John Deere Tractor Party

Back in August, my son celebrated his third birthday with a tractor party. He loves everything with wheels, especially tractors!

 

Our neighbors let us borrow their tractors...

...and the kids loved climbing around on them!

The John Deere pedal car was a big hit!

So were the boxed lunches packed up in John Deere gable boxes. I ordered them from this online store. I also purchased some astro-turf from Home Depot to use as a table cloth...cause it looks like grass!

Inside their lunch boxes was a sandwich, juice, applesauce, sesame sticks, and John Deere fruit snacks.

I made the cake, but in hind site I would have made the base a little wider to accommodate the toy tractor a little better. We also had "haystacks" made from chow mein noodles, almond butter and melted butterscotch chips. Just mix it all together and drop by large scoops onto some waxed or parchment paper and let set.

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Along with the cake, we served little piggy sherbet scoops. I used a big scoop for the body, a little scoop (from the melon baller) for the nose, mini chocolate chips for the nostrils and regular chocolate chips for the eyes. The ears are made from pink Jelly Bellies.

 For goody bags, I found the John Deere coloring books at the dollar store, the fruit snacks were from the grocery store and the John Deere logo lollipop and the popcorn were from the Green Fun Store (website listed in the link above).

I packaged them all up in John Deer retail bags that cost just pennies a piece from the same website.

The rest of the party pics

The poll results are currently leaning towards posting party stuff here, so I will go ahead and post a few pics from last Saturday. I usually post party photos on my family blog, but I'd rather share them where more people can see what I've been up to. Hope you enjoy as much as I do!

I go a little crazy at birthday time...see for yourself:

The Munchies:

Veggies and dip

PB & J samiches for the kids

Make your own sub sandwich for the "big" kids!

A truck-load of salty chips.

The Loot:
Each kid got a bunch of car/truck related things packaged up in the car shaped boxes I found at Oriental Trading. The fire fighter's badge and tattoo are from our local fire station (free!), the gummy cars, stencil, train whistle, tire flashlight key chain and mini truck are all from Oriental Trading.

These suckers are also from Oriental Trading...How cute are they?

I made a drivers license for each kid. They were a huge hit! Don't turn me in for making fake IDs!

When it was time to eat, everyone found where they were sitting at the table by locating their very own set of keys found from this website.

Party Fun
As the guest were arriving, my husband gave the kids rides on our riding mower.
Then we gathered all the kids around my brother-in-law's BIG truck for a great photo op.

The party table. I bought the plates and coordinating napkins when I saw them on clearance a couple years ago for $1 per package. I found those cute traffic signs at the Learning Palace.

Party entrance.

For games we played Red Light, Green Light and Duck Duck Goose. Then I got out the parachute and the kids enjoyed playing parachute games.

Thanks for looking!

Crafty Cake!

I think I have just about recovered from my latest burst of creative energy. Last weekend we celebrated my son's second birthday with a cars, trucks and trains birthday. I found the cutest idea for a cake and decided to give it a try...
I don't know what I was thinking...this cake took 4 cake mixes and 2 days of prep to make. Decorating all the cookies (over 50 of them) was a 3 step process: outline with colorflow, let dry overnight, fill in with a thinned-down colorflow, let dry, then add all the details and let dry. After it was all done I realized it was all worth it, but in those 2 days, I was a wreck!

Hayden's First Hair Cut...finally!

I have been trying to figure out how much "personal" stuff to include on my paper capers blog. At first I wanted to keep it strictly crafty stuff, but I had so much fun with this one I wanted to share. For those who read my family blog...sorry for the duplicate post, but I couldn't resist...

Hayden has needed a hair cut for a couple months now...but before we cut his golden locks off, we had a little fun...

"The Hayden"

"The Donald"

"The Kramer"

"The Godzilla"

"The Squiggy"

"The Pebbles"

"The Ed Grimley"/"Jack Jack"/ "Mary"

Hayden didn't want to sit still, so after I cut his first lock of hair, I held him while Dan buzzed the rest of his hair off.

"The New Hayden"

Hayden looks so cute with his shorter hair...just in time for his second birthday! Doesn't he look like Zander? I think the reason I waited so long to cut his hair was because I knew it would move him from my "baby" to my little boy in the blink of an eye. I remember how dramatic it was when Zander got his first hair cut. It seems like he hit the fast forward button and aged about 6 months. I was also a little nervous about how to cut his hair. He has two cowlicks in front and a few longer areas of growth in the back...the hair clippers solved that problem...now it's all one length.

Favorite photos from our camping trip

We went to the coast this past weekend and all the cousins had so much fun playing together on the beach. I'm so glad they are all close in age...all within a year of eachother.

Here is my little Hayden. He will be 2 next month and boy does he love trucks!

Bad things can happen when I'm on 2 Peas!!!

It had been a while since I've had enough free time to post to the message boards on 2 peas. Well today as I was "peaing," I realized it was time to pick up my kindergartner from school. So I went downstairs, got my keys and purse, then I saw my almost 2 year old up on a chair, dropping eggs onto the floor! He was having a ball...I guess that explains why it was so quiet downstairs, and here I thought he was just playing nicely so I could play on the computer...silly me!

And yes, I am THAT kind of mom who has to take a picture of this before cleaning it up. Evidence for later!

Santa Baby

Who can resist a nakie baby. Hayden was such a trooper while I shot these photos...a little bag of gummy fruit snacks makes photo shoots like these so much easier! (notice, he is eating as the photo is being taken! Whatever works, right?)

Patterned paper by Adornit (Carolee's creations) "Christmas Frost"
Red cardstock, bookplate and brads by Stampin' Up!
Ribbon, bought at Big Lots