Frugal Friday-Frugal Thank-You's

At my daughter's recent Angelina Ballerina Birthday Party, I took individual portraits of each of the 12 little ladies in front of our cream-colored curtain behind the couch.  All of them turned out fairly well and I was able to enhance them a little bit with our Kodak program and add some colorful borders to some of them at the Walmart photo site.  I wish I could have added text to the photo, but Walmart photo didn't have that option.  It would have been cute to write the child's name followed by Ballerina on their photo.

I plan to glue the photos to the front of a piece of folded cardstock for a sweet thank-you card for the nice gifts they brought for Ali.  The parents will enjoy seeing each of their lovely little ballerinas, and it will cost me merely a few bucks for the photos and cardstock.  A nice final touch for a fun occasion!

Kayci Ballerina

Lindsay Ballerina

Reagan Ballerina

Ali Ballerina

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Birthday Party Pics

Here are some pics for anyone who's been wondering how all of my planning and prep for the Angelina Birthday Party turned out!

Coloring Angelina pictures.  The girls were SOOOOO quiet! 

All of the moms who were there were amazed at how quiet they were.

 

The cake was delicious.  I was so glad I had made it 2 days early as

I was busy cleaning and getting ready for the party the morning of the party.

The ballerina balloon stomp was fun, but the girls weren't very agressive and had trouble breaking the balloons.  A pattern emerged: The sisters tended to break each other's balloons since they felt comfy getting rough with each other!

Everyone was attentive during the gift opening.  My mom, who teaches 2nd and 3rd graders, kept remarking that the girls were soooo quiet and well-behaved during the party.  I expected chaos with 12 little girls in a tiny house, but it was very controlled.  The more girls that left, the wilder things got.  Ali + 1 girl can be horrifyingly loud but Ali + 11 was great!

The whole group

This is what happens when you are the only boy left at home with 12 little ballerinas!  Daddy took Jer to the Children's Museum for the afternoon but Justus was "supposed to be" sleeping.  He loved the ribbon wands and kept examining the 800-bead beading kit she received, hoping to get into it, and he loved all the attention.

Angelina Ballerina Birthday Activities

Found these free coloring pages here.  Had 15 of each pic printed off at the local print shop for around $1.

I was originally planning to roll 2 sheets up for each girl, tie a tulle ribbon around them, and use them for party favors, but then I decided to do the other favors instead.  So, I plan to have the girls color them as part of the party activities.  When you have an 850 sq. ft. house and 12 little girls filling it up, you need a QUIET activity for them to do!

Since Ali got an Angelina DVD for her birthday, our plan is to show that to the girls as one of the activities. 

We will also be doing the ballerina stomp (tying a balloon to each girl's foot and having them dance around to ballerina music while trying to pop each other's balloons) and the typical cake and presents.  I don't want things to be too structured since it's fun for them to simply play together so they will have time to do dress-ups and play with dolls too.  I also plan to take a group pic with their wands and individual portraits of each guest dressed like a ballerina, which we print off and glue onto a card for their thank-you cards.

Birthday Decorations

I used some of the Angelina wrapping paper to make little place cards.  Instead of Angelina Ballerina, I will (Child's Name) Ballerina on them.  Example:  Fernanda Ballerina, Alathia Ballerina

A foil roll cut into pieces with a knife.  The placecards stand up nicely when taped to these.

Had a lot of extra tulle from the tutu so I covered the window with a big piece of purple (it's hard to see) but then pinned little pictures of Angelina to the tulle.  I found an Angelina book at the Bargain Book Basement at the local library while shopping there a month ago and it was half-filled with pen markings.  So, I cut the non-marked up pictures out of it to use as party decorations.  I have some more little pictures that I could tape to the pink cups or the doilies or the favor bags.

Extra tulle put to work

My favorite decoration--an Ali Garland! 
I used the same picture I used for the invites and had the local print shop copy it onto pink cardstock for me.  I had them do 13.  Then I cut them out with scrapbooking scissors, punched a hole in the top and ran tulle from the Dollar Tree (wedding section) through them.  A beautiful dcoration for the living room, and one we will save in her box of special childhood things.  Total cost was around $3.

The Dollar Tree is a Mom's best friend!  $6 for all of these party supplies!

I had these doilies in the craft box.  They will be nice on the pink tablecloth or under the cups.

Other Decoration Ideas:

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  We have an Angelina mylar balloon
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  We plan to use her ballet costumes from the dress-up bin to hang around the house for added ballerina flair
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  Ballet shoes hung up
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  Ballerina books set up for display on shelves or tables
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  Wispy scarves or ribbons
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  Pink balloons tied to the chair backs (which we'll then use for the ballerina stomp at the end of the party)

She Likes the Tutu!

Angelina Cake

My first plan was to make a laminated picture to simply stick on the cake.  You can buy frosting cake toppers of characters but I didn't want to pay $10 for one online.  This was only about 50 cents to laminate at the local printshop.  However, I was thinking "mouse" when I colored it and forgot Angelina is white!  FAIL!  When my friend Tina suggested I trace a coloring page on wax paper with frosting to make an Angelina topper, I was excited to try it!  The laminated picture was demoted to front door decoration.

Here is my friend Tina's cake, which she did several years ago for one of her 5 lovely daughters.

All that I had on hand was whipped frosting (store bought) so it made a bit of a gooey mess but here is the final result of tracing a coloring page.  I thought I was supposed to freeze it to make it hard so that it would scrape off.  It turns out I should have just traced the outline of her, dumped it straight onto the cake and filled in the outline with other colors.  That's how Tina did it.

Instead I tried in vain to scrape the frozen Angelina from the wax paper with a metal spatula.  The legs, head and tail came off.  The body and tutu were a jumbled mess.

Here's my attempt at using decorator gel tube frostings to cover over the frozen whipped frosting Angelina.  I'm thankful the head and tail stayed intact because they were the cutest parts.

Here's what happens when you get halfway through your daughter's full first name only to realize it won't fit.  Should have stuck with her nickname!  I was out of pink base-colored frosting too!  Uh-oh!  FAIL!

Here is the solution to the problem.  Cover it over with MORE frosting!  I had thought about making a homemade batch of white buttercream to trim the cake with white lacy ridges but then I thought, "They don't need any more sugar!"  The cake is 2 9x13 layers, the bottom layer is strawberry cake, the top layer white.  I snipped a raisin apart with scissors to do the eyes and nose.

I did this cake two days before the party and have it in the fridge because I didn't want to be either melting down with stress on the day of the party or have a flop and no time to run to the store and get stuff to fix it.  Preparation is my key to party success!

For more Friday Fails, visit sweet Myra's blog here.

Ballerina Birthday--Making a No-Sew Tutu

The nice thing about the ribbon tutus is that anyone can wear them.  Here I am modeling the tutu, since Ali won't open in until Thursday.

A fellow ballet mom shared with me how to make a ribbon tutu.  It took less than an hour (even though I had to cut my own strips since our Walmart doesn't sell the tiny rolls of tulle) and is so cute!  I love it!  I just need someone to give me some tips on how to keep it from getting wrinkled and squished up to smithereens since they definitely don't look cute like that (ask me how I know!)

You will need around 1.5 yards of ribbon and

5 yards of tulle

This will cost you around $6-$7 at Walmart.  Not bad for something so pretty that your little girl will LOVE!

Here's a great tutorial.  You can choose to use elastic (which is sewn together) or just use a thick and pretty ribbon, knotted at two points to hold the tulle loops on.  I went with ribbon since I've tried doing the elastic ones before.

Ballerina Birthday Gifts

I've already posted about one of Ali's gifts here, but here are some more! The most important part of throwing a successful birthday party is being prepared. I had the gifts picked out and completely wrapped 2-3 weeks before her birthday.

When I saw the Lightning Deal at Amazon, via Money Saving Mom, for this cake set before Christmas, I snatched it up immediately!  An hour later I went back to order another and they were already sold out.  This set, which is $20-$25 at a local store, was $8.  My kids play tea party and/or birthday party every day so I know they will LOVE this!!!

It's hard to find party stuff with Angelina on it in the USA although there is lots of it in the UK.  For this reason, I was excited to nab an Angelina package on ebay.  It was $12 including shipping and contained a mylar balloon, a card, wrapping paper, a silk Angelina ballet shoes backpack, and bracelet.  My little girl really gets into theme events so I was thrilled to be able to get her some Angelina stuff for her Angelina-themed party.  I also found a brand-new Angelina DVD for $2 (plus $3.50 shipping) on half.com

These gifts were from the Dollar Tree.  Pretty hairbows (something I just can't resist!)

and flashcards for school.

Inexpensive Party Favors!

Ali's favor bags include a heart-shaped candy ring (10 cents each at Family Dollar)

and a homemade tulle-covered ponytail  holder (around 10 cents for materials). 

Princess goody bags were $1 for 20 at the Dollar Store.

Each child will also receive a star ribbon wand to dance with

(since Angelina often dances with ribbon wands). 

I bought a stack of foam ($1 at Dollar Tree) and cut star shapes from the foam.

Ali happily painted the dowels pink for me

(while wearing a B-day hat from her dress-ups.) 

The dowels were 8 for $1 at Walmart.

After I hotglued the ribbon (from the Dollar Tree) between two stars with the dowel in the middle,

I painted the foam with glitter paint.  I could have saved myself this

step by using glitter foam in the first place, but oh well!

I estimate I spent 35 cents per birthday guest for some very cute favors!  Not bad!

The Dollar Tree is a party planners' favorite store!

More options for Ballerina Favors:

It was hard to choose favors because there were so many great options for little girls, but I'm happy with the ones we finally decided upon.  Other choices included:

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  Foam masques from Dollar Tree (let the girls decorate them with glitter, rhinestones, sequins, etc.)
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  Pretty hair ribbons from Family Dollar (they have roses on bobby pins, rose headbands, ribbons with silver stars, fluffy bows, etc.)
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  Homemade tutus (one of my creative friends suggested this great idea, but because of our social circles, we ended up needing to invite 12 girls and that was way too many for me to attempt, even if they are simple!)
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  Pink ballet shoe cookies
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  Tiaras or foam crowns
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  Wispy or silky scarves to dance with
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  Candy necklaces
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  Mouse ear headbands
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  Fancy photo of each guest in a tutu with a ribbon wand
• Angelina coloring pages printed off the computer for free!

 

Angelina Ballerina Birthday Invitations

I priced Angelina invites online and while there were some darling ones, custom-made by moms with Etsy shops or ebay stores, I didn't want to pay $1 per invite.  So, I designed my own using the coloring book feature on our Kodak program (that came with my camera).  I took a photo of Alathia at her ballet recital and made it into a coloring book page and added my own wording and a pic of Angelina I found online.  I then took it to the printshop and had 12 printed on pink cardstock for around $2.  I tied the card closed with tulle from the dollar store.  Pretty, but frugal, invitations!