Heather's 2nd Birthday!

Has it truly already come and gone! Is my sweet little baby already 2! I can't believe she is already a full blown toddler! For this party, I decided what I wanted it to be months ago. I found a rainbow layer cake on Pinterest and that's when I decided for it to be a rainbow theme party. I have loved making cakes for my family. I have been trying to find all sorts of occasions to practice my skills and techniques. I thought this would be the perfect cake to advance my technique. It wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be and it turned out great! I was very happy with the results. There was a ton of ideas on Pinterest for rainbow parties. I wanted to keep it simple and do as much and I could myself. I don't know why, but when I thinking about it months in advance it seems so easy! Really this was not a difficult party to put together, but the last week was a little stressful. I was happy to do it for my spunky 2 year old, Heather! Ryan and I decided to just have family and the neighborhood kids and keep it in the afternoon. So, I made the desserts and just had snacks. I saw a similar wreath on Etsy for $40 and I figured I could make one for less than that! The numbers are interchangeable so I can use this until Heather begs me not to! I have a Happy Birthday banner that I made a couple of years ago and I just change out the center to reflect the birthday we are celebrating. This was Heather's center for this birthday! I found how to make these tissue poofs off of pinterest and I made 5 in different colors. Heather's bedazzaled birthday hat! There was a funny behind-the-scenes story for this party, although I didn't think it was funny at the time! So, about 3 hours before the party. Everything seems to be going smoothly and I was beginning to relax and realize this was going to be a fun party! That's when the power went out! Ryan and Brooke were outside getting ready to head to the lake for a little fishing. I poked my head out the garage door and told Ryan the power just went out. He said he thought he heard a loud bang and went hunting in our backyard for answers. He found a fried squirrel. A dang squirrel had knocked out our power (and 3 other houses on our street)!! How random is that! My anxiety immediately went through the roof! I knew it was a Saturday and the electrical crew was slim on the weekends. I called the electric company immediately and was on hold for 20 minutes. I tried explaining to the dispatcher the urgency of this matter as we have a birthday party planned in 2.5 hrs! He didn't seem to be interested in that at all! I probably sounded a tad stressed! I decided to call my father-in-law, who has magical social skills and he was able to get the guy to tell him that the electrician was on his way, but they had to stop by the office and get the truck. Finally, 30 minutes later we see a truck in our neighborhood. They fiddled with the line in our back yard and then a few other spots in the neighborhood and with an hour to spare our electricity was turned on! I was so relieved and the party went on smoothly! Thankfully I didn't have much preparation that I needed the electricity for and I could do the rest with the sunlight coming in the windows! Heather had a blast at her party. We played a punch-the-hole game. I saw this on pinterest and it reminded me of the price is right game. I had the kids line up in order of birthdays starting with Heather's. Then they spun a wheel (from the high ho cherry o game) to see how many punches they got. I didn't realize when I was taping the bags on the back of the poster board that all the prizes had slipped down, so the bottom two rows was where all the good stuff was. The kids had fun once they got the hang of it. Next, on our game list was a musical star game. Kind of like the cake walk game. I played music and all the kids had to walk in a circle, when the music stopped they had to stand on a star. Then someone picked a color out of a bag and whoever was standing on that color star would win a prize. The kids absolutely love this game! I will probably do that one again at a future party! This is how I made the punch-the-hole game. First I started with poster boards and cut a bunch of holes in them. Then I placed candy or money on the holes and taped a cut paper sack to cover them. I'll have to remember to tape in between the sacks so all the prizes don't slip down when I stand it up, if I ever make this again! This is the final product! Next came cake time! I was nervous because I didn't know how my cake was going to turn out. It turned out great and Heather really enjoyed the icing. Cooking day!! I had set all the eggs, and butter on the counter to come to room temperature before I started baking the cake, 24 cupcakes, and 4 dozen cookies. Yes, that is 14 sticks of butter if you look closely! Dying the cake batter. I only had 2 9" round pans, so I had to bake the cakes in 3 different sessions. The iced cake! The cookies before decorating. The rest of the cookies not pictured were saved for Heather's school party! The dyed royal icing. This was my first time working with royal icing. It took me several attempts, but I think they turned out cute for her party. The cupcakes were the easiest thing to make. I got this idea off of pinterest! Party favors! Food Display Rainbow Fruit Cake and layered skittles with pinwheels Living room decorations Singing Happy Birthday to Heather! Sweet display After the first cut! Hooray, it looks like a rainbow! Birthday girl enjoying her cake! A better picture of the cake Brooke loves it! Heather saying, "I'm two!" Then on to presents! Heather's favorites. She had a few helpers helping her open, but she finally got the hang of it and enjoyed opening a few on her own.             Thanks for making my birthday so BRIGHT!!