Mother's Day with Stampin' Up!

For me, Mother's Day is a day to give thanks to a special lady in your life who is caring and nurturing, usually this is your birth mum, but often it can be a carer or foster mum.  I decided to donate Mother's Day cards to the school just down the road and with that decided to ask a few Mum's to help me assemble them.  I created the cards in three layouts, one with colour and butterflies, a white card with hearts and a beautiful tree of colour - the tree being from Stampin' Up! Sheltering Tree stamp set.  These are our creations...

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! Papillion Potpourri with sponging over the Hex Hive thinlit die I used as a mask for the background

The first was Papillion Potpourri and Sponging over a honey comb mask in colours of Perfect Plumb, Melon Mambo...  

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! Papillion Potpourri with sponging over masked background

The layered butterfly using Stampin' Up! Bitty Butterfly and Elegant Butterfly punches...

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! Papillion Potpourri with sponging over masked background

The second layout was simple and used an embossed piece on a backing of Whisper White  and a line of hearts...

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! embossing folders and small heart punch

More, more, more, together we made over 150 cards...

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! embossing folders and small heart punch

The third layout used the stamp Sheltering Tree, LOVE THIS SET, and love that we can colour the tree to anything we like...

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! Sheltering Tree

 The majority of the cards were not dressed but I snuck a few with hearts and bows...

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! Sheltering Tree

 From a different angle...

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! 

I thought they looked cute... the tree was double stamped in Melon Mambo and Rich Razzleberry...

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! Sheltering Tree

This was so lovely, I ran a class just before Mother's Day for my lovely A Crafty Cats.  So check out the next post to see what we made.

Yours in paper craft,

Trifold Card x Heather Baker

Trifold cards have so much dimension and are fun to decorate.  Heather Baker created this stunning trifold card with retired Stampin' Up! DSP, Old Olive and Island Indigo card stock

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! Trifold card x Heather Baker

 The card features fussy cut flowers from the DSP coated with a tickle of Shimmer paint...

A Crafty Cat: Stampin' Up! Trifold card x Heather Baker

For a You Tube video instruction visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeaG4wvdZbw
and see how TheMadStamper creates them.  I have a template so if you would like to create a card with me, please call me and we can organise a class, workshop or one on one, just contact me.

Yours in paper craft,

Disney Planes Birthday Party: the activities and games

Disney Planes was the theme for my son's 5th Birthday party. The activities started as they fronted up to the gate which was transformed into a checking in area. From the entry where the passports were checked off, through a magnetic detector, the children then got to fly down a runway in El Chupacabra.

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the entrance

 There was even a Dusty for those that wanted to fly the high sky and not sit and do the activities...

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the entrance

The activity tables were full of activities sourced off SKGaleana, the kids coloured, dot-to-dotted their way as they awaited the arrival of all of their friends...  These activities were great so a big thank you to SKGaleana.

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the activity area

 These fold up camping tables are great...I love watching children working together.

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the activity area

Once everyone arrived, the children were tasked to build a glider and then fly them...These are available from Birthday in a Box.


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the glider building

The children lined up in three lines and threw their gliders towards the target hoops...look at the concentration and assessment of some of the children...

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the glider throwing

All of the children had their photo taken against the licencing board once they had enough flying...

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the licencing board

...but in order to be a pilot and get a photo, they had to dress up!...The shirt was purchased from Trade Secret and the Pilots outfit was purchased from The Party Hut Toowoomba.  The sunnies were purchased from a local sunglasses place...they took some hunting down!

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the licencing dress up

And this is what the little guys looked like - this was sooo cool...and ensured we got at least one great shot of every child that attended.

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the licence

 From licencing to a test of skill, balancing skill that is...the dusty plane was printed from 30minute crafts and although a flash light cover, we adapted it a little and added a propeller from North Phoenix Mums blog.  Thanks Rach.

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the dressed spoons for the egg and spoon / pilot and plane race.

 The children were each given a boiled egg they had to draw on to create their own pilot...


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the dressed spoons for the egg and spoon / pilot and plane race.

 The eggs/pilots were placed on the spoons/planes...


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the dressed spoons for the egg and spoon / pilot and plane race.

The children lined up...and walked toward me to establish a winner - this however was too easy so we went to a run - Oh My Gosh you should have heard the squealing and laughter then!  This was accomplished in record time LOL.


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; the dressed spoons for the egg and spoon / pilot and plane race.

Skills were then tested with blind accuracy :-) as the children tried to place a propeller on Dusty's nose cone - there was a lot of cheating going on...heads were tilted, eyes were open, glasses were moved on the nose, was so funny...  This great idea came from Pinterest!


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; Pin the propeller on Dusty

This is the picture of Dusty I printed and had laminated. I printed and cut out the propellers and dressed glasses using the printable from North Phoenix Mums blog.  Thanks Rach, I stuck the glasses eyes on the glasses and cut out the propellers and put a dimensional/foam pop dot on the back. I just had to remove the backing for each child when it was their turn......

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party; Pin the propeller on Dusty

After this, a group photo was taken as we organised ourselves for the cake.  So stay posted for the Disney Planes Birthday Cake.

Embracing Birthday celebrations,

Disney Planes - The Food: Server two

Today's post showcases one of the servers of Disney Planes themed food for my son's 5th Birthday Celebration.  The buffet style table was covered in pale blue and set upon it was two 3 tier servers and 2 cake stands, along with chip buckets filled with popcorn clouds and for the adults little dippers.  This is the table before the food came out.

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - The table setting

The Fruit sticks were made into planes - the strawberry was the nose cone, the body the banana and the tail fin - apple or grapes in two directions - great tails.

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Fruit Stick Planes

 This was the remainder of the fruit to make little planes.  I cannot believe how popular these were.


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Fruit Stick Planes

A dozen croissant planes - a banana in a lightly toasted croissant.  Simple and loved by the adults.

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Croissant Planes

The cloud biscuits were the Gluten Free short bread biscuit recipe...the cookie dough was refrigerated for 5 minutes and then the clouds cut out with my clouds cookie cutter from Cakes Around Town Australia (Darra Qld)


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Cloud Biscuits

 Some were not iced...


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Cloud Biscuits

 and some were with butter icing...


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Cloud Biscuits

Check out my pinterest page for lots of FOOD recipes and Disney Planes party ideas.  See you at the next post...

Disney Planes - The Food: Server one

On two 3 tier stairs, I placed the Disney Planes themed food for the adults and children.  The Table was dressed in pale blue with buckets of popcorn, little dippers, the serviettes and plates as seen in the last post. 

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party

Plane tyres topped the server...This was our ever popular Gluten Free Macadamia Nut Brownie.  This recipe was featured at our Dinosaur party as the Fossil Slice.  The recipe is on that post and a slightly adapted recipe is as per below...


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party

Gluten Free Chocolate Macadamia Brownie
Ingredients
200+ grams of Dark Chocolate
180g Organic Butter
1/3 cup rice milk
1 cup Gluten Free Self Raising Flour
1/2 cup Almond meal
1 cup Rapadura or brown sugar
1/2 cup Organic Cacao
1+ cup chopped up Organic Macadamia Nuts - the fresher the better
3 Organic eggs lightly beaten
Optional 1/8 to 1/4 tps Gluten Free Baking powder but a must if you only have GF Plain Flour.

Method
Melt Dark chocolate and butter in a double boiler
In a separate bowl add flour, baking powder, sugar, nut meal, cacao and macadamia nuts in a bowl and mix well.
Add to this dry mix, the eggs, milk and then the chocolate mixture.  Fold ingredients together until well combined. 
Pour into greased and lined cake tin/slice tin.
Bake at 140-160oC in fan forced oven for 40 minutes.
Cool and then cut out tyres with cookie cutters

If you use SR flour, it rises quite considerably - if you use Plain flour with the baking powder there is not as much rise (enough though for the tyres above!)
Place the rings in the centre to act as wheel centres...


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party

Pigs in Planes
This was fun but not a food for Ben, in fact a little nibble and his comment was "disgusting" LOL. No recipe here just saveloys and pastry squares cut into four squares.

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Pigs in Planes

 Ben helped wrap the little sausages in the pastry and together we made different planes.


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Pigs in Planes

 A dash of egg...


A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Pigs in Planes

  Daddy cooked these for our little guests and yes they were a hit too

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Pigs in Planes

The children flew the planes and those rings/tyre centres from Character Parties Qld were worn by every child....Looking good gorgeous...

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Pigs in Planes

Clouds and plane shaped Gluten Free shortbread biscuits and they were a huge hit disappearing before my eyes.  Again the cookie dough was rolled out, put in the freezer for 5 minutes and cut out with my plane cookie cutters purchased from Cakes Around Town at Durack.

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Pigs in Planes

These were a short bread biscuits with coloured butter icing on top...Thanks Elaine for your help with the icing!

A Crafty Cat: Disney Planes Birthday Party - Pigs in Planes

Enjoy planning your Planes themed birthday party!