Flower Fairy Party

My daughter turned three this month and it was time to try some new projects for her party. Since she tries to pick every flower she sees, we decided on a flower fairy theme.

The entire party took place outside where we played fairy games, barbequed, and ate out dessert on blankets in the shade.

Invitations:

I found a very creative idea for invitations here and tried it out.

There's a tutorial on Martha Stewart's website that explains how to cut out these flowers using tissue paper. I used more layers to make them thicker and after a few tries, I got the look I wanted. I hooked one end of a pipe cleaner and pulled it through the flower and wrapped the "stem" with floral tape I found at JoAnne's.

My daughter had a hard time giving these up when we delivered them to her friends,
so I made a few extra for her to keep. They make cute decorations for the party if you put them into bouquets, make flower fairy crowns (by linking the pipe cleaners together), or hats.

Pinata:
I decided it was finally time to tackle a paper mache project and make my own pinata.
(Read this post for details.)
Once again, I was inspired by Brooke Reynolds and made my pinata into a flower.



I didn't follow the instructions which suggested wrapping the string around the pinata during the paper mache process for extra reinforcement. My husband came up with a crafty solution described in my pinata post. It's not the prettiest, but it survived a couple beatings before breaking open.

Treats:
Cupcakes are one of my favorite things to bake and decorate.
This flower cupcake idea is now a favorite of mine.




I used Dum-dums instead of those nifty old-fashioned lollipops the Martha Stewart clan use; I couldn't find them anywhere. I also used Airheads for the leaves which worked perfectly.
So cute and very yummy.

For the birthday cake, I used my smallest ceramic mixing bowl to bake a small round cake.


I found my daughter's favorite fairy in miniature size at Walmart for $5, wrapped her bottom half in Saran wrap, and stuck her in the middle of the cake.

Then I frosted her "dress" with a light blue frosting and added some pre-fab frosting flowers I found at JoAnne's.



The first thing my daughter wanted to do was rescue her favorite fairy from all that frosting! She didn't let go of her for the rest of the day
(until she accidentally dropped her into the toilet that night).

Decorations:
I saw this idea on TV and thought it might work for a birthday banner. You use coffee filters and you can spray paint them or decorate them however you want. I used one of my small vials of "fairy dust" and made a ring around each die cut letter (mine had sticky backs).
Instead of messing with string, I hot glued them to my fence!


(I would tell you that they pull right off and you can keep them, but I just realized that they are still outside, glued to my fence. Oops.)



I placed my "Fairy Princess" letters above the face painting table on the deck.


I asked a young woman in my neighborhood to come and face paint, which helped give the kids something to do between games or when they were done with their food.

Games:
I printed pictures of various flower fairies from the official Flower Fairy website and had a very patient gentleman at FedEx make them big enough for little ones to spot them around our yard.
Then we had a fairy hunt!



We also played "Fairy, Fairy, Troll" (instead of Duck, Duck, Goose)
and played with balloons, trying to keep them off the ground as long as possible.
At the end of the party, everyone got a fairy wand or whistle (for the few boys)
and a vial of fairy dust.




For the adults, we brought out our Bag-o (or Corn hole) game my husband made last year.
If you or your husband is handy, it's worth making this game yourself. It's addicting!

Please share your birthday party ideas with me!