Monster Truck Party (3rd Birthday Party)

Those of you that know us know that our boys LOVE monster trucks!!  They LOVE monster trucks!!! We had a monster truck themed 3rd birthday party for them last Sunday.  

The top left picture is of the birthday invitations I made.  The top right is the monster truck birthday cake I made.  The bottom left picture is of 11 monster trucks that I made for all of the boys cousins.

*The little boy in the bottom right picture is not mine.  He is one of our nephews.  Isn't he adorable!  

 

I had a little area set up where the cousins could decorate and personalize a license plate.  

 

After the license plate decorating the kids used those license plates to play pin the license on the monster truck.  I was suppose to draw a monster truck for this game but the boys got sick earlier in the week and when they are sick Mama gets NOTHING done but snuggling (I can't complain too much about that).  Hubs did a great job sketching a truck for me the morning of the party after church while I was doing some last minute finishing touches on the monster truck boxes.  He personalized it to make it look like M's favorite monster truck (since I used one of G's monster trucks on their birthday cake from on their birthday).

M didn't want his eyes covered.

G didn't seem to mind having his eyes covered.

After playing pin the license plate on the monster truck we went downstairs to have a monster truck race.  After getting all the kids down there (they were asking to go down there for quite awhile) we decided to just skip the 'obstacle' course.  They were more interested in the toys.  Earlier we talked about Hubs making a course out in the snow but our snow blower is still broken.  That would have been SO much fun!  

I made two monster trucks with bottoms for the littler ones.  M decided he didn't want the one that he could drive on his own.  He wanted the one he could sit in.  I mean come on, you sit when you drive NOT stand right.

G had the same thoughts as M about having a bottom of the truck.  L was stuck in the truck with no bottom - you can see his little piggies.  

I made the boys a monster truck cake.  I was hoping to start getting pieces of the cake done earlier in the week.  I was doing so great at getting party things accomplished, but like I said M & G got sick.  The middle of the night on Wednesday Hubs had to bring G to the ER for his breathing.  Thursday and Friday were don't move off the couch days for the boys.  They were miserable.  Thankfully they were feeling much better by Saturday and perfectly normal by their party on Sunday.  Since I wasn't able to get much done early I threw the cake together Saturday night after the 3 boys went to bed.  Oh, I did have the cakes made on Tuesday, everything else I had to do on Saturday.  

I was very disappointed with my flames.  I LOVED the bottom tier.  The tire came out awesome (it looked so much better in real life than in the picture).  The tires for the truck were cool.  The truck was ok (I had more detail sketch out, but decided to go to bed instead)... the bottom of the truck annoyed me.  I wanted to cover it in black but I ran out of black so I said owell.  Sunday morning when I woke up and looked at it I thought, duh, why didn't you cover it in the blue like the mohawk!?!  I was going to fix it after church but never got around to it before the party.  

The bottom tier is chocolate cake with butterfinger buttercream.  The top tier is vanilla cake with carmel buttercream.  The truck is made out of rice krispie treats and covered in fondant.  

I love them.  They are just too cute!

Friday I had to run to the store to pick up a few things.  When I was at Walmart I quick went through the boy section to see if they had any monster truck shirts (I figured there was no way I had time to make one).  They had just recently put out their spring/summer clothes and I came across these.  I thought they were perfect... except they are a size too big - but barely.  I even bought one for L.

G dug right in.

Happy birthday boys!!!

* I still have 2 'birthday' activities to do.  I still have to do their 3 year old handprint and 3 year old pictures.

Christmas Gifts

This year I decided to tackle home made Christmas gifts.  I had a whole bunch in mind.  I was planning on making ALL of M & G's presents.  I ended up not having enough time to make all that I wanted to.  I waited a tad too long before beginning.  

I made all of my boys Christmas pj pants.  Daddy, M, G & L.  I was hoping to make myself a pair but apparently my Hubs isn't a tiny guy.  I thought I bought enough fabric for the both of us... not so!  I had JUST enough for him.  It was ok though, I got a pair from Old Navy for $4 and they coordinated with Hubs perfectly.  They were white with red HO HO HO all over them.  The pants were wrapped for Christmas Eve.  The boys watched me make them and knew what they were but they were so psyched to get them.   When they first opened them they said, "just clothes".  Hubs said, "WOW we got Christmas pjs.  Mommy made them special for us."  They shrilled in delight.  Can you say warm fuzzy heart. :)  Thanks Hubs :) 

The biggest project of all was the car map back pack.  I found it on Pinterest and followed it to here.  I'm not a great crafter or sewer.  I don't have much of an imagination when it comes to this stuff (or anything for that matter haha).  I might have an idea of something I want to do, but then I search to see if anyone has done it before.  Maybe it's the easy way out.  When I came across the car mat backpack I was thrilled.  Then I saw that there was no tutorial for it.  

BUMMER!  Then I looked at it some more.  How hard could it be?  Let's just try.  So I made 6!  Geeze, that's right 6!  One for M & G each and then for our four nephews that I thought might appreciate it.  I started with one.  I figured if I could get the first one right I would be able to do an assembly line with the rest of the 5.  

I think I have enough pictures (not very good ones) to put up a mini tutorial of how I did this.  

I zipped up the backpacks threw in a wooden car and cinched it closed.

After the backpacks were all done I made some hair accessories for my nieces and the cousins gift exchange.

The blue clip went to my oldest niece.  The heart band went to her little sister.  The purple flower went to another niece and the white one when to the cousin exchange.  The hair accessories tutorial can be found at one of my favorite blogs deliacreates.

I also made an ear warmer for the cousin exchange.  I really want to make myself one!  I think it is sooo awesome.  This can be found at deliacreates too.  She has so many different fun things to do with the ear warmer.  I can't wait to make myself one.  I will probably never wear it but I want it non the less.

Hubs brother and wife had their 5th baby 7 days before Christmas.  I made her a cute little outfit.  Honestly I wanted to hold onto it, but who knows if I'll ever have a girl.

The tutorial for the skirt can be found at another one of my favorite sewing craft go to blogs made.  I can't stand how the elastic looks on this.  I didn't have the exact same grey color thread as I did elastic.  I also sewed too high on the elastic that it was flipping funny so I had to sew a second line.  I had already ripped out half of the skirt once I didn't want to do it again so two lines were staying.  Not sure why I was so silly, I've made this skirt a few other times for other people.  O'well.  It's cute non the less.

I dyed the onsie blue.  I had these rosettes already made.  When I was pregnant with L and we didn't know if he was going to be a she or a he I went a little girl crazy and started practicing my girl crafts :)  Since I have a baggie full of rosettes I just utilized what I had.  I never finished twisting the white ribbon one so I scrunched it across the onsie and loved it.  I will definitely be replicating this one if I ever have a girl.  

I didn't think the hair accessories were enough for our nieces.  I'm sure they were, but I wanted to do a little bit more.  I made little hobby horses.  I found them here.  Mine are no where near as cute, but they work.  I went to Walmart for the socks and they didn't have white ones left, the craft store didn't have light pink boas, the dollar store didn't have fake eyelashes, and I only had medium googely eyes.  I think they are cute anyway.  

I had extra little flowers made from the clips and hair bands so I decided to put them in the horses mane.  

I have a feeling I will be making manly ones for M & G's birthday.  

Talk about HOT PINK!!

I also made a book for our youngest nephew.  I came across it here.  She has a great tutorial for it.  I was so thrilled with myself, I didn't actually have to read her tutorial.  That could have been because she had awesome pictures, or maybe because I'm getting better at all these sewing crafts I'm doing.  

After I cut out all of the pieces, ironed them on, and then secured them by sewing around them I realized that I have my own awesome little nugget at home that would like it too.  When I make multiple of things (which is more often than not since I have twins) I like to do them at the same time.  I left this book in pages hoping I could get one done for L but those backpacks just took so long.  I never did make one for L.  I had to sew this up just a few days before Christmas and it was the first project I had ready to be done.  

I think the kids gifts came out pretty great.  I'm happy with them.  

Sadly we weren't there when all the kids opened their gifts.  :(  It was pretty hard for me.  I spent all nap times, bed times, and some wake times where I put on some movies just to get these done.  I felt like I was missing out on time with my boys and I didn't even get to see the nieces and nephews reactions.  

Unfortunately M & G were sick over Christmas.  They had high fevers the week before and were wheezing.  We had to give them their inhalers.  Ever since they were little and had RSV several times in their first winter now they always get bronchitis to almost pneuma type of symptoms and since the newest member of the extended family was only 7 days I didn't think it was right to bring my boys over.  I didn't want to be the one to get a new baby sick.  

I was happy when I received some picture texts.  One of my sister in laws tried to take pictures for me of the kids opening their gifts.  

I'm taking a little break from crafting but have a good list of things that I want to get done soon.  At least there is no time line for them :)  

Thing 1, Thing 2, and the Cat in the Hat go Trick-or-Treating

I have so many pictures and daily happenings that have yet to be blogged about.  I just can't get around to getting them all up.  My three monsters or should I say four (gotta include Hubs) keep me busy.  Honestly I've been pretty lazy around here so that doesn't help either.  Don't get me wrong, I get what I have to get done done but that's about it... actually sometimes I do things that don't have to be done and not things that have to be done... ;)  owell.

I was looking forward to Halloween this year.  M & G are at such a fun age I knew they would have a blast.  Sadly Hubs wasn't able to go trick or treating with us.  He had a costume party at the youth group and spent just about the whole day getting ready for the night activities at church.  My mom came out for the afternoon/evening to go trick or treating with me and the boys.  

Sorry about the horrible pictures. :) 

 L was the Cat in the Hat

M & G were Thing 1 & Thing 2 (so appropriate for their personalities) 

They held hands and walked from house to house.  They rang the door bells (those that they could reach) and yelled trick or treat.  If they couldn't reach a door bell they just continued to yell trick or treat, hello, etc.  Too cute!  

They asked some if they could go inside and play.  They said, do you have toys?  Can I come in and see your toys?  They were as nosey as me, peeking into the houses to see how they were decorated, well in their case whether or not they had toys.  

You can see me in the reflection of the above picture.  I was Cindy Lou Who.  

After we went trick or treating we got into the car and went to the church to visit Daddy.  

Dr, Seuss themed Halloween

Cindy Lou Who, The Grinch, The Cat in the Hat, Thing 1, and Thing 2

I made the photo booth for Hubs earlier in the day.  He set up the sheet and I just added the bats and made the props.  I told him he should have asked me to bring the iron so I could iron the sheet.  He laughed and said that he suggested that to one of the youth leaders and she laughed at him.  I said, yea well you can laugh at her because all those creases are going to show up in every single picture.  The students don't care and most of the pictures came out fun so no big deal :) 

We had fun visiting Daddy and meeting a lot of his students.  The kids loved our kids and played around with them a bunch.  The boys were in their glory playing with "the kids".  

It took me longer than I wanted to but I finally got the boys back into their costumes for some pictures.  I would have loved to take more but M & G weren't feeling well and they HATED wearing their hats, which was kinda funny because they didn't mind them at all on Halloween.  I would try to get them to do some more individual pictures but I don't think so.  They love wearing their shirts but I don't plan on trying to put their hats on them again.  

At the end L was done.  He had no desire to be in anymore pictures.  I tried to get a single one of him but he had other plans.  I will probably dress him up one more time to take pictures... but maybe not... remember, I've been lazy lately :)

The bulk of the costumes were made by me.  For the Cat in the Hat I purchased a My First Christmas onsie (the only black onsie I could find) and sewed a white belly and red bow tie on.  For the leg warmers I cut up a pair of Hubs black dress socks (he doesn't wear them so no loss there) and sewed them into baby leg warmers.  The hat was made out of white and red felt.  I was impressed that it fit him perfectly.  So fun that I had little black and white tiger striped socks.  For Thing 1 & 2 I purchased red sweats and red long sleeve shirts from Walmart.  I used freezer paper and fabric paint to paint on the belly of the shirt.  I also bought larger shirts from the dollar store to go over their jackets incase it was super cold.  They weren't necessary, but they came out much cuter.  I painted the Thing 1 & 2 onto white felt and then sewed it onto the large shirt.  Well hey, they will have Thing 1 & 2 shirts for a while.  For the blue hat I bought hats form the dollar store and a blue boa.  I cut the boa up into 2 inch pieces or so and then hot glued the pieces onto the hats.  I bought green towel material to make the Grinch costume.  I found a free pj tutorial for kids online and followed that, but traced Hubs jeans and shirt as a pattern.  I will totally be using that pattern again and make pjs for the boys.  They came out great... well not so great, the torso area was way long (I'm sure that was due to tracing two different articles of clothing and not a 1 piece.  So when I do them for the boys I will just trace their current footie pjs).  I didn't have enough fabric to make the costume large enough so Hubs opted to put on his gym shorts (which looked good - I think) instead of tearing seams (they did tear) and showing parts of him that shouldn't be shown, especially to his students ... eek!  I didn't have to make anything for my costume.  I wore my clothes and borrowed the coat from my sister in law.  I used one of the boys cups for under my hair and clipped a dollar bow to the top.

I'm already thinking about what family themed costumes I can make for next year...  :)

I know that no one is thinking about Halloween anymore, but I didn't want you to miss out on the boys cuteness... and my corniness :)