Carter's Lego Star Wars party

Who knew Lego Star Wars would be so much fun to put together for a birthday party?!

Carter just turned six so I thought it would be a fun play on words to use the name of Darth Vader's order instead. 

Do note that you will be questioned your spelling skills if people are not familiar with Star Wars :)

Lego juice box covers (printed on colored paper) and light saber napkin ware. 

Click on the links to see the awesome parents who shared how you can print your own.

I printed out all the food tags just by coping and pasting a Lego photo I found online to a Word document and adding the text, super easy!

Droid mini water bottle labels

Blue and Red Kool-aide

 It was all fun until there was a problem... Darth Vader took the birthday candle!!!

We then had to go on a scavenger hunt to find him and rescue the candle!

We had to travel thru space and collect galaxies (bouncy balls) and asteroids (Pop Rocks) that were hidden.

Next we encountered storm troopers to battle with our light sabers (pool noodles with duck and electrical tape handles)

Carter helped draw some pictures and we printed off the rest and attached them to cardboard boxes.  Feel free to wrap the paper all around the box if it's a diaper one so there's no battling a baby :)



*Side note*  I did see online that you can put a glow stick in the middle of the noodle for it to light up at night, didn't try it myself but sounds awesome!

Then we used the Force to locate Darth Vader (my dad was a good sport on such a hot day) and got the candle back!

They got energy out on a piñata with their light sabers

Then each Jedi received a Jedi Knight Certificate from Yoda and Lego candy as a favor

 May the force be with you!

Girly Baptism fun!

May God richly bless you
As you take this step of faith,
Being baptized in His name
And to walk within His grace
So you may always carry
The light of Jesus love
To those who may not have
Faith in God above.

© By M.S.Lowndes

Can I just say that I had a blast actually doing girly things!  Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy playing soccer and digging the mud with the boys, but frills and bows get me weak at the knees! 

I saw the idea of barefoot sandals on Pinterest and couldn't wait to make a pair for Cassidy, the late summer was nice enough for dresses but not cool enough for tights, so I thought making these would help keep her little socks on and boy do they do the trick!

I made my first pair white as it's a neutral color, but as soon as she put them on I knew they had to be worn for her baptism!  Who needs $20 booties that will never be worn again, verses $2.00 sandals I can reuse!  Each flower was $.80 and the elastic was $1 for 2yards- super cheap!  So then of course she needed a headband to match, as I'm sure she won't keep the bonnet on all day!

The christening gown was truly adorable, it reminded me of the lace detail I had at the bottom of my wedding gown.  My Mom offered to buy her gown but a fun trip to the Mall revealed there are no real options in-store, christening gowns are all online.  So after some research I found a website that was reasonably priced and had better options than Macy's- http://www.pinkprincess.com/christening--girls-christening.html , and fell in love with a dress called Sophia.  But come to find out after a Google search Walmart online had the same dress $20 less!

 

 

Then came my favorite part, reception planning!  For the cake I knew I wanted to use the cross cake pan I had from the boys Baptism but this time cover it with flowers.

 

 

But the longest process were the Christening gown cookie favors.  Three days of non stop baking and decorating, my first time using royal icing, home with all 3 kids by my self, talk about a labor of love!  No wonder these kinds of things sell for $40/dozen on esty.com!  But do have to say that even though I did most of them at midnight, piping the dresses was super fun, I see other decorated cookies in my future.

 

 

Welcome to the faith Cassidy!

 

 

Baby Cassidy joins the wildflower family!

 

She came late but our new addition, Cassidy Jean, arrived July 25th at 12:35am!  She arrived in a hurry, and thank goodness because she was all natural and I don't think I could have endured that pain if she took as long as the boys did at birth!

 

 Everyone is so excited to have a girl in family, I finally feel our family is complete (and yes, I'm thrilled to see pink in the house too), but I think no one is more excited than the two big brothers! 

 

They are always checking on her, singing to her, and there are limitless kisses and hugs every time she's in their presence.  Of course life doesn't stop when a newborn arrives and you have 2 older ones who need to get energy out so we've been quite busy until school starts, thankfully my recovery was quick.

 

She was an early smiler at a few weeks old and now at 3 months she's teething, reminds me a lot of Carter hitting early milestones when he was a baby.  She also has Carter's 'chipmunk cheeks' and nose, looking a baby pictures they look a lot alike.  So far she's petite and long, growing out of the length of sleepers before filling them out, reminding me of Gavin and how tall he always was, and still is!  It's neat to see both of her brothers in her!

 

Cassie and I have some one-on-one time while the boys are in school which is nice because boy oh boy does it get busy once they get home at 4pm.  I can't believe how much homework Gavin brings home in 1st grade already.  Thankfully Carter doesn't have much in Kindergarten but helping them both with trying to tend to a baby was pretty trying the first few weeks.  Now we're on a routine and she recognizes the bus, is all smiles when her brothers come home and most days watches them contently while we talk about their day and do homework together. 

 

Can't wait to go thru the baby stages again and will truly soak up every moment this go-round.  I look forward to the many blessings she will bring and receive while with us... welcome little wildflower to our family!

 

 

Carter's pirate party invites

 

I am so behind on Carter's party, well not really as it's still 3 weeks away, but at this time I'm usually done the planning and making process.  Guess baby #3 is wearing me out more than I thought :)

I had been looking for neat message in a bottle invites for his pirate theme party and did come across a neat set at Oriental Trading, but found them too late as there was a week wait time to ship.  Craft stores only carried small ones for sand projects that wouldn't be big enough for even a 4z6 paper to go inside.  So I opted to dig up some old Scrapbook paper and make my own bottles on the fly.

Carter loves Jake from Disney Jr. so I used a picture of him I found on a napkin to make the bottle label, which looks much better for younger ones than the skull and bones theme now that I compare the two.

Can't wait for his party that's a Pirate Adventure Cruise on a real pirate ship!!!  No mess at home and an afternoon cruising around Annapolis Harbor, right up my alley this year!

What will baby Bee? Gender Reval Party!

This past weekend we had a gender reveal party for famiy and friends, what fun!  It was so much more special than calling or e-mailing everyone! 



 

It was an after dinner affair where we provided sweets and drinks but most of all we had cupcakes filled with either blue for a boy or pink for a girl.  Everyone could come dressed in the color they thought baby would be.

So glad the boys were involved with the decorations- they did awesome!

Honeycomb out of cut-out toilet paper rolls!

Super easy!

 

 

 

 No matter pink or blue, we can't wait to share the news!
 

 

Everyone chose a cupcake,

 

 

 

chose a pink or blue plate to make their guess,

 

and bit on the count of three to find the color....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...PINK!!!!!

We are on cloud nine and it was wonderful to share this news with all our friends and family!  Can't wait until July to finally welcome our little Girl!!!