Frozen Party: Making it happen

I wanted to dedicate a separate post to giving lots of tips on how I put together the details for my bug's 5th birthday party. I know Frozen parties are BIG right now and I hope my tips can help save other busy moms some time trying to figure out all the picky details on their own.

Finding Frozen merchandise is not for the weak of heart

Frozen merchandise is nearly impossible to find. I managed to get my bug the pictured Elsa doll/dress set during a random trip to Target. My best advice is to walk through the toy section of Target (I hate Walmart, but did try them too and never found anything) as often as you can. Doing this I managed to snag this gift set, a snow globe wand that plays "Let it Go", and a small Elsa figurine.

Turn portraits and paintings into party decor!

A simple way to decorate at home is to turn pictures that are already hanging into party decor. I covered a large painting that was over the fireplace with an inexpensive plastic tablecloth and paper snowflakes. The tablecloth can be saved and reused for a future party to reduce waste:-)

Hanging decor creates an impressive "centerpiece" when you don't have much room on your table

If you know your theme ahead of time, you can collect items on sale to save money. These lanterns, pom-poms, and hanging twirls were all purchased from Hobby Lobby on sale. The twirls were "Christmas clearance" at 90% off and the other decor were from the wedding section during a 50% off sale. These were hung using the easy to remove tabs from Command.

This falling snow creates a dramatic effect for a small cost

Using invisible thread I strung white pom poms (but you could easily use cotton balls!) and placed them at different heights to give the illusion of falling snow. The larger snowflakes were purchased from the wedding section at Hobby Lobby during a 50% off sale ($5 for 25 snowflakes). To save money, make paper snowflakes or find clearance items after the holidays.

Turn an easy cheese ball recipe into an impressive Olaf replica

The make ahead cheese ball recipe I created was incredibly simple:

1. Soften two 8oz bars of regular cream cheese and one 8oz bar of reduced fat cream cheese on the counter for a few hours.
2. Mix all of the softened cream cheese in a large bowl with one packet of ranch dip mix and 4oz of shredded sharp white cheddar. I shred my own cheese because I don't like the consistency of pre-shredded cheese because of the anti-caking agents they add.
3. Chill the mixture overnight or for several hours until firm.
4. Create two small balls for feet (I used a Pamper Chef 1 inch cookie scoop), a large and smaller ball for the body, and an oval for his head. I wrapped each piece separately in plastic wrap and then placed them all on a plate and covered again with plastic wrap. Freeze until the morning of your party. 
5. Right before the party, assemble Olaf. I am going to make a second one for bug's kid party and will post a separate tutorial on Olaf's assembly in a few weeks. 

These cute milk bottles play double duty as a dessert table decoration

I love the way fancy milk bottles look for parties, but hate the cost. I also hate how much milk gets wasted when the kids take them because they look cool, but only drink a few ounces of milk. For these reasons, I decided I wasn't going to make them. Then, I stumbled upon these bud vases on sale at Michael's. They only cost me 40 cents apiece and hold 3-4 oz of milk. Perfect! I cropped a photo of Olaf to just include his face, printed on a regular color printer, and then glued these onto paper straws (from the dollar bins at Target). I glued the black pom poms on with hot glue.

Fun way to display treats

I used this same cupcake stand last year (which my mom purchased from a craft store using a coupon) to display "wisps" for our Brave themed party. The treat this year was hot cocoa muddy buddy mix. Recipe can be found here.

Snowball and snowflake cookies complete a perfectly frosty dessert display

The vanilla meringues were purchased from Trader Joe's ($3.99 for a decent size container) and the cookies were homemade. I purchased snowflake cookie cutters on clearance after the holidays and used my mom's sugar cookie recipe. After reading many blogs for advice to prevent the cookies from spreading, I omitted all baking powder/baking soda from the recipe and made sure to chill the cut dough in the freezer for at least twenty minutes before baking.

I made the cookies ahead of time and stored them (un-frosted) in the freezer until the week of the party. Two days before the party I took the cookies out and used this small batch recipe for royal icing to outline and flood the cookies. The next day I made a second batch to pipe on the details. I kept them stored in an air-tight container until the party.

This impressive, but easy to assemble Frozen cake is a show stopper!

The first step in creating this cake is making all of the snowflakes to embellish the cake. I used a coupon to purchase a small package of Wilton white fondant at 40% off. I used the snowflake cookie cutters for the larger flakes and a set of flower fondant punches from Hobby Lobby for the smaller flakes. I left them out on a cooling rack for 24 hours to harden. I embellished the flakes with larger teal pearls, mini white pearls, and the same royal icing I used to decorate the sugar cookies.

Two days day before the party I used two box mixes (I know, I hate them too. I replaced the oil with melted butter for a more homemade flavor) to bake three layers of cake (6, 8, and 10 inch Wilton pans). They need to cool completely before you frost!

The day before the party I made 2 batches of this buttercream that I piped on using a Wilton 2D tip. Once all the frosting was piped I sprinkled the cake with white sanding sugar for sparkle and added my hardened fondant decorations and extra teal pearls.

I will have more details on Frozen party activities coming up in a few weeks after the bug's friend party, so check back then if you are hungry for more!

Frozen Party

My bug is five (FIVE!) years old now. I'll spare you a bunch of cheesy comments about "time flying" and feeling like it was "just yesterday that she was born". The truth is that some days being her mom have been amazing and others have been really, really hard. Even on our worst days, I love her with all of my heart. This year I had a blast planning a Frozen themed birthday party to celebrate what a special little girl she is to me.

Thanks to the internet and Pinterest I've been researching ideas for her party for months. I thought it would be fun this year to share "inspiration" versus "actual" photos of our party details. I'll fill in a few more details and post larger photos in a separate post later this week.

I really wanted to share these photos early, check back later this week for tutorials, recipes, etc! As always, I hope my work inspires someone else out there!

Let it Go

I can hardly believe this, but my bug's 5th birthday is just over a week away!! Which means right now is party planning crunch time! Things always become stressful around now because I get overenthusiastic and try to do too much. In addition to keeping up with the normal routine of being a full time pediatrician, raising two monsters beautiful children, preventing the destruction of my parents' house, stressing over the building of our new house, getting back to the gym (at last!), and feeding us all, squeezing in time to plan adorable goodie bags for 20+ kids with a quirky theme is challenging.

Obviously no one is holding a gun to my head to do anything. It's just that planning a party brings together theme-ing, crafting, decorating, food, and baking which are seriously some of my favorite things. I find it very hard to hold back sometimes because I get SO EXCITED when I find a fun idea. The problem with the internet and Pinterest is that I find too many fun ideas and then I get too busy and lose sight of what my goal really is - enjoying my hobbies and creating fun for my girls.

That is the inspiration for my post today - finding balance. I'm not going to throw it all out the window as some cheeky blogs are telling me I should. I think it's rude and judge-y to say what I'm doing is all fluff and doesn't matter just because it doesn't matter to you. Honestly, when you get right down to it, isn't that attitude really just more of the same? Instead of "I'm a better parent than you because I had a cupcake station at my kid's party", it's "I'm a better parent because I didn't have to make a cupcake station." For me, I'm letting go of the bad stuff and keeping the things that mean something to me. I hope I can inspire more overly stressed mamas out there to embrace what they love and let the rest go.

Today, I'm letting go of...

• Cooking myself into a frenzy
• Spending a fortune in time and money replicating every party blog detail just because I saw it when I don't love it
• Having to decorate everything! I'm focusing on my dessert table - because it's my favorite thing!
• Having too much to do the day of the party so I miss things
• Hating myself when I can't do it all - this applies to party planning, parenting, and LIFE

Frozen Day 4 - Tutu photo tutorial!

So when I started my "5 days of Frozen" I intended it to be five consecutive days. Seriously, I have no idea how I thought that was going to happen. Life is just too crazy for a working mama with two kids under the age of five to really expect enough free time FIVE DAYS IN A ROW to accomplish anything more than keeping everyone alive. In my defense, I did create the two pretty sweet Anna and Elsa tutus you're about to read all about. They are actually really easy to make and I finished each one with just a few hours of mindless work after the girls went to bed.

Without further ado, here is my photo tutorial...

Step 1: Measure the waist of your birthday girl/princess/monster child. I was ready to start my little one's tutu when she was napping, so I based her waist measurement on a pair of pants I knew fit her well. Whatever your measurement is, subtract 1-2 inches (1 for a smaller tutu, 2 for a bigger one) before cutting your elastic. You do this because the elastic gets stretched as you tie the tulle. Trust me. If you don't subtract some length, the tutu won't fit!

Step 2: Overlap the ends of your elastic by ~1 inch and sew. You can use a machine or do it by hand like I did. I like to fully secure the elastic ends by sewing a square.

Step 3: Measure and cut your tulle. I used 25 yard rolls of tulle in different colors from Hobby Lobby. The amount you will need depends on how full you want to make your tutu. For my older daughter I used two full rolls and about 1/2 of a roll of glitter tulle added as an accent. I measured by using a rigid mailing envelope to wrap a large amount of tulle around and then cut one end to create many strips with one cut. For the bigger tutu I wrapped the long way around the envelope and the opposite for the smaller one (I was making the smaller one in this tutorial).

Step 4: Start tying the tulle. Fold the tulle in half and create a loop. Place the loop behind the elastic. Pull the loose ends up and through the loop. Pull just until the loop is wrapped around the elastic with the loose ends pointing down. How tight you make the knot (and how close together you squeeze the pieces of tulle) will determine how full your tutu is at the end.

Step 5: Keep tying! Repeat step 4 until the entire elastic band is covered.

Step 6: Once the entire band is covered, you can add more tulle on top of the first row if you want to make it fuller. This was really hard to capture a photo of, but basically you just add another loop between pre-existing loops and don't pull it as tight allowing it to lay on top of your base layer of tulle. I also did this on my Elsa tutu with the glitter tulle that I added at the end.

Step 7: Add on any embellishments you want! I didn't add anything to the little bear's tutu because I didn't want her to be enticed to pull it apart, but I did sew on some snowflake ribbon I purchased after Christmas for my bug's tutu. Other add-on ideas include a big bow, ribbons, or sequins.

FYI: The shirts were made by a local small business RyleighRoo

Frozen Birthday Party Sneak Peek!

As per my usual routine I start hoarding birthday party supplies as soon as we decide on a theme. Although Maddie's birthday falls in the spring, I've had all winter to look for snowflakes and glittery icicle items. I was even able to get some great deals after Christmas and will be able to take advantage of my father-in-law's extensive Christmas lawn decoration collection to set the scene.

Here are the supplies I will be working with over the next month to put together a Frozen celebration worthy of a princess...

Can you guess what I'm doing with all these supplies? Or what items will never actually make it to the party?


Here's a sneak peek at my custom made invitation...

For the first time in forrrrrever (good luck getting it out of your head now...) we're planning a separate adult family party and a kid/school friends party. Double planning, double the fun? We will see!

In Summer

Usually this is the time of year when it finally starts warming up in Upstate NY and we can look forward to Spring. About now it really doesn't feel like it's ever going to happen. There is still more than a few inches of snow covering the ground and the local weather is calling for a possible 6 inches of snow later this week.

Bug loves the snow, but mommy is SO over it!

In addition to being just plain yucky, all this frigid cold is preventing our builder from making any progress on the construction of our new house. Total bummer all around.

Where we thought we would have at least part of a house at this point...

In an effort to be optimistic (like the hilarious Olaf) I'm jotting down all the things I'm looking forward to when it's finally summer...

• Taking nature walks and hikes
• Our house (hopefully) being built 
• My parents coming home from Florida
• Chasing lightening bugs
• Trips to the lake
• Going outside without six layers of insulated clothing
• Seeing my girls play with their cousins on Cape Cod
• Grilling season
• Sand on my toes
• Farmer's Markets
• Visiting all the local ice cream stands
• Seeing Phish in an outdoor venue
• Iced coffee on a hot afternoon
• Swimming with my girls
• Campfires
• Sitting in the grass
• Sandals
• Local produce
• Picnics at the park
• Gin and Tonic by the pool
• Sunshine!

Keep thinking warm thoughts everyone, we'll get to enjoy all these things "in summer" before we know it!

Five Days of Frozen

My family is officially Frozen obsessed. The movie crept into our lives before it even debuted on the big screen. Merchandise was prominently on display throughout the Disney Parks back in the beginning of November before the movie came out. We didn't stock up on toys (not knowing how in demand they would be in just a few short weeks), but my bug happened to fall in love with the Anna gown when we took her shopping for a princess dress in Downtown Disney.

"Princess pose" in Downtown Disney after buying her new dress

I was a bit skeptical about letting her buy the dress of an unknown princess from an unseen movie, but it fit all the major bug criteria - spin-y skirt, sparkles, and no itchy crinoline/tulle on her skin - so we went ahead and bought it. If only we knew how obsessed she would become, we probably would have splurged and bought her the Elsa dress too.

After her full princess makeover

Which brings me to the day we saw the movie. We I cried, laughed, and thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing. When we walked out of the theater my bug declared that she was having a Frozen themed birthday party. My husband downloaded the soundtrack as soon as we got home and it's been playing non-stop ever since. No joke, we've been living in a house of Frozen worship for over three months now. 

Bug knows all the lyrics to "Let it Go" (amazing song), "Love is an Open Door" (fun song), and "Frozen Heart" (somewhat disturbing song to hear a four year old sing/chant). Baby bear dances and giggles as soon as she hears the opening bars of "Let it Go". I go to bed each night planning Frozen themed party treats and ways to make decorations that look like snow.

If there was a word stronger than OBSESSED, you could use it to describe us.

As it's always on my mind anyway, I've decided to spend the next week making Frozen themed posts. I might even give some sneak peaks into my party planning. 

Check back soon for more!