A's 12th Birthday Bird Party

 A painting her bird house.

I can't believe it but A is now 12 and has been for over a month!  Life has been pretty crazy with my latest pregnancy.  I have been feeling unwell most of the time and then I developed a posterior vitreous detachment in my left eye (it took awhile to diagnose) but the long and short is that I am okay.  I now have a retina specialist, who by the way is awesome!  I am slowly getting more energy but I always feel like I am ten things behind if that makes sense. 

A had a lovely themed bird birthday party at our house.  When she picked a bird theme I thought it might be difficult but it was fairly easy to put together and all the guests had a great time painting a miniature bird house.  Hope you enjoy the photos and ideas below.

We served cheese, crackers, fruit, goldfish, various chips, gummy worms, sunflower seeds, cookies, brownies and of course cake and ice cream!

 A's Bird Cake, A actually made the chocolate bird for the nest!

 Side view of the cake

Close up of bird and nest

singing and blowing out candles

 

A wanted to have a painting craft at her party.  We found super cute miniature bird houses at Michael's for only $1/ea.  They had lots of cute designs to choose from.  We also picked up some small wooden birds for the littler kids to paint.

 Our painting table set-up for the party.

Here you can see the paint and brushes as well.

 D loved making a bird house.

Painting Fun

I loved watching all the kids paint.  It is so fun for me to see creativity in action and this was a fabulous activity for watching that happen.  I was able to take photos of several of the bird houses.  I love the variety and diversity.

 blue and yellow house

 sparkle house

 green and yellow house (complete with birdseed)

 multi-color house

 several houses

A had a bigger house to decorate.

If you have a birthday party coming up and you need a theme, consider birds!  There is a lot you can do with it and the kids will have a great time.  I also like that this theme will work for a variety of ages including tween!

Bird Theme Baby Shower

Here are the hostesses and the guest of honor (in black).  This could also be an 18 week photo of me.

I told you about the bird cages I made but I didn't show you photos of some of the other decorations or food so here you go.  My friends and I had a lot of fun planning it and I am very pleased with how everything turned out!

David made an Italian Cream Cake

The food spread!

I made the two small bird diaper cakes on the table there, my first ever!  It was pretty fun to come up with my own idea too :).

 My friend Jenn is the cookie master.  Look at some of her creations.

Check out these super cute nests my friend Mellissa made as favors!

If you are planning a bird themed party anytime soon there are truly so many different things you can do.  As it turns out, it is a pretty easy theme to work with.

DIY Bird Cages for Bird Themed Baby Shower or Party

I helped co-host a baby shower over the weekend and it was so much fun.  My friend is having her third little girl this October and the theme was birds.  You can do a lot with that!  I made some bird cage lanterns inspired from the Bride's Cafe.  I did make a few changes.  Hope you enjoy this tutorial.

 Scrapbook paper I picked out.  

Our main two colors were pink and green and I wanted to mix in a few fun designs as well.  Really, there are tons of options here.

 Other supplies needed.  

I chose a golden textured scrapbook paper to make the cage.  You will also need scissors, hole punch, thread, double sided tape, brads, ruler, birds (find a template and cut them out) and I used coasters for the base (I had to tape two together because I needed more width but I liked the look better than using ice cream pint lids).

Cut strips

Cut a strip of colored scrapbook paper 1.5 inches wide.  I had to cut two strips and tape a bit of the second strip to the first to go all the way around the cage.  Take your golden paper and cut four strips slightly less than .5 inch (when you fold them over your four strips will seem like 8).

Find the centers of the strips and hole punch them.

I made a small hole in the bird, tied thread on it and put it through the strips.  I secured everything together with a brad.

Tape two coasters together and then place double sided tape all along the sides.

Attach the strips to the tape and then secure your colored scrapbook paper along the sides and voila - finished bird cage!

 We attached them to a baby banner.

 Poof balls and bird cage display

 And another type of banner

As you can see, you can get really creative with what you do with these cages.  If you make these please let me know what you do.