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First, let me give credit where credit is due! My dear sweet friend agreed to take photos of the party so all of these beautiful shots are due to
Beth York Photography. Please take a moment to check her out on Facebook. She does AMAZING work and her photography business is strictly an effort to bring home their darling daughter from China. Even if you aren't local and can not take advantage of her photography skills for your family, please take a moment to visit her
blog, read her inspiring stories, and consider supporting them through their
31 fundraiser that is going on this month. You will be truly humbled and blessed by this precious family's testimony!
In our family we don't go overboard with birthday presents but instead this creative mama probably goes a bit overboard with parties. I am so thankful that I have a husband who understands my need to be creative and supports me in that. I will admit, that a lot of what I do is for fun, but while working hard on this particular party, I was convicted about my motives. It scared me to think that it might be for my own glory and not for my little girl or for the friends we were inviting. After searching my heart, I truly feel that most of my efforts were with the children in mind.
When I began her party planning, there wasn't much question about what the theme would be. This girl LOVES dinosaurs! She knows the different names better than anyone I know and can tell whether they are herbivores, carnivores or omnivores. She can tell you whether they are bipeds or quadrupeds and what a track wave is and can also explain how fossils are made. Pretty good for a four-year-old!
I started by creating this
Pinterest board dedicated to her party and collecting ideas from the NUMEROUS dinosaur parties out there. There were so many wonderful inspirations. I wasn't able to use them all but it was a great springboard for making her party unique.
Birthday Outfit
I took Elena with me to pick out the fabrics for her birthday outfit. I gave her some peramiters and let her give me suggestions/tell me what she liked best (if you read my earlier birthday post, you know how opinionated she is getting about what she wears). She found some orange dot fabric, the green fabric that I also used for some other party favors, and fixated on a pink ruffle fabric that was WAY too pricey. I told her no on the pink until I found a remnant that was marked down because of a pull. I found a hot pink T shirt at the Dollar Tree and used this
adorable dino alphabet to applique her shirt with the green and orange fabrics. I also used the green to make her pants with the pink ruffle around the base of each leg. She has insisted on wearing this outfit almost every day since her party (we've washed it almost every night). It certainly is not what I would have chosen, but she LOVES it, and that is what is important.
Location
Normally we have the party in our home, but I decided to investigate off-site locations because I knew we would be inviting more guests this year. I found the perfect location in our local Science Center. It was a beautiful facility that was the perfect size, educational, affordable, and provided the perfect community outreach that we like to include in our birthday celebrations. We are trying to teach our girls that it is better to give than to receive so we ask for donations instead of gifts. The Science Center provided us with a list of needed materials and guests were asked to bring those in place of presents (trust me, these girls have enough toys and clothes).
Decorations
Next, I decided to start with color choices. Elena has more friends that are boys than girls, but I wanted the party to have a girlish feel. I chose lime green, hot pink, and bright orange. Polka-dots, tulle, and ribbons increased the girly feel. I always like to have the personal touches with names & birthday wishes, and enjoy any opportunity to use my design skills, so I make my own party printables. I designed her invitation first. The simple dinosaur silhouettes were from a
free dinosaur font download.
The Science Center is located in our "Cultural Center" along with the local ballet, artist guild, and symphony offices in a group of three buildings. Finding the location can be a bit of a challenge if you've never been there so I used hot pink polka-dot, orange and lime balloons outside and inside to direct guests to the right location.
I also posted a sign on the door with further directions. It read "Stomp Rumble and Roar! Elena's party is on the second floor. Track the Dino Prints through the door.
Using my Silhouette Cameo, I cut out small dino foot prints which I taped to the floor creating an obvious path to the Science Center.
Using the same stripe and dinosaur elements from the invitation, I added a polka dot background to pink and orange to create coordinating cupcake toppers, food labels, party hat labels, table centerpieces, favor toppers, dino dig labels, etc. Since helium was not in our budget, I wanted to come up with a creative way to use the pink polka dot balloons in the party room. The day before the party, I made the impromptu "balloon topiaries" for centerpieces on the table (you can see my tutorial on how to make them here).
Party Favors
The main party activity also served as a party favor. Each guest had their own dinosaur excavation site which included "paleontologist tools," a dinosaur skeleton to excavate and a dinosaur fossil to keep (you can see my earlier post about how to make your own
here). Each guest also had a few other special treats to take home with them. I knew the instant I saw
this post that I HAD to make dino tails for Elena's party! Using a lime green fabric I found at JoAnn on the clearance table, I made 20 tails (total cost to make all 20 was about $30)The girls' tails had pink spikes and the boys' tails had orange. It took me the better part of two days to make them but it was well worth every bit of the effort when I saw how much everyone enjoyed them.
I also used my Siloette Cameo to cut out dino feet that slipped over their shoes. I cut out matching pink and orange claws for the tips to coordinate with the tails.
To top off the dino set, I was inspired by
this find on Pinterest. I purchased solid green party hats online and added the pink and orange spikes to the back. Each hat had a guests "dino" name on the front and these were also used as place cards at the tables.
I also had to include dino eggs. Elena helped me sort some Easter candy so we had only pink and white eggs to match her decor. I made simple toppers for small ziplock bags and put a handful in each container.
Finally, we continued our magnet tradition where each guest was given a "Thank You" magnet with Elena's picture. It has been neat for us to see how she has grown each year through this little memento.
Agenda
The first 30 minutes of the party were spent enjoying the facilities at the Science Center. From the live animal exhibits to the hands-on experimenting exhibits, there was plenty for them to do. I was a little afraid that some of the exhibits would be over their heads, but they seemed to enjoy it all!
Next, everyone gathered in the party room where a sweet intern delivered a quick lesson on fossils. She passed around actual dinosaur fossils and talked with them briefly about how fossils are formed. She then explained what a paleontologist does.
Then, the kids moved to their seats at the table where I had their dino-digs waiting on them. After some brief directions, they dug up their dino bones and discussed with their parents what dinosaur they had discovered.
We poured the extra sand into buckets and it was used for the turtles living in the science center. I had bags prepared for the guests to carry their dinosaur bones, fossils, and tools home with them so they wouldn't get sand all over their cars (as a mama, you try to think of those things).
The kids then put on their party hats, dino tails and feet, and gathered around the intern once more to see, touch, and hold a live snake (a special request by the Birthday girl) while the parents cleaned up the table for food.
After singing Happy Birthday to Elena, the food was enjoyed and more fun was had exploring the exhibits and dancing in dinosaur regalia.
The Menu
The party was held from 10-12 so I planned a light lunch. I started with the "Herbivore" food and served a
Mandarin Orange Salad and a
Lime-Kissed Fruit Salad (though I forgot the honey and it ended up just being fruit salad). The salad containers were Walmart finds that I am sure I will use time and time again.
Next came the "Carnivore" food which was Publix party platters. We served ham & cheese roll ups and pizza roll ups. For the "Watering Hole" I made my
Sparkling Strawberry Punch and labeled small water bottles. I purchased lime green cups and made coordinating stickers for each cup. Each cup and water bottle had a place for guests to write their name so drinks weren't mixed up or discarded prematurely.
Finally, for desert, I made
strawberry cupcakes and vanilla cupcakes with cream cheese icing. I made the cupcake wrappers and toppers using my Silhouette Cameo.
When Elena caught a glimpse of the cake on the site where I got her cupcake recipe, she insisted on a "rose" cake for her party so that is what she got!
Keep checking back in the next couple of weeks...once I get my computer out of the shop, I hope to post some FREE dino party printables as well as my designs for cutting out the dinosaur feet and cupcake wrappers via your Silhouette Cameo!
FREE Silhouette Files:
