A week or two before the party, I started googling images of jungle-themed birthday cakes. And let's just say that I am no 'cake boss', so there was not a chance that I could reproduce the professional images I was seeing. (I must say there was one I thought was a great idea - had I looked into it earlier than I had - as it was a really cool, edible decoration you could order and have them put your child's name on it. But since I didn't have time to order that, I decided to get creative and make this a family adventure.) I asked my three daughters to draw a picture of how they would decorate a jungle cake (I, of course, joined them on this artistic venture). It was really cute because they were all excited to be a part of this art experience as well as possibly design the cake. And I actually did get my idea for the cake from their drawings (pic below).
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| Jungle Cake Ideas |
With the drawings complete, I was now fully on my mission to make this cake. I bought cake mix and white frosting, as well as a package of food coloring (I did say I was no Betty Crocker, so of course I would not be making this cake from scratch!). Then we looked for jungle animals to put on the cake. I thought it would be easy to find a package of inexpensive, jungle animals at the store; however, this ended up not being the case. So I decided to look around our house (amongst the over-abundance of toys that is my life since I have had kids) for some small jungle animals. In addition to the figurines we found in the house, one of my daughters had the good idea of using animal crackers to add to the scene. My daughters all helped frost and decorate the cake. (I love these fun, creative, family-bonding moments because I know all to well how fast kids grow up!). The adventure of doing this cake ourselves was a fun one and we were happy with the outcome.
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| Jungle Themed Cake |
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| Jungle-themed decor |
Next on the party planning agenda, was deciding on the activities the group would do. Ironically, we just went to my niece's 5th birthday party and she had a scavenger hunt (and the end of the search led to the gift bags for the kids). My soon-to-be 11 year olds loved the scavenger hunt and decided they really wanted to do this at their party. They got busy writing out the clues and planning the hunt (all of the spots had jungle stuffed-animals hiding with the next clue). The party guests loved running around doing this and they also loved the 'find' at the end.
I am very happy to say that, after the girls were all rowdy and crazy from their scavenger hunt, my daughters asked the group what they wanted to do next, and they chose a quiet craft. This is now my favorite party craft for kids. It is called perler beads (http://www.eksuccessbrands.com/perlerbeads/), and it involves the kids placing tiny plastic pieces onto a shape and then ironing it to create a plastic piece of art. This requires creativity and extreme patience as the pieces are very small and get knocked off the pegs very easily! Their creations are below.
The house was very peaceful during this craft and it kept them constructively busy for almost two hours and they did it again the next morning when they first woke up. It inspires creativity; in fact, I was impressed with the designs they came up with. And all it required from me was about one minute of ironing for each one. (Parents - this one is a big winner in my book for a party craft that interested the kids and kept the house calm!) :)
Now, if only that calm could stay the whole time! There is apparently quite the rage going on right now about a song called the 'cup song' . If you, like me, have never heard of this, all you have to do is google it on YouTube and you will have plenty of examples to find out what it is all about (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7oqsc6ahHVI&NR=1&feature=endscreen). Now, once you watch that, you may find it catchy or even cute. But let me tell you, once you have heard that song (and cup being banged around) for 45 minutes by 5 girls, well...let's just say the 'cuteness' wears off.
The evening eventually came to an end (although later than I had planned) and I had 7 girls camped out on the family room floor. One girl had to leave at 9am, so my husband and I came downstairs a little after 8am and all the girls were completely sound asleep. We started making breakfast and very slowly the group woke up. They were a tired group of girls!
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| Sleepover Breakfast of Champions! |
Breakfast consisted of delicious cinnamon rolls, with fresh fruit as well as bacon (hey - they needed some protein in there!).
After breakfast, the girls resumed their perler beads craft until their parents came at 10am.
Overall, a successful sleepover party with happy birthday girls!
Creatively Yours,
Me
Motivational Moment:
“Every child is an artist, the problem is staying an artist when you grow up” – Pablo Picasso
“Curiosity about life in all of its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people” – Leo Burnett
“Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the thinks you can think up if only you try” – Dr. Seuss
“Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It’s self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can’t try to do things. You simply must do things” – Ray Bradbury
"Anxiety is part of creativity, the need to get something out, the need to be rid of something or to get in touch with something within." - David Duchovny
"Creativity takes courage." - Henry Matisse
“Life beats down and crushes the soul and art reminds you that you have one.” - Stella Adler
“There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of people you love. When you learn to tap this source, you will truly have defeated age.” - Sophia Loren
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