A Place for Everything and Everything in its Place!

I'm OCD, we all know this... I have issues with having to have order in almost everything I do... I also have a husband who... I swear takes joy in seeing just how red my face will turn when he makes a sandwich in the kitchen I just cleaned and leaves it a disaster... bread crumbs on the counter, mayo on the cutting board, spinach dropped on the floor... OY!! he does it on purpose I'm sure of it! and after he cooks... OMG it looks like a bomb went off in there! But the food is AMAZING, he is one hell of a cook :) so I smile and enjoy my DELISH meal and go clean it up later... but seriously babe HOW in the heck DO you get spaghetti sauce on the ceiling!?  Anyhoo back to me and my issues lol.

Do you have to have order with your little one's toys?

I do, everything has a place and everything should be in its place!

For a while my husband convinced me to just let them have all their toys in big toys boxes commingling with each other, it was a DISASTER!  For one thing they could never find anything they wanted to play with because everything was just one big mess and because it was all just a huge mess that was how it always got left, things got lost, things got broken and after a while I finally said we are going back to doing things my way.  My way is: A bucket or container for each and every different type of toy with a label on the front to let them know what goes in there.  My husband was convinced I was saddling the kids with my OCD issues by making them clean up and sort their toys in this manner, that was why he just wanted a big toy box "let them be kids!" he said... "Kids make messes" he says...  Um, I don't think teaching your kids to be organized is "saddling them with OCD" but whatever...
 
I do realize that I take it bit further than most might, rather than just a bucket or bin for action figures in general, I have specific ones for the different types:  Dragon Ball Z, Pokemon, Star Wars, Super Heroes, Ben Ten etc... but honestly the boys are not going to play with their Luke Skywalker and their Superman at the same time, so it makes perfect sense to me to have them in separate bins.  

I have had a problem for years, when it came to labels because often their collections would outgrow the containers they were in. So I would have to move them into bigger containers, or they would lose interest in something and it would get donated or sold at a garage sale and I'd have this bin with a label on it. Sometimes I'd just stick another one over it for whatever was in there now but after a while that starts to looks like garbage and the labels themselves start to peel and get all mucky.  I had bounced around the idea of laminating some labels like I had seen here and here but laminate sheets can get spendy and doesn't solve the problem of what to do when their interests change.

 One day I was cleaning out a drawer of my husband's old junk and I came across a pile of these little plastic sleeves:

And I thought... I can do SOMETHING with these, so I set them aside, and then as I was scraping an old label off a bin later that week I remembered them.  I Googled to see what the measurements of a baseball card are (2 1/2 x 3 1/2) and I got busy!! 

I have been putting pictures on the boys labels since they were babies so even though they are now 7 and 9 I can't help myself but to always Google for a cool pic of whatever toy it is and use that as the label.  I put it in my editing software and just told it to make the image the correct size.  Then I repeated for all the toys they have.  Printed them out and then cut them to size.  Then I had to get all the old labels off the darn bins... rubbing alcohol is your friend here squirt some on, let it sit, come back and then it should be a LOT less work to get the label and all the goop off.

If you don't already have some of these baseball card sleeve things laying around (ask your hubs he might have a stash somewhere) they are really cheap!  Like 100 for $1 and you can get them at any Comic book shop or hobby store.  The ones we had might have been a little more expensive as they had a black backing and not totally clear but I bet they were not that much more.  There are also some thicker really nice ones that are like 25 for about $3.00 if you want them to be really sturdy.



Run a bead of hot glue around the outside edges of the card holder and press onto the container.  Be careful not to touch the tip of your hot glue gun to the card holder because it will melt it.  Then slide your printed image into the sleeve and viola! Neat organized labels!  

But the BEST thing about these for me is that they are SO EASY TO CHANGE!!  NO MESS, no label goo... just slide out the printed image and slide in whatever new one you want to change it out with!

And... don't limit yourself to labeling toy boxes!  I have gone kind of crazy with them around the house.  I have them on the dishwasher:

 Just use those cheap free magnets you find all over  the place to hold them on!

I used a hole punch and zip ties to attach them to my kids catch-all baskets that I keep at the top of the stairs.

Hole punch and zip ties to label containers in the freezer.  Told ya... I kinda went crazy :)

Hey before you go, I wanted to share one other thing with you all today...  We read SO much around here, seriously PILES of books and we LOVE the library!  We check out so many books.  We always have a HUGE stack to carry up to the counter.  I have two library baskets in our house; one is filled with the books we need to read, and one is filled with the ones we have already read, that need to go back.  We have to go empty that basket about 2-3 times a week (of course we always bring home more too!) Anyway... I have found that checking out books from the library is a GREAT way to determine which books are worth buying and are destined to become favorites!  Two that we read this morning over breakfast that we just LOVED were Gingerbread Girl Goes Animal Crackers, which is about a bunch of CRAZY, WILD animal crackers on the loose



and Spoon, which is about a little spoon who thinks he is kinda dull and not cool like his pals the fork or chopsticks, but he learns that spoons are pretty awesome too!


I definitely think these are two that we will be purchasing to add to our personal library.  Check them out from your library and if you love them like we did we'd love to hear all about it!!

I am linking up over at:
Gluesticks

Jedi Training Academy - The Most Amazing Star Wars Birthday Party EVER!

I realize the title is a little self congratulatory, but those were the actual words out of my son's mouth "THE BEST MOST AMAZING PARTY EVER, MOM!!!"  So you can consider them more of a quote than a mom's bragging. 

My middle baby, Brandon, turned 7 a couple weeks ago.  He is Luke Skywalker, Yoda, Anakin, and Darth OBSESSED so naturally Star Wars was the theme he wanted for his birthday this year.  I went all out with the theme for him, but saying I went all out does NOT mean I broke the bank on this party.  I had been pinning like crazy to the Star Wars Party Board I made on Pinterest so I had no shortage of ideas of great ideas, some from others and some of my own.  I made a lot of the decorations, and used the plethora of Star Wars toys we had around the house for more decorations, made the invitations, jedi robes, lightsabers and all the food which, yes, aside from one infraction (sherbert) was all vegan.  This was an EPIC party and I can't wait to share all the details with you!!

*Disclaimer* this is a LONG post, it was a VERY labor intensive party I was EXHAUSTED after it was all said and done.  Grab a snack and a comfy chair and settle in, I'm ready to dish :)

First invites:
We have a LOT of family and friends that don't live anywhere near us so I always try to do an evite for all the parties for far away family and an actual physical invite for local and school friends.  The evite that I put together for this party was the best evite ever, in the history of evites!! Check it out:

Seriously cool right!?  Make your own here!

For the paper invites I made these:

They were crazy simple to make, just print on white paper and then glue onto black construction paper cut slightly larger.  Of course you could use cardstock and make them a little more "sturdy" but I didn't have enough black on hand and I had plenty of black construction paper.  I was totally happy with them the way they came out and Brandon thought they were the coolest invites ever, I even got compliments on them from several parents when they called to RSVP.   

All the invitations, ready to go out.  Between school, Scouts and neighborhood friends we sent out about 25 invites, and I think we ended up with around 12-15 kids.

Second Cupcakes:  In the week leading up to his party I was busy getting all the props and decorations ready and I made him 2 batches of these kick ass cupcakes, one to share with his class at school and one to share at Cub Scouts.

I played up the "Dark Side" vs. the "Light Side" by making Dark Side chocolate on chocolate cupcakes and sticking all of the Galactic Empire picks in them, and then Light Side white on white cupcakes and sticking all of the Rebel Alliance picks into them.  Then when we were passing them out in class or at Scouts I would ask in an ominous voice "Dark Side or Light Side, young padawan?"  It was a lot of fun and I was surprised at how many kids went over to The Dark Side but I think the yummy yummy smell of chocolate may have had something to do with that :) 

 
 The cupcake liners and picks are available at Williams and Sonoma 












Third props: Thanks to this pin from Pinterest I got the great idea to make simple pool noodle lightsabers for each of the kids.  We made them with  noodles from the Dollar Store (you'll get two sabers from each noodle so .50 cents each!), duct and electrical tape.  Head on over here for the simple step-by-step instructions.  My husband actually made them all one night while he was watching a movie, thanks Babe!  After I took the photo I found a pink and a purple noodle so I had him make up a few girly ones for the girls.  They were fantastic, the kids LOVED them, they got to have lightsaber battles and whack the crap out of each other and no one got hurt!  All the kids got to choose the one they wanted (they were all different) and then keep it to take home after the party.


Each guest got a padawan/jedi robe.  I had grand plans to make some REALLY awesome Jedi robes for the kids like these but once I realized how many kids we were expecting and how little time I had, those plans were soooo out the window.  In fact, I got so busy with decorations and food that I almost totally forgot about the robes, I ran out to Joanne's the night before the party and bought enough fabric to make a simple parka style garment with a lighter colored strip of fabric as a belt.  It took about a yard and a half for each one.  The kids all thought they were great and they got to keep these to take home as well. 

 I made a Certificate of Completion for each of the kids to prove that they graduated from training academy and were full fledged Jedi now.  After we were done with training, I wrote their names and the date on the certificates.  So each guest took home a lightsaber, Jedi robe and Jedi Training Certificate of Completion. 


 Fourth Decorations:  

As guests arrived they were greeted by "Stormtrooper" guards on the walk outside.

Once at the door Darth Maul let guests know they were DEFINITELY in the right place!

We made a few planets from the Star Wars Universe out of balloons and homemade papermache and then spray painted them to look like:

Dagobah
Coruscant
Hoth
Naboo
Endor
Tattooine
We even strung a few ships up with fishing line to be flying around in "space" between the planets.

More decorations and the Star Wars Origami Station I set up as a quiet activity center. This was to keep kids busy while everyone arrived and also to serve as an area that kids could go to to catch their breath should they get a little too over excited at the party which happened a few times, it worked great!

I just printed out some of the simpler Star Wars Origami instructions here: http://origamiyoda.wordpress.com/folding-your-own-origami-yoda-other-star-wars-papercraft/ and laid out paper and crayons. I just set out simple notebook paper instead of expensive origami paper, the kids didn't care at all and they were able to get more creative with their coloring (faces and features) on regular paper.

The Origami Station was inspired by the books by Tom Angleberger - The Strange Case of Origami Yoda, Darth Paper Strikes Back and the new one coming out this summer that we cannot wait for The Secret of the Fortune Wookie http://origamiyoda.wordpress.com/

If you have kids about my boys' ages (6-10ish) who love Star Wars and have to read for school or just love to read I HIGHLY recommend these books! They are engaging and hilarious!

That backdrop is just two cheap black tablecloths taped to the wall. They were .99 cents a piece and then I dotted on some white spray paint to make the stars. The whole thing took about 15 mins to make. The Star Wars logo was cut out of some yellow cardstock.  All of the decorations (aside from Darth Maul and the Happy Birthday banner) were handmade and low cost and it all came together amazingly, if I do say so myself! 

Darth Maul was the most expensive thing I bought for the party, he was $30 but Brandon LOVES him and he sure did allow us to get some AWESOME pics with the boys! Plus now he is being used as a decoration in his bedroom, and as a battering post for lightsaber battles.  He was $30 well spent!

This is how we kept the kids out of unauthorized areas, with so many kids and several areas in the house we didn't want kids in I thought this was the way to go

Next up Party Activities!

Station One:  Jedi Uniform, as the padawans arrived we suited them up!

Station Two:  Lightsaber training.  After the kids picked their weapons we lined them up for lightsaber training.  And then the Jedi Master (yours truly) ran them through all the lightsaber skills Jedi need to know.

 

 

 

Station Three:  Endurance.  We drew Stormtrooper faces on white balloons and then tied popsicle sticks in an X pattern to the bottom of the strings and fished them down through the gaps in the deck.  It worked out pretty well and looked really cool like an army of troopers, the wind tangled up the strings a few times but overall it was pretty cool and the kids had fun whacking them.

After everyone had their lightsaber skills we set them loose on the the Stormtrooper army.  The endurance test was to make it through the army, hit every one of the balloons as they ran a lap around the deck.    

Darth Vader (Daddy) made an appearance and challenged the padawans, once they had become Jedi he would return to fight them!


Defeated Stormtroopers fleeing from the young padawans!
Station Four:  Balance and Agility.  Jedi must be light on their feet!  This was the last challenge before they were awarded their Jedi Certificates.  For this challenge we strung a rope across the yard and tied a hula-hoop to it.  The padawans had to get a running start bounce off the trampoline, through the hoop and land on their feet.  Some of them had to do it a couple times but the kids surprised me and most of them were able to do it on their first try. 
The newly graduated JEDIs!



Vader showed his face again!!



The happiness on his face in this moment made every minute of the work I put into the party so worth it!



We took a photo with each guest posing with Darth Maul to be included with the thank you notes.  These are my two ferocious Jedi.  Birthday boy first, then his big brother, and baby sister as Princess Leia below that.






There were lightsaber battles going on all over the yard after the "official" activities had ended



Finally.... the FOOD
The Food... ah the food, I had sooo much fun with the food!!

We had:

Padawan Puffs: Popcorn
Ewok food: Pretzel sticks, animal crackers and cracker jacks
Vader veggies with Darth Dressing: Veggie platter with ranch
Han Solo in Carbonite - Han Solo action figure in jello!
Space Cake - Birthday Cake
Padme Pizza - Bagel Pizzas
Wookie Cookies - Chewbacca and chocolate chip cookies
Fett Fruit Salad - Fresh fruit salad
Bantha Blue Milk - Colored soy milk
Kenobi Ketchup
Mace Windu Mustard 

Jedi Juice - Grape Soda frozen into ice cubes and then fruit punch poured over them
Droid Dogs - Mini Corndogs
Millennium Mac n Cheese - Macaroni and Cheese
Twin Twisters - Luke and Leia garlic bread twists
Yoda Soda - 7 up with Lime Sherbert *the sherbert was the ONLY thing served at the party that was not vegan, I was going to make homemade green soy ice cream but ran out of time and in a moment of desperation grabbed some sherbert :/

Han Solo in Carbonite!!










So I'm almost as wiped out telling you all about it as I was right after the actual party.  I didn't get much of a break though because I turned right around and planned my oldest's Beyblade Tournament Birthday Party.  The boys' birthday's are only 2 weeks apart, April/May are crazy time for me!  Be sure to check back in the future for all the details on that one.  In the meantime... MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU....


I'm linking up at:
Gluesticks
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