24 Olive Street

mini smash album

For my daughter's birthday party I mentioned that I set up a photo booth for the girls. I also had an album sitting on the table for them to write some stuff in after they took their pics.

I wanted to have a book that had no page protectors to mess with, something that was quick and easy to use. I thought about making my own book but then found one of the mini smash books at Target & thought that would be perfect...and it was. I glued in the photos & then let the girls write in it.

After the party I decorated the cover with some papers from the Noel Mignon Soda Shoppe kit (the thickers are the same as the ones in the last layout from my stash).

I also printed off some of the photos that I had taken during the party with my 'good' camera. I used photoshop to crop them all to 2x3 (perfect size for this book) and then printed 4 of them on a 4x6 canvas.

Then I put them all in the book, added a little washi to some of the photos, and Olivia can now go back and add in any journaling that she wants...like, how good the cupcakes were :)

And I've said this 98459384573 times but how fun will this be to look back on in 20 years?? It's not just the photos but the journaling...the silly, goofy journaling :)

i survived my first slumber party...

My oldest daughter's slumber party that is :)

She just turned 11 and really wanted to have a party. Since it's winter, and since we really couldn't think of a place she wanted to have a party, she opted to just have one at home & make it a slumber party.

8 girls came over.

That's a lot of loud, giggly girls!!

It was a bit hard to try & come up with a 'theme' for a bunch of pre-teens. It's an awkard age...in many ways :)

So we decided to do a 'dance party, movie night, slumber party' theme.

I also set up a photo booth of sorts so the girls could take some pics. I used this idea for setting it up and used a tablecloth I had for the backdrop. For some reason I didn't get a pic of it all set up??? But the frame does make for a fun volleyball 'net'!

Yeah, it's kinda big :) But I figured we could take it apart & keep the pieces for any other parties we have.

I purchased 10' sections of the 3/4" PVC piping that cost $6.29/ea at Lowes (the 1" pipe was toooo expensive). I only ended up using 3 pieces instead of 4 like in the link (maybe they had shorter pieces??) 2 of the pieces were cut in 2-3' sections and 2-2'sections. Those made the 2 side pieces & the legs. Then I my hubby cut the 3rd piece into 2-5' sections for the 2 crossbars.

The whole thing cost about $25. Easy peesy.

Then I set up with some props I bought at a local party supply store. I really wanted to have mustaches & stuff like that on sticks but I ran out of time. Always running out of time!

For the photos I used my Instax camera. I was the photographer :) I bought one of those mini smash albums to put the photos in (I'll share that in another post).

After that there was some dancing :)

Notice my little one right in the mix with the big girls :) She so enjoyed having all those girls over!

For dinner I made these pepperoni rolls.

Oh man, they were good!!! As in, I should have made more good. As in, the girls gobbled them all up good!

I will say that 425 degrees was a bit hot in my oven, so I lowered it to about 375 so the tops wouldn't get too brown before the insides cooked...I made more the next day for lunch :) I also just brushed the tops with a beaten egg white. And maybe I wasn't rolling mine as small but I could only fit 2 containers of biscuits in a 13x9 pan so I used an extra 9x9 pan so I could get more.

SO good. I'll definitely be making these again. And again. And again!

I also tried a new recipe for the cupcakes (see here). By far I think this is my favorite recipe that I've tried for chocolate cake.

I like to make things from scratch but I have yet to find a from scratch cake recipe that I like as much as a boxed recipe.

The frosting was super yummy, too. It's very sweet so if you like that kind of frosting you'll like this one.

Just a note, I had to use my hand mixer to get the shortening whipped up enough before adding the sugar (my stand mixer just didn't do it well). I also added some of the heavy cream in after adding just half of the powdered sugar so it would cream up, then I added the rest of the sugar.

Another cute little thing I did with drinks was to add some duct tape to the water bottles. The girls thought this was cute & I was surprised at how many of them actually drank water! They could also add their names to the tape.

After dinner it was sleeping bags, movie time & popcorn. Boy, my popcorn maker got a workout!

The next morning...

Can you see my little one right in the middle of the big girls again??

For breakfast I set up a waffle bar. Waffles, whipped cream, chocolate chips. Yes please!

And just like that it was over. And I spent a good chunk of Sunday afternoon laying on the couch. Cause I was exhausted!!

birthday girl

On Saturday we celebrated Addie's first birthday. We had originally planned on going to back to back baseball games for my son but they were cancelled. So we ended up having some time to let Addie dive into her cake & open some presents.

And boy did she dive into her cake! Straight in, no hesitation. It was hilarious!!

Then she began flinging cake everywhere so it was time for a bath! hehe

On Sunday we had her rainbow birthday party.

the invitation:

I made the invitation in Photoshop using this digital kit. Super simple & easy.

I kept the decorations really simple (balloons & crepe paper) and Olivia had fun decorating everywhere with the crepe paper :) I had planned on making some tissue paper flowers/pom poms but simply ran out of time. Planning a party & getting your house in order for company during baseball games & end of school year stuff is a bit difficult so you do what you can! Some things just had to give.

the dessert table:

This is the best part, isn't it??! We had gummie bears, chocolate dipped pretzels, rice krispie treats, jello popcorn and instead of a cake I made rainbow cupcakes.

I used the recipes from Hello Cupcake for the cake and frosting & tinted the cake with icing colors...and I have decided that I'm not buying boxes mixes again! They were yummy :)

There was supposed to be confetti on the table...but I couldn't find it to save my life. It'll turn up in a week I'm sure!

the food:

Can you tell it started getting a big cloudy outside?? We had chicken kebobs that I had marinated in beer, Italian dressing & garlic. Yum :)

To the side of the table I had 2 big white metal tubs purchased at Target a few years back that held 2 liters of drinks...in rainbow colors as well :)

And a rainbow fruit tray, for the rainbow party, of course!

All of these white serving trays and cupcake stand I purchased a few years ago for Olivia's first communion party have definitely come in handy! I got the trays at Joann's for 1/2 off and they're very versatile. The cupcake stand holds 37 cupcakes so it's great for parties.

The kids that came to the party had fun with the outside stuff I bought for them. Yay!

And Addie certainly had a fun time diving into some more cake!

Thankfully the weather held out (for the most part) & didn't get too chilly til the end of the party. It was a great day & I'm so grateful for the friends that came over to celebrate Addie's first birthday with us!

party planning!

We're on the countdown to Addie's first birthday. Still kind of in shock that we're here already! But super excited, too.

After seeing Stephanie Howell do a rainbow themed birthday party the wheels started turning in my head as I thought that would be an awesome idea for a 1st birthday party...and I immediately started pinning ideas on Pinterest! You can see my rainbow board here.

I'm keeping the menu simple, as in things I can prep ahead of time. I'm not doing a cake but instead rainbow cupcakes. And I'm planning on making some other rainbow treats. We're bbq'ing so I'm making chicken kebobs with corn on the cob, chips, rainbow fruit. Again, I can prep all of that ahead of time so that I'm not stuck in the kitchen the day of her party.

I also bought some fun stuff for the kids to do outside. Since we don't have a play set in our backyard (and weather permitting I would prefer to keep kids outside during parties!) I bought some outdoor fun stuff for them...

I love these bubble wands. They make gigantic bubbles and at a buck a piece I can buy a bunch and the kids can each take one home with them. I wish they had more colors though! I also made sure to buy a big refill bottle of bubbles as well.

If the weather is rainy I'm reserving the right to turn on the Wii for the big kids and leaving it on all afternoon! hehe

I got Addie this cute birthday chair....

Although all she wanted to do was jump out cause she thought that was so funny!

I'll probably take it to the park next week and do a little photo shoot with her for some 1 year pics.

And since it's her birthday this weekend I gave her an early present...just cause I wanted to ;)