A Mary Poppin's birthday party

Come join us as we look back at Sienna's Jolly Holiday 3rd Birthday Party!

We celebrated Sienna's 3rd birthday 2 weekends ago and had the party at this wonderful train park in Scottsdale with an almost Mary worthy magical carousel and everything! The down side to the practically perfect location was having to get there at the crack of dawn to reserve your spot, so from the wee hours of the morning that I opened my eyes til the last guest was gone it was Step In Time!

So please pardon me for the picture quality here... hosting 3 year old birthdays in a park is a little crazy without even trying to take pictures, but I'd say if you love to laugh then keep on scrolling for some fun and goofy pictures, plus a few pretty good Mary Poppins theme party ideas if I do say so myself!

First there were costumes....

Mary Poppins (scandalously pregnant) and Jane

Despite the particularly warm, sunny day of 75, "Jane" stayed in costume all day and for, well, I do believe she still thinks she actually is Jane.

I don't think we helped by letting her call her brother Michael, although he was more interested in drinking his first CapriSun than dressing up like Mary Poppins characters.

In case you don't think I'm a bad enough mother for giving my 1 year old a CapriSun, I made sure that everyone else had spoons full of sugar to help the medicine go down.

Sienna actually helped me make these out of melted white chocolate and red sprinkles! Super easy and the kids LOVED them!

Next, what would a Mary Poppins' party be without umbrellas?

I found these PERFECT while umbrellas from the Oriental Trading Company that you can actually decorate yourself!

I had to admit that these didn't go exactly as planned... I wanted to make ruffles to sew along the bottom of each one like a real "Jane" umbrella would be out of a water-proof shower curtain, but you can't do every good idea you have I supposed! Even still, I think it's a nice token or tuppence for everyone to take home!

Don't worry the boys had fun at this ultra girlie fest too!


I laid out long strips of butcher paper I've been saving since I stopped teaching for just the right occasion, such as, needing long "side walks" for the kids to draw magical chalk pictures to jump into.

That, and the really cool real KITES (also from the Oriental Trading Company) that they got to decorate themselves too!!

Then after we decorated them....

You guessed it!!

Let's go fly a kite!


Up to the highest height!

And send it soaring!!

It's been a week since the party and the soundtrack only played through 2 or 3 times during the party, but I still find myself singing silently in my head all day :)


And finally, last, but not least...


We finished off the day with Funfetti Penguin cake for all!

It's supposed to be the Jolly Holiday penguins with the menu...

Don't laugh, it was the best I could do with limitations of frosting, food coloring and trying to involve a very excited almost 3 year old!


Sienna had been begging for a Mary Poppins theme party for months and months. When I couldn't persuade her to go for something like Strawberry Shortcake or a little easier, I started hunting all crafty corners I know for Mary Poppins theme party and ideas and was quite surprised by how little I could find online.

I did find this ADORABLE professionally photographed party that set the bar far higher than my highest kite would reach on a practical budget. But if you're looking to do a Poppins Party I recommend checking it out for some more fancy ideas...


Such as these scrumptious candied applies, but I decided our age group wasn't the best for something like that... or, adorable as it was the real tea set for that matter!


Now, truth be told, there was one other tiny little part for the party that got left behind, because I simply ran out of time! But I think it would've been so cute and easy that I just have to tell you about the cute little carpet bags I was sewing for all the party favors!! They just didn't get done in time... but can we still say it was the thought that counts??

All things considered I'd say the party was very supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!

I know it's Christmas, but this is one amazing halloween costume

Ok, ok, how can I bring up Halloween at a time like this?

Well, when you have a really good reason like my friend, Mary's untouchable talent you just have to give your hat tips whenever you can.

All of her siblings pick a theme each year for Halloween and assign each niece/nephew to a character. When they decided on Alice In Wonderland this year Mary knew the older kids would quickly scoop up the "easier" or more popular costumes, but what she didn't expect was that her little man was going to instantly set his heart on the Caterpillar of all things!

If coming up with a 3T size Caterpillar costume wasn't enough of a challenge imagine sewing it literally 9 months pregnant!

And then realizing you're just going to need another costume for the new arrival!

....and then, actually pulling it off with a week to spare between delivery and Halloween...

A.M.A.Z.I.N.G

Hop over to her blog to see more pictures of the rest of the cast and the adorable themed party decorations they had to go with it!

Hard hats required for this birthday zone

Our little man had his first birthday a few weeks ago and I couldn't think of a more fitting party theme than this!

Our house quickly became construction central with dump trucks, building blocks, tools, dirt and lots of hungry boys hanging around.

Wait, that doesn't sound too different than normal!

Ok, a little different from normal... unlike our normal construction zones, this Birthday Zone was specially made for little diggers 3 and under!

Even the birthday cake was a just like playing in the dirt!

Jonah blew out his first candles in the back of his dump truck filled with dirt cake!

Each kid even got their own mini trucks to dig around their cake with.

When we weren't covered in chocolatey dirt we were very busy constructing giant cardboard block towers.

Well... actually they weren't so gigantic after all.

It's no surprise really if Jonah thought it was this much fun knocking over little blocks...

We could've expected our big block towers never to rise much taller than this...


The kids still had fun and loved helping Jonah break in his new favorite toy from Aunt Dani...

You didn't, did you?!

You DID!!

Our little boy has his very own, very manly, QUAD!

Adorable.

Here's the yummy, super manly (but could also be girlie with a slightly different angle) Dirt Cake Recipe!

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
• 2 (3.5 ounce) packages instant french vanilla pudding mix
• 3 1/2 cups milk
• 1 (12 ounce) container frozen whipped topping, thawed
• 1 package of chocolate oreo cookies with creme filling

Directions

1. Smash, crumble or chop cookies into a small pieces. You can use a food processor or a meat mallet and a ziplock bag seem to do the trick :)
   
2. Mix the softened butter, cream cheese, and sugar in bowl until smooth.
3. In a separate large bowl mix milk and pudding. Incorporate as many of the pudding globs as possible before adding the whipped topping to the mixture.
4. Combine pudding mixture and cream mixture together.
5. Layer in a lined dump truck or flower pot starting with cookies then cream mixture. Repeat layers.
6. Chill until ready to serve.
7. Decorate with mini dump trucks, paper flowers, gummy worms, etc
   

Note: As with all cakes, they're not exactly easy on the diet, but the best secret I've discovered with this is that using fat free or low fat dairy ingredients doesn't really change the taste! I've been doing it for years and my husband has had no idea :)