Awesome party mom

I went to a friends party recently and she has the cutest ideas for parties. A bit of an ocd'er like me she is always googling to find great themes/ideas. Then I had a thought...she should showcase her wonderful ideas for parties/cake (she is a fab baker also) Nilch no go...so here are a few of her party ideas.

1. She threw a Wii themed party and replaced her family pix with mii characters. As a game she decorated around her fireplace a group of MII look alikes and you had to guess who they were. The highest won. THe grab bags were cardstock Wiimotes filled with goodies.

2. She threw a water themed party for her daughter. SHe had a series of cups (clear and 4 red plastic) taped to her coffee table with the 4 scattered around. THe kids threw ping pong balls and if they got the red...they won a betta fish. She had 4 betta fish in bowls decorated with some curly ribbon and marbles. Some decorations she made were from water bottles twisted in the shape of fish and tissue paper (these were so cute!!!) The kids craft of course was water theme also. Using mineral oil and colored kool-aid water (no sugar) they made little aquariums in small water bottles with lil fish beads and glitter inside. Another smart ltttle game you know those little fishy games that the kids fish for their color fish. Well she took all the fish and put them in a water/sand set and blindfolded the kids and gave them a net to go fishing..The person with the most fish wins...

Colored rice tubs

1. As a tie in to the crazy for pasta theme...I have been itching to try this with rice. A recent purchase of a 50 lb bag of rice and voila....we have colored rice. Now the how to.
   
   I took enough rice to cover a cookie sheet and poured rubbing alcohol on top just to get slightly wet. Then had my daughter place drops of color on the rice. Using a rubber spatula slowly stir together the rice to mix the coloring throughout. Towards the end we added a little more alcohol and set it out to dry. We did this 4 times for the different colors. When the rice is dry I took a small tupperware about 12 x 24 and filled it up with the rice. We will be rotating various goodies inside the rice for the kids to sift through the rice. Aside from being a great sensory tool, the kids have a blast. This week we have dinosaurs buried deep within and a few paintbrushes they become mini archeologists.

Bird watching

My kids aren't very intrigued when bird watching out in the wide open because they can't see them. But I found the greatest little site....Thanks to www.cookingwithmykid.com they had a great urban/rainy day solution. Using toilet paper/paper towel tubes. We made binoculars and wrapped them in construction paper then decorated them with stickers. My daughter tied ribbon around them knotted around a hole punch and secured with a rubber band. To keep the tubes together I placed a bobby pin in the center of the two tubes. On the above link she made some great bird printouts to stick throughout your house with a bird guide. Take them on an adventure they won't forget.