This and that..... and getting BIGGER by the day!

Hello Friends!
And a happy belated Valentine's Day to all of you.  My sweet little Valentine had a party at preschool and this mama was in charge of the treat bags.  I have to say, this is my favorite part about preschool!!!

My other two valentines are busy growing... and kicking!  I'm officially six months along now, and getting slower and bigger by the day.  The photo is from three weeks ago, but oh this tummy is certainly beginning to pop!

The only question that remains is... will I still be on my feet by the time my sweet has her third birthday in April???  I certainly hope so!  I have been totally inspired to throw a Cookie Monster themed birthday party for my girl.  This blog offered up some fabulous ideas!!!!!  I am praying that I can pull it off.  How adorable would this be?!  All images below are courtesy of www.hostessblog.com

Me want cookies! And you will too after checking out this adorable Cookie Monster-themed Real Party thatStephanie Stach created for her son Alex’s 3rd birthday.

From adorable cups, party hats, and cupcakes inspired by our favorite sugar-loving monster to cookie-jar favors and giant cookies on sticks, this party is loaded with tons of sweet & super creative details!

Read on for all the details, as told by Stephanie…

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“I saw the adorable cookie monster cupcakes on HWTM, and immediately knew that it would be the perfect theme for our son Alex’s third birthday.  It was so much fun to use the inspiration board as a starting point and build a party around it.

To make things easier to coordinate, I chose to go with many different shades of blue… it isn’t that easy to find the perfect cookie-monster blue!  I made blue pom-poms from Martha’s tutorial to hang over the buffet, found acookie monster pinata at the local Party City, and even found bright blue spider-mums at the local farmer’s market.

To add a little extra fun, I put the mums in a vase filled with Cookie-Krisp Cereal, and wrapped it in blue striped scrapbook paper.

I made cookie monster party hats that the kids loved by embellishing a basic blue hat with a felt mouth, googly eyes and a pom-pom and fuzzy boa (inspired found here).

For drinks, I made the Cooking Monster cups from the HWTM inspiration board by hot gluing cookies and googly eyes to blue paper cups.

The food was all chosen to resemble cookies… we had round cinnamon toast topped with cream cheese and bananas, sausage biscuits, blueberry scones, and mini pizzas on the main buffet; and a separate cookie buffet with oatmeal sandwich cookies, M&M cookies, chocolate crinkle cookies, triple chocolate cookies, and chocolate chip cookies on a stick.

The highlight was still the Cookie Monster cupcakes, which my local bakery, Sweet N’ Sinful, did a fabulous job of replicating.

For a craft activity, the kids each made a Cookie Monster paper bag puppet out of bright blue bags and white and black construction paper that I precut for them.  The bags were perfect for taking home their loot from the pinata.

For party favors, each child got a cookie jar filled with an assortment of cookies.

I found the jars at the dollar store, and embellished them with scrapbook paper, a pom-pom, and a tag that said “Alex’s Birthday was brought to you today by the letter A and the number 3.  Thanks for Celebrating with Us!”

It was a great party. Thanks so much for the inspiration!”

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