Sesame Street Party – First Birthday Poster

Continuing in my series of posts about Nathan’s Sesame Street 1st Birthday Party, today I’m sharing the First Birthday Poster I made.

I loved the posters for sale on Etsy by MoulageCollection but at $52 they were way out of my price range. Instead I spent $1 on a piece of bristol board, used the expensive chalk version as inspiration and made my own with markers.

I started in the centre with “Nathan is ONE!” and then wrote around the outside about his favourites, his activities and his measurements. Basically I aimed to capture the essence of Nathan at 12 months old ;)

The last step was to dress it up by adding some doodling and then some Sesame Street chipboard characters to tie the poster to the theme. I hung it up in the living room and it was neat to see people stop and read it throughout the party. I hope I can remember that I want to make one of these every year!

Sesame Street Party – Balloon Birthday Wreath

If you’re a regular reader than you probably know that I’ve got a thing for wreaths. I’ve got one for pretty much every season and holiday. I hang them outside, inside, my Summer Paper Wreath hangs in my kitchen all year round. So when I started seeing variations of this balloon wreath all over Pinterest I knew I needed to make one for Nathan’s party.

 

It was so easy to make but had big impact and I got a lot of compliments. All you need for the basic concept is a Styrofoam wreath form, straight pins and balloons in your colour scheme. I went with 5 different colours and used just under 50 balloons in total. How many you need will depend on the size of your wreath form. Buy more than you think you’ll need because the end result is a lot better when the wreath is fuller.

All you need to do is start pinning the balloons to the wreath form with the straight pins. I tried to space out the colours evenly but I didn’t worry about a pattern as everything ends up overlapping. If you don’t like a section it’s easy to unpin and try again so don’t think too hard about it! Once I had all my balloons in place I pinned a loop of ribbon on to the back for hanging.

 

It was cute with just balloons but I decided it needed something else so I painted a wooden N that I had in my stash and attached the Sesame Street lamppost. I hot glued ribbon to the back and then pinned it to the back of the wreath.

All told this wreath took me less than an hour to make and cost less than $10. The bright primary colours fit the Sesame Street theme perfectly but they’re also just cheerful birthday colours so I’ll be able to use the wreath again next year just by removing the lamppost and replacing it with something to fit the next theme.

Still lots more Sesame Street Party posts to come!

Sesame Street Party – Baby Food Jar Favours

When I decided to make favours for Nathan’s 1st birthday I knew I needed to do something edible. I hate bringing home favours that just collect dust because you feel too guilty to throw them out. I even made edible favours for our wedding. I had acquired a bunch of baby food jars last fall for a project I never got around to making and decided favours would be a perfect use for them.

To make the labels I had Nathan scribble all over white paper and then I cut it into strips to wrap around each jar. I wrote “Thanks for coming! Love Nathan” on each one before I glued them on. For toppers I used cupcake liners. The regular sized ones fit perfectly over a baby food jar lid but I had to cut the top halves off so they didn’t cover the writing on the labels. I attached them to the lids with a glue stick.

To fill the jars – the actual favour part – I used mini M&Ms and sour jelly beans. The bright colours matched the party theme perfectly.

The favours were a hit and I’m sure the candy was enjoyed not long after it left the house. Hopefully all the jars made it to the recycling bin ;)

More Sesame Street Party posts to come so be sure to check back!

Sesame Street Party – Invitations (with Template!)

Earlier this week I posted about my son’s Sesame Street 1st Birthday Party with the promise that I’d be blogging about all the projects I made for it. I figured first things first – we have to start with the invitations.

I started with the image of the gang from Sesame Street. I don’t have a proper credit for it as it seems to be floating around on a lot of blogs and parenting sites but I found it on Google Images. I’m sure it probably originated with Sesame Street. I used a photo editing program to add the multi-coloured circles and text and done! I somehow managed to forget a picture of the finished product but I printed them 4 to a page and then backed each with colourful card stock. It was a pretty simple invite but I didn’t want to spend a lot of money on something that people were probably just going to throw out not long after receiving it. And I think they turned out pretty cute :)

If you like them too maybe you’d like to make your own! Click on the image below to get a copy of the template – all you need to do is add your text and print them out!

Lots more Sesame Street Birthday posts coming up so be sure to check back!

Sesame Street 1st Birthday Party!

Hello! Yes, I’m still here and I’m sorry my posting has been so sporadic lately. Being back to work and figuring out our new family schedule has been tough and the blog has had to take a backseat despite the fact that I’ve got lots of great stuff to share with you. Well I’m hoping to correct that now but introducing a series of posts about my son’s first birthday party. We went with a Sesame Street theme – he loves the characters and I loved working in all the bright primary colours. Over the next week or two (I’m trying not to over commit myself here!) I’ll be posting about everything you see here – and maybe a few more things I couldn’t fit in the collage!

 

I’ll come back here after each post to add a link so it’ll be easy to find everything. Here’s a partial list of the projects I’ll be writing about:

• Sesame Street Invite
• Baby Food Jar Favours
• 12 Month Summary Bristol Board
• Heart Garland
• Sesame Street Pennant Garland
• Mason Jar Decor
• “Framed” Guest Photos
• Tissue Paper Pom Poms
• Balloon Wreath
• Photo Garland
• Table Decor

Hope you’ll come back to see all of the posts!

Guest Post - Pork Chops with Apple & Onion Relish

Happy Sunday! Is your weekend flying by too? If you still haven’t found the time to plan for dinner then check out this recipe from One Hungry Dude!

I love the flavour combination of pork and apples. There's just something about the tartness and sweetness of apples and brown sugar that compliments the saltiness of the pork so well. This is an easy recipe that requires a few staple ingredients.

 
Ingredients
• 4 Tbsp Olive Oil
• 4 Tbsp Margarine
• 4 Granny Smith Apples, thinly sliced
• 2 Yellow Onions, thinly sliced
• 4 Cloves Garlic, diced
• Zest and Juice from 1/2 Lemon
• 4 Tsp Rosemary
• 4 Tsp Brown Sugar
• Salt and Pepper, to taste
• 4 Pork Chops, with bone

In a large frying pan on the stovetop, heat the olive oil and margarine over medium.   Add the apple and onion, cooking for about four to five minutes. Add the garlic, and cook for another three to four minutes. Reduce heat by about half, add the lemon, rosemary, brown sugar, salt and pepper, and cover. Sweat the relish for about 30 minutes, stirring often, to ensure it doesn't stick to the pan. Once the mixture is soft, and the onions appear translucent, you can reduce the heat to a simmer.

While the relish is sweating, preheat another large frying pan over medium-high. Season the pork chops with salt and pepper, then place in the second frying pan, searing each side for two to three minutes. Reduce the heat to about medium, and cook until done. Allow the pork to rest for about four or five minutes, then top with the relish. Garnish with parsley and serve.

By the Batch – Strawberry Napoleons

I’m finding fresh produce to be very expensive this winter. With a one year old who loves his fruits and veggies we’re spending a fortune at the grocery store every week so I’ve started basing my purchases on what’s on sale. A few weeks ago our local store had three cartons of strawberries on for $5 so I jumped all over that. I sliced up a bunch and froze them and I made a huge batch of Toddler Smoothies but I still had a ton of strawberries leftover. Chris loves strawberry desserts so I did a quick Pinterest search and found an Easy Strawberry Napoleon Recipe from Six Sisters’ Stuff. We had puffed pastry in the freezer leftover from when Chris made Beef Wellington so I gave it a try. Turns out it actually was really easy and Chris loved them! I’ve altered the directions mostly based on the fact that my pastry was the type you roll out.

Ingredients

• 1 roll (half of a 450 gram package) frozen puff pastry
• 1 box instant vanilla pudding mix
• 1 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon almond extract
• 1 cup Cool Whip
• 2 cups hulled and sliced strawberries
• Icing sugar, for garnish

Directions

• Heat oven to 400 degrees. Thaw pastry according to directions on the box - I left mine in the refrigerator over night. Roll out pastry until you have a rectangle that’s about 1/8 of an inch thick. Make two cuts across the long part of the rectangle so you have three equally sized strips. Then cut each of those strips in half on the short part. Space the 6 resulting pieces on a baking sheet. Bake on the middle rack for 15 minutes or until golden. Place on a rack to cool.
• Meanwhile, in a bowl, whisk pudding mix, milk, and extract for 2 minutes; fold in Cool Whip and blend thoroughly. Cover and refrigerate.
• Carefully split each piece of pastry in half horizontally. Cover bottom halves with pudding mixture and then sliced strawberries, dividing equally. Cover with pastry tops. Dust with icing sugar.

I don’t like strawberries – weird I know – but Chris loved these. I loved that they were incredibly easy to make and the only thing I had to buy was almond extract. I would definitely make these again but will wait until we’re having people over for dinner as the pastry got very soggy before Chris could get through the whole batch on his own.