehand!) The kids loved colouring it. All of them sat down to help. I hung the picture on the wall before the kids sat down to eat their cake.
There wasn't a lot of noise while the kids were eating their cake!
I was trying to get a picture of Super Simon holding the fun balloons, but he was not interested in a photo shoot.
Simon had a great time. Simon was a little overwhelmed by all of the kids at Claire's party, so this was the perfect size party for him. And just like that, my party planning is over for another year, unless I plan a summer ice cream party...
What about you? Do you love planning parties? Leave me your links in the comments, I'd love to check them out!
